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Valhalla's Edge (Definitive Edition)
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| Author |
File Description |
Filthydelphia
(id: Al_Kharn the Great) |
Posted on 01/01/20 @ 01:41 PM
| File Details |
|---|
| Version: |
Age of Empires II: DE |
| Style: |
Build and Destroy |
Screenshot:
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To the Edge of Valhalla!
Survive the frozen north and discover a new land in Valhalla's Edge, updated with new features and extended gameplay for the Definitive Edition.
Features:
Updated based on community feedback
Unique exploration, colonization, and survival gameplay
Battle Skraeling natives, wildlife, and Irish monks to colonize the North Atlantic and America
Unlock heroes of the Greenland sagas, such as Erik the Red and Thorfinn Karlsefni
About the Author:
Filthydelphia (xbox: PhillySouljah) is the award-winning designer of historical custom campaigns and official content for the Age of Empires franchise. Part of the Forgotten Empires campaign team, his works include the Portuguese, Burmese, Bulgarian, Italian, and Indian campaigns featured in Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition as well as several campaigns in Age of Empires: Definitive Edition. |
| Author | Comments & Reviews ( All | Comments Only | Reviews Only ) |
|---|
| rakovsky |
Posted on 10/21/23 @ 10:53 PM
It played smoothly. I didn't get stuck, although I was careful to avoid running out of wood.
Balance: 4
I beat it on Hard.
The main challenge in this game is actually about gathering a landing party that is strong enough to survive raids, and then when it lands, it either makes repairs (ie. when on Iceland) or chops wood (on Labrador or Newfoundland). Along with this, you haver to make sure that you never run out of wood, or else you won't be able to repair your ships or build new ones. There is only a little wood on Greenland and Labrador has lots of enemies. So the main challenge is logistics. In real life, the limitations of wood on Greenland really did hurt the Greenland colony and probably contributed to its eventual demise. Nowadays there is only one forest on Greenland, and it's in the southern area.
However, the enemies don't seem to grow their armies on Newfoundland or Labrador, so you can win if you are able to fend off the initial raids against you and make a lumber yard there.
Creativity: 5
This is a very Creative mission, as is typical for this skilled Designer, Philly_Souljah/Filthydelphia. I like how he included the Faroes, Iceland, Labrador, and Newfoundland, along with Baffin Island, with a somewhat realistic real life geographic layout. I also liked the use of heroes, and how he chose different units and cultures that went along with the players that he chose, like using Beothuk Warrior units for the Amerindians and monks and monasteries in Iceland. The opening story screens were pretty cool.
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Map Design: 4
I liked the design alot, because of how the Designer chose units matching the Players' themes, etc. There were some secondary places that could be improved, even though it still had a solid, good design.
A message says to research Berserker gang at the barracks to unlock Berserker, but I don't see that at the barracks. I researched something with a name like "Bodsveiger" and it unlocked Berserker.
A message says that some attacking animals like bears (the context seemed to me to imply polar bears) will attack my Settlement. I expected that some predatory animals would spawn and attack my settlement like what happens in the AOE DE official "Vinland Saga" scenario. I'm 1 hour into the mission and the animal attack hasn't happened and I can't find any bears on Greenland or on the rocky barren land with wolves to Greenland's west. Maybe the message is referring to the wolves on Baffin Island. AOEIII has Polar bear animals. In that case, if the message was referring to the wolves, I wish that I'd hunted the wolves with villagers because the message said that I could hunt the attacking animals. I hadn't hunted the wolves because normally in the game wolves don't give you meat.
The mission map only goes as far southwest as Newfoundland, but in real history, the Vikings must have gotten at least as far southwest as the St. Lawrence River, New Brunswick, or New England. This is because those three regions are the farthest northeast that the range of butternuts goes, and butternuts were found at the archaeological Viking site in Newfoundland. So the Vikings must have gone to one of those regions.
Of course, it's not a big deal - you as the player can just pretend that southern Labrador is the St. Lawrence River Valley.
But it is called Valhalla's edge, and the Vikigns did get farther away than Newfoundland. Of course, who knows how far west the Vikings got in real life. Maybe they got to Mexico or the Great Lakes region.
The mission map might also have added Scotland or the edge of Norway, but it's not necessary.
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Story/Instructions: 5
The Story screens were pretty cool, and so was the background set around the Story screens.
I didn't see an epilogue, and I know that sometimes when I've beaten missions in AOE 2 HD or AOE 2 DE, the epilogue doesn't play, and I'm not sure why. When this happens, I beat the mission and go to the Victory screen with statistics, thinking that there is no epilogue, and then online I read that there is an epilogue.
The objectives were clear, and so were the instructions.
Of course, this is would be an issue with AOE 2 DE itself, not the mission.
Additional Comments:
I liked this mission alot. In the Viking sagas, there was an incident where a "One Footed" Amerindian attacker threw a projective at one of the Vikings. It sounds like the Saga is talking about the Amerindians' weapon called an "Atlatl". The theme of "One-Footed" people is a theme that shows up in medieval European literature when talking about Africa and India, so it seems to be a way that the Saga writer was indicating that he was talking about the kind of people who literally live at the world's edge. |
HGDL v0.8.2 |
| Rating |
|---|
| 4.6 | | Breakdown |
|---|
| Playability | 5.0 | | Balance | 4.0 | | Creativity | 5.0 | | Map Design | 4.0 | | Story/Instructions | 5.0 |
| Statistics |
| Downloads: | 879 |
| Favorites: [] | 1 |
| Size: | 6.12 MB |
| Added: | 01/01/20 |
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