Celtic Kings: Rage of War

The Good
The Campaign mode in Celtic Kings : Rage of War is unique in the way your character, Larax, and his party can travel to any place at will, not only focusing on the main objectives but also on optional quests and the gain of experience/magical items. This freedom captures the player into a constant search for a better way to accomplish a task, as there are many things that you do early in the campaign that have an affect on the outcome in subsequent areas. The main success in this game is how strategy is carried out on several different levels. There's the combat stategy: the combinations of warriors you chose, where you place them in an army and how you move your forces around to expand and maintain your territory. Then there's the more managerial aspect of the game: harvests, food and gold distribution, supplying food to troops... etc.

The Bad
There are somewhat many aspects of the game that don't quite work. Firstly, unlike many strategy games, you can't build anything which means that the entire chance of success lies in the way your troops fight and how you manage your armies, which can become very tedious and simply boring if you're looking for a lot of action. I also don't like how there is very little 'chance' involved in combat. For example, the victor of a one-on-one combat between two level 20 swordsmen will always be the one who gave the first hit, no matter how many times you try. Another disappointement is the lack of variety throughout the game. Everything stays about the same in terms of enemies and monsters, so a battle in one multiplayer game can seem very similar to any other game. Losing entire armies in a few seconds because of the wrong formation can be extremely demoralizing!!

The Bottom Line
The quality of the game really depends on how the player can appreciate the differences between Celtic Kings and other strategy games, and see these as an opportunity to experience a different type of game. Comparisons can't be made between this game and say Red Alert or Warcraft, simply because the entire setting of the game puts more constraints on the variety of troops and items possible.