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This game would be fun.. if I could play it...

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 8 / 17
Date: July 17, 2001
Author: Amazon User

I'm sure this game would be great, if it would run on my computer. I have windows ME, a pentium 4 1.7, a geforce 3, 256 ram, sblive, latest drivers... and for some reason, westwood (the developer) couldnt bother to test it on a new system? I've tried costumer support, no help there, but i did discover pleanty of other problems other people have had with the game. Also, the minimun requierments are far short of what you really need, this game requires a lot more then they say, not to mention that if you have an athlon processor, it wont run. And system requirements are the irony where my problem lies with this game.. because I have one of the only systems that would run the game in all its visual glory.

Unplayable

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 5 / 20
Date: September 09, 2001
Author: Amazon User

The manual does not provide enough information on unit costs, strengths, and weaknesses. The UI is badly designed and does not allow you to build, deploy units, and manage operations at the pace required by the game. The units move and act stupidly; when I order a group to move to an area of the map they seem to take random circuitous routes, and when they encounter enemies they will not shoot unless specifically ordered to do so, even if they are fired upon. Stay away from this one.

This games looks superb but...

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 1 / 10
Date: October 29, 2001
Author: Amazon User

it works on almost no computers except for like a pentium 32 and the game play isnt that good even if you play. This game has to be one of the worst westwood has created. If you like games games like this I would definitly get Age of the Empires II or Red Alert 2. They are much better than this

Be carefull of what you ask for.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 0 / 9
Date: July 21, 2001
Author: Amazon User

Bummer. Couldn't even install this game on our computer. At first, we thought we'd received a bad version and reordered a replacement. Then, after hours on-line with tech support, Westwood decided our Celeron processor doesn't meet the requirements. Boo hoo.

is this game fun

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 0 / 21
Date: August 07, 2001
Author: Amazon User

please answere my question is this game fun or no

....

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 20 / 27
Date: July 22, 2001
Author: Amazon User

No one ever said that war was simple. The guys at Interplay seem to understand this - and they definately understand how Frank Herbert wanted people to understand the world of Arrakis and his wonderfully complex universe. The plot line is excellent, and the developments that keep the game moving rival Herbert's own fiction in strength of tale. Everything that happens before you get to the battlefield is wonderful -- the backstory that few of the modern RTS games have and everybody wants.

But, once you get thrown into the captain's chair and try to control the combat... Let's just hope that you either wrote the thing or have a P.h.D. with a thesis in "point-click-point-right-click, now run over there and do the same thing over again". RTS is supposed to be exciting, right? It's supposed to keep you moving from place to place, following and directing the battle on every front. It should progress slowly, teaching you the interface and the tools with which you wage war. Dune is all these things -- with an enormous, Devastator-sized "but" looming in the foreground.

Your troops are absolutely stupid. Maybe one time in twenty will they make an intelligent decision on their own. Pathfinding is absolutely attrocious. Troops always seem to take the most dangerous route to where they are going -- not necessarily the longest mind you, but the way that puts twenty newly minted infantrymen running right by your opponents machine gun emplacements. Machine guns? In Dune? In the world where kinetic energy weapons are obsolete because of personal shielding technology that was one of the highlights of Herbert's "Dune" series? Yeah, machine guns. This is supposed to be how many thousands of years in the future? Next week, Westwood is going to introduce a modern RTS that has your US Marines charging the battlefield with bows-and-arrows and greatswords. But, I digress.

The wonderfully crafted resource-end of the game, built on harvesting and refining the spice melange, is definately an integral part of the plot-line. It would be fine -- if the AI that controls your harvesters and carryalls had any real decision-making skills. For instance...

I'm trying to defend my base plateau from an assault of no-less than six Harkonnen Devastators. ...the Devastator is the most powerful Harkonnen unit in the game. It can attack both land- and air-borne threats. So, as I'm watching these behemoths coming towards my base. I'm moving my defenses into place, creating interlocking fields of fire with my emplaced machine guns and rocket launchers, deploying my infantry-based rocket launchers, ...! All three of my carry-alls proceed to deposit my three, very expensive harvesters right in the middle of the inbound assault. The sensual female voice proclaims through my speakers in rapid succession - "Your harvester is under attack." "Your carryall is under attack." "Unit lost." "Unit lost." "Unit lost." Repeat ad nauseum. There went fifteen minutes worth of development and I couldn't even stop the carryalls from their stupidity. Didn't I tell you? You can't even intervene.

Oh, and by the way, the defense missions -- for the unitiated at Westwood that means I'm defending and someone else is attacking -- are really just normal missions with a starting base instead of an MCV. You can sit there and build up your defenses to your hearts content, but the game won't end until you go on the offense and destroy the enemy. It isn't even timed. This morning, I built up my defenses until they were literally unbeatable - I literally built a maze out of walls and lined the walls with machine guns and rocket launchers. I walked away from the game for three hours, letting my defenses do their job so I could get finished with this stupid mission. And nothing happened.

Well enough of a rant -- if you've read this far, I wouldn't recommend ...this game. ....The good things about this game are far outweighed by the bad.

Sorely disappointed

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 5 / 13
Date: July 31, 2001
Author: Amazon User

For a start, the game is incredibly demanding on hardware, even if you turn down all the graphics settings. My computer's about a year old, and has good sound/video cards as well as up-to-date drivers, but the game keeps freezing whenever it gets busy.

Secondly, with the 3D graphics it's really hard to tell the units apart, unless you zoom right in.

Thirdly, your own units are incredibly stupid: They're magnetically attracted to the enemy's guns, even when you specifically select a safer route.

And finally, everything happens so fast that you never get a chance to defend - either you've put up enough defences in the first place, or when the enemy attacks, it's all over in a few seconds.

Too slow and clunky

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 5 / 9
Date: August 07, 2001
Author: Amazon User

Being a hard-core C&C/RE fan, I was excited to pick up Emperor this weekend. But after installing and playing it, I found it to be way too slow and clunky. I have a decent PC - PIII 750 128 megs etc. but I found the interface slow to use, the screen very slow to scroll, and the missions took forever to load. I found myself wanting to load up RE2 and play it. Maybe the upgrades will speed up the game to be playable, until then I am back on RE2.

Okay game but choppy on some computers

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 1 / 5
Date: July 16, 2001
Author: Amazon User

this game is kinda cool it is similar to starcraft but much faster peace as in you don't have to build up your city or what ever you want to call it as much.

I'm running a penutm3 550 and 192 mags of ram and dsl connection. The game freezes. And when theirs a bit going on it gets choppy malti player games are pointless playing the menus don't even run smoothly. So maybe if you got a newer computer it might be worth buying but if you got like a 550 mhz or something you might want to think about it

Not a bad rehash

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 1 / 8
Date: July 25, 2001
Author: Amazon User

Emporer is a well done 3D rehash of all the other Westwood Studios real time strategy games. This time however, most combat turns into a battle of attrition forcing even more unit buliding than in the C&C and RA games. They spent a lot of time/money on full motion video that could have been better spent on new, innovative units and gameplay tweaking.

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