Archimedean Dynasty

Lazy Panda

Spaceman
Anyone know this game? It's a true underdog, but it feels like Privateer 2 under water! If you happen to have played it or its great sequels, Aquanox and Aquanox 2, I'd like to hear your experience.

PS: For all interested Germans, Archimedean Dynasty is known as "Schleichfahrt" in Germany.
 
Archimedean Dynasty had a nice feel to it, with the little still pictures and the featureless characters - it gave you the feeling of only half-understanding the complexity of the story. In a time when all games scream IMMERSIVE and INVOLVING at you, this little gem was unique in not really integrating the player into the action. It actually made the story more believable, and a bit more tragic.

I still haven't finished AN2 - the graphics are much better, the storytelling is a bit more up close and personal to the player, and I like the comic-strip style of the cutscene and story graphics. But I don't like the joystick routines (way too twitchy), so I have to play it with a mouse - which works very good, but just makes me sad.
Also, the story is a bit overdone fo my taste. Maybe I'm getting too old for all this family-mystery-treasure-enemies-demons-ya-di-dah - a simple piece of fiction would've been enough...

But since we're at it: I've enjoyed SubCulture a lot more than both of them - and it also incorporates the spirit of the original Privateer a lot better than the Aquanoxes. Toiling around in that small sup, picking up giant cigarette stubs and bottlecaps with heavy gear is great fun, and the story missions with lots of funny voice acting is just hilarious - although there's action enough. And although the grapics are not really up to today's standards, all the underwater life, the different fish and the lighting effects are just nice to watch.
 
Played the demo of subculture back in '97/98, and it was one of those games that I've been meaning to play ever since.
 
I rather enjoyed Archimedean Dynasty; it wasn't hugely freeform, but the game 'felt' like the original Privateer.

I bought the sequel but never got anywhere.
 
I played Archimedian Dinasty until close to the end, when they send the hibrid-human inside someplace no one else could go. Never finished it. And where did the Bionts come from, anyway?
 
d3r3k said:
oh, man. subculture was a great game. i played the hell outta that demo.

Hehe, if I remember correctly, one of the characters in the demo for the(unfinished) sequel is played by Lt. Forbes.
 
Delance said:
I played Archimedian Dinasty until close to the end, when they send the hibrid-human inside someplace no one else could go. Never finished it. And where did the Bionts come from, anyway?

That question is still open. The fanbase hopes for Aquanox 3 to pick up on that, but there is no hard news about the project. (A console version of AN2 is scheduled to be released this fall, so there is still hope.)

The general theory goes that the Bionts are either some kind of space aliens who fell into the ocean and "slept" there until they were awoken (you can deduct part of that from the AN2 storyline). There's another theory that they are mutants, but the rest of the story goes along the same line.
 
Don't you hate it when they make a game about a mysterious alien race and don't ever explain where they come from?
 
Well, nobody tells you where the Nephlim really come from, but that makes them so mysterious and dangerous. The same should apply to the Bionts, shouldn't it?
 
Well I somewhat hoped in Secret Ops that they find some information about where the Nephilim came from or what kind of species they are. Finely mention something briefly during Prophecy but not much after that I think.
Although it would have been nice if there was another game/expansion which bridge the end of that campaign and find out what happens to Casey and the rest of the motley crew
 
What other game series unpopular with sections of this community features an unexplained alien race?
 
Delance said:
What other game series unpopular with sections of this community features an unexplained alien race?

Quite a list, but you probably wouldn't know them if I named them by titles, but the most popular example would be the Khaak from X2. Last time I checked,, nobody explained the Steltek from Privateer much either.
 
Actually, the Steltek get a pretty good explanation as far as game alien races go, thanks to the Oxford computer readout you see after running that mission set and what Monkhouse says in discussion with you/Brownhair.

Personally, I've never found the Shivans, from Freespace, all that well explained, even at the end of 2 games. I mean, yeah, they're new to GTVA, but I'd hope for a little more than the scraplets in FS2. (OTOH, I'll grant you that the introduction of them could be argued as being better than the Nephilim intro from WCP.)
 
Actually I think you get to see the Shivans in one of the Freespace games, I am not sure which one but I am definitely sure that in one of the movies scenes you see one.
 
Actually, there's a picture of them in the in-game database, as well as glimpses of them in the FMV of human troops boarding the disabled freighter in the original game. That's not what I meant by "well explained", though. I was referring to stuff like where they came from, what their overall racial goals were (beyond the attacking forces, that is), and things like that.
 
criticalmass said:
Archimedean Dynasty had a nice feel to it, with the little still pictures and the featureless characters - it gave you the feeling of only half-understanding the complexity of the story. In a time when all games scream IMMERSIVE and INVOLVING at you, this little gem was unique in not really integrating the player into the action. It actually made the story more believable, and a bit more tragic.

I still haven't finished AN2 - the graphics are much better, the storytelling is a bit more up close and personal to the player, and I like the comic-strip style of the cutscene and story graphics. But I don't like the joystick routines (way too twitchy), so I have to play it with a mouse - which works very good, but just makes me sad.
Also, the story is a bit overdone fo my taste. Maybe I'm getting too old for all this family-mystery-treasure-enemies-demons-ya-di-dah - a simple piece of fiction would've been enough...

But since we're at it: I've enjoyed SubCulture a lot more than both of them - and it also incorporates the spirit of the original Privateer a lot better than the Aquanoxes. Toiling around in that small sup, picking up giant cigarette stubs and bottlecaps with heavy gear is great fun, and the story missions with lots of funny voice acting is just hilarious - although there's action enough. And although the grapics are not really up to today's standards, all the underwater life, the different fish and the lighting effects are just nice to watch.

The order for Sub Culture has finally arrived, I must say, the game is cool! Combat feels somewhat neglected though, I seem to spend most of the time prospecting and trading. Speed goes down an awful lot if you have a penny/bottlecap in toil, too, that hurts!

The game is still great, 'cuz prospecting is fun!
 
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