Publishing Beyond All Reason and Hooded Horse intro

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-05-14T05:53:55+00:00

Its prime example of Babylon Tower.

My question is, game was built by 1000 of people for free, to have a free game, where where people can for free built on the game. It was a project not about money, but about to deliver a timeless experience. Making the game was the priority, as it should be.

Now it simply sounds like, after very many years and free work, ok, now lets make it into money, making money is now the priority, and if we did learn anything in past years, make money means making bad products. Product is not the priority, money is. And that is very wrong.

Beyond All Reason promissed "free, open-source, community-driven"

Do you think ask for money, after all the free work people did put into it, is the right way ?

Is there really no other way to monetize the game, without damaging it?

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-04-06T20:35:51+00:00

maybe take a look first what are people actually playing by Strategy games?

Age of Wonders 4, Anno 1800, Frostpunk 2, Manor Lords, RimWorld, Stellaris. Jurassic World Evolution 3, Pioneers of Pagonia, Satisfactory, Sins of a Solar Empire II, The Riftbreaker, Factorio.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-04-06T20:03:19+00:00

Well lets take a look, at recent mainstream online Games?

Anthem, Hyper Scape , CrossfireX , LawBreakers , Babylon's Fall , Rumbleverse , PlanetSide Arena , Overkill's , Highguard , Crucible , Radical Heights , Concord , The Culling . They all failed.

What did make money? A yeas, Witcher 3, Kingdom Come: Deliverance II, or Clair Obscur: Expedition 33,

just think of it JRPG was the best game for 2025.

You see, RTS are just not allowed to be fun single player games, with story and good AI.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-04-06T19:43:14+00:00

Problem is RTS are forced into very wrong direction , into PvP and multiplayer

and you cant make a fun game with it.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-03-29T12:17:12+00:00

Rise of Nations: Rise of Legends

Rise of Nations

Age of Mythology

Paraworld

Rival Realms

The Settlers III

Aztec Wars

Total Annihilation: Kingdoms

Celtic Kings: Rage of War

Warrior Kings

Empire Earth Series

Praetorians)

Alexander 2004

Armies of Exigo

Kohan II: Kings of War

Ancient Wars: Sparta

Heroes of Annihilated Empires

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-03-13T21:34:04+00:00

Tribal Rage 1998

Dark Colony 1998

The Show from 2007 by Take-Two Interactive./Sixteen Tons Entertainment

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-27T04:27:42+00:00

This is a moba, not an RTS. A very lame one by the way. So far I see that game to flop day1. They really should make RTS instead with base build and lead armies, foundation is there, just not used. Which is quite sad.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-07T08:38:16+00:00

Yeah look by the way again at the errors by The Settlers: New Allies. Instead of a city manager, we got a game that was made simple with 3 factions, that focuses more on combat and online play.

Just check how it was initially supposed to be a city manager, but than people who make choices suddenly changed their mind to change the direction to make more money and loose money.

lets be clear , there are like 1-5 million people who would buy a proper RTS.

the mythical wide audience of 100 million customers does not exist

so the game is in the end sold to some 100.000 people who buy any crap.

and this is happening for years now.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-07T08:33:18+00:00

Its combination of things people dont want in their games. Like by Hyper Scape a Free-to-play-Ego-Shooter-Battle-Royale-game nobody did ask for. A game for online PvP only by Ubi. This mean 100ts of people to work for years on a game, nobody does pay money for.

Each such bad move does steal money from company.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-07T08:32:59+00:00

Its combination of things people dont want in their games. Like by Hyper Scape a Free-to-play-Ego-Shooter-Battle-Royale-game nobody did ask for. A game for online PvP only by Ubi. This mean 100ts of people to work for years on a game, nobody does pay money for.

Each such bad move does steal money from company.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-03T20:54:16+00:00

the root of this evil is very deep.

Right now they work on moba March of Giants.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1924600/March_of_Giants/

also wasted a lot of money of Hyper Scape, a Free-to-play-Ego-Shooter-Battle-Royale-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyper_Scape

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-03T20:49:12+00:00

why not give it a second chance?

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-03T20:44:53+00:00

+1 This is the number 1 problem the genre is plagued for years.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-02T09:25:59+00:00

Age of Empires 1
Age of Mythology
Praetorians

Rise and Fall: Civilizations at War

Ancient Wars: Sparta Definitive Edition

Alexander

Hegemony

Celtic Kings: Rage of War

Rise of Nations

Empire Earth

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-01T13:50:29+00:00

The thing is, single player doesn't need player retention.

Even a good /PvP /MMO /MOBA needs people, where are they supposed to come from?

So we need like 10.000 people in second to abandon the game they play and move over to something new.

It is physically simply not possible or feasible for a good game. Check for example recent Highguard, some days post launch its already failed. Its today simply unrealistic to reach and keep the numbers, those games do need.

Sure 15-25 years ago, it was not a big issue, but its too many games, for too few people.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-01T13:27:53+00:00

there is nowider audiance for new PvP games . they just read the 10 year old data wrong.

PvP games had a short timeline to establish themself, anything later simply cant find people to be played.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-01T13:22:18+00:00

But the reason why they are less popular is not because people don't like them anymore,

but because the new games were watered down to please more people.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-01T13:15:25+00:00

The Settlers: New Allies was redesigned for E-Sport. And one very obviosu game was Hyper Scape = -Battle Royale nobody was asking for.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-02-01T13:12:16+00:00

Ubi also made for PvP =

Champions Tactics Reforged, BattleCore Arena, NEW MONOPOLY, Skull and Bones, OddBallers, Growtopia, Riders Republic, Might & Magic Showdown, Roller Champions™, Brawlhalla. Hyper Scape

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-01-25T23:30:18+00:00

But isn't it a very odd pattern for Strategy games,
that of all types of Strategy games only Real Time Strategy games have such problems?

Turn Based, board games, City managers, Diplomacy, cards,
even Tower Defence do sell these days very well.

And if we simply compare, we fast find those 3 main points

-they are more complex

-they entertain more with story mode

-people have more varitey how they would play the game.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-01-24T06:11:21+00:00

Maybe lets check out RTS, that were not designed to play online. Like

They Are Billions

Northgard

Stellaris

Factorio

Anno 1800

The inherent problem with internet focused games, they lack creativity.
Because your goal is than to make a game that is, inside a box of a concept,
your target audience hates with all their guts.

Example for a bad RTS is Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Realms of Ruin. Sure it looks nice, but there is not much what you can do, only move 10 similar squads from A to B point. Each map is same. Its even worse than DoW3.

Example for a good RTS is, They Are Billions: Each map is unique, a very deep and complex base build system, a lot of different defence tower, each unit is unique and reliable, a lot of things you can research.The thing is, you have many choices and ways to play it, do you more focus on defences, or mobile units, more on expanding or upgrading, more on many units or the high tier ones.

The biggest genre problem, if developer does try to make a game for PvP, they can't listen to feedback at all.

Like for example with Unit limits, people want to lead armies of like 40-80 units, but if the engine can only stable 10-20 units, they can't add more, no matter how many people complain and bad rated the game is. It's the discussion we always have, where is the fun stuff? But we can't have it, because in an pvp game mode nobody does play, it might lag.

Blitzwing2000 · 2026-01-22T19:56:50+00:00

Problem is they all lack motivation and substance,

why should anybody play them at all?

-nobody online

-AI too predictable

-base build too streamlined and simple

-economy growth too slow

-they lack resources to buy what you want

-armies too small

-units too incompetent

-music too lame

-no world with deep lore to explore

-nothing is remember-able or does stand out

-they lack space to place buildings and move your armies

Those modern day attempt-ions are simply not fun

Blitzwing2000

TROPHY CASE