Recently been playing these again, remembered how fun they were. I hate that Multiwinia died so quickly, so here we are, in a revival thread. :D
[IMG]http://www.introversion.co.uk/darwinia/images/titleimage_new.jpg[/IMG]
[QUOTE=wikipedia]Darwinia was created as a digital theme world for [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_intelligence"]artificially intelligent[/URL] [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polygon"]polygons[/URL] by Dr. Sepulveda. Housed in a massive network of surplus Protologic 68000 machines from the 1980s, Darwinia is a world where the single-poly Darwinians, with their simple, but growing AI, can grow and evolve. Darwinia is also where the world can visit to see them frolicking in their natural, fractal habitat. Darwinians live a life, working and growing, until eventual death, which releases their digital soul to be reincarnated.[/QUOTE]
That explains a little about the Darwinians and how they began, but nothing about the gameplay, I'll do that now. Darwinia is first and foremost a real time strategy game. It was commended for the fast paced battles which took place and the wonderfully stylized graphics it uses. Missions consist usually of taking control of a certain area, thought here are differentiations such as saving a certain amount of darwinians and destroying infected areas. The whole reason for the story is an infection in the system, which you ahve been tasked with destroying. These can take the form of different animals for example, the common grunts are a snake type animal/thing, though they do have others. You gain the ability to make gunner squads early on, these are small groups you can control and use to shoot and lob grenades. There are others, such as the engineer, who collects the souls of dead darwinians and infected darwinians so you can create more troops. Creating the unique squads is done via the task manager, all of which can be upgraded for you by Dr. Sepulveda, you just tell him which one to concentrate on. And now after my poorly structured explanation some info from Wikipedia on the gameplay:
[QUOTE=wikipedia][I]Darwinia[/I] does not fall into any one game genre, as it mixes elements from strategy, action, puzzle, hacker, and God games alike.[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwinia_%28video_game%29#cite_note-0"][1][/URL] The player has the ability to run several programs through the Task Manager (a reference to the [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Task_Manager"]Windows Task Manager[/URL]), similar to units used in many [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_time_strategy"]real time strategy[/URL] games. Research allows the player to upgrade programs and weapons, which is critical as the enemy develops. Mission Objectives are given at each location/level, as the player and the Darwinians attempt to wipe out the Viruses in a Great War.[/QUOTE]
I personally, think this is a perfect game to introduce new people to strategy. Hell this is the first startegy game I've properly played,and I absolutely love the art style in it, while not cutting edge, the graphics are great by todays standards I think. Difficulty is not lowered by the pace, which is a good thing, you still need to make tactical decisions. All in all, a one of the great indie games in my opinion.
[img]http://www.cheats-area.com/news/img/1599.jpg[/img]
This was Introversions attempt to bring the gameplay of Darwinia to Multiplayer, and it's great. Gameplay hasn't changed much, though there are several gamemodes to play. Six in all, here's Wikipedia's summary:
[LIST]
[*][B]Domination[/B]
[/LIST]
Each team fights to control the entire map.
Teams fight over the spawn points dotted around the map in order to capture them and achieve a dominant position that will enable them to control the entire map. This game mode will continue until one team is victorious, or a timer can be used to limit the game to a set time limit. After that time the team with the most spawn points will win the game.
[LIST]
[*][B]King of the Hill[/B]
[/LIST]
Two multiwinia tribes battling in the King of the Hill game-mode
Occupy key tactical zones around the map to score points.[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiwinia#cite_note-ign_preview-1"][2][/URL]
On each map there are a fixed number of Scoring zones - for a standard sized two-player map there are up to four zones. Each team can score points by occupying these zones with Multiwinians - scoring one point per second for every zone under their control.
Scoring zones often become areas of heavy fighting, and are frequently occupied by several teams at once, all in intense combat. In this case, the team with the largest share of the zone will be scoring the points, and this is shown by rendering the Scoring zone as a "pie chart", showing the team colours occupying the zone and their relative percentages.
[LIST]
[*][B]Capture the Statue[/B]
[/LIST]
Multiwinians must lift the giant stone statues that appear in the Statue Zone, and carry them safely back to their base to score points.[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiwinia#cite_note-ign_preview-1"][2][/URL]
Large numbers of Multiwinians are required to lift the heavy statues, and they move very slowly. If the Multiwinians carrying a statue are killed, it is dropped and remains where it is until more Multiwinians pick it up. If it is dropped heavily (e.g. on the edge of a steep hill) the statue shatters, and re-appears randomly in one of the Statue Zones.
Each team has a base near their start point, into which they must lift the statue to score a point. The winner is the team that has successfully carried the most number of statues to their base.
[LIST]
[*][B]Rocket Riot[/B]
[/LIST]
Each team has a giant rocket at their start point, and in order to win they must refuel and occupy the rocket, and perform a successful launch.
Each team must complete several stages in order to successfully launch their rocket. First it must be refueled, and then occupied by 100 Multiwinian astronauts. Once occupied a launch countdown begins and upon completion the rocket launches. The team that first launches its rocket wins the game.
Fuel for the rocket is generated by several fuel pumps, located around the map. These fuel pumps are the key to winning Rocket Riot - the team must occupy and control the solar panels which work the fuel pumps, in order to divert their fuel into the rocket.
At any point during these phases, the rocket is extremely vulnerable to explosions. If the rocket is successfully attacked by an enemy team it will explode, burning all the fuel and all the Multiwinians inside, and resetting the rocket to its starting point.
[LIST]
[*][B]Blitzkrieg[/B]
[/LIST]
Each team tries to capture the enemy's flag while defending their own.[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiwinia#cite_note-bit-2"][3][/URL]
Each team starts with a flag. A number of other flags are spread across the map, and in order to win the game, a team must capture flags which link their own flag to their opponents' flags. When a team loses its flag, it is eliminated from the game - the last team standing (the one which has kept hold of its flag until the end of the game) wins. Each team's flag is well protected, and each team receives regular reinforcements of Multiwinians throughout the match.
[LIST]
[*][B]Assault[/B]
[/LIST]
One team must defend a [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weapon_of_mass_destruction"]weapon of mass destruction[/URL](WMD) that will explode within a defined time period, whilst the other team must attack and destroy the WMD before the time period elapse. Play then switches around and the attacker becomes the defender and vice versa. The winner is the team that successfully attacks in the quickest time.[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiwinia#cite_note-ign_preview-1"][2][/URL]
The attacking team receives a constant flow of reinforcements whilst the defending team is heavily armed with turrets, but has a limited force. The attacking team must build up a force and attack in waves to capture [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_gun"]machine gun[/URL] turrets, [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bunker#Pillbox"]pillboxes[/URL] and sabotage the three control stations connected to the bomb. The constant reinforcements provided to the attacking team ensure that eventually they will break through - the challenge is for the defending team to hold off for as long as possible.
Most are self explanatory, though there are tutorials included obviously. Also included are several units and buildings, such as:
[LIST]
[*][B]Spawn Points[/B]
[*][B]Crates[/B]
[*][B]Officers[/B]
[*][B]Squads[/B]
[*][B]Armour[/B]
[*][B]Trunk Ports[/B]
[*][B]Turrets[/B]
[*][B]Radar Dishes[/B]
[/LIST]
Some changes were made, such as player controllable turrets, armour to transport darwinians faster,and the crates drop power ups and msut be captured, these can be anything from a speed boost to nukes. Overall, a fun game though can be quite imbalanced sometimes, but that's easy to look by.
Media:
[U][B]
Darwinia[/B][/U]
[IMG]http://www.introversion.co.uk/darwinia/screenshots/image17.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://www.introversion.co.uk/darwinia/screenshots/image18.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://www.introversion.co.uk/darwinia/screenshots/image9.jpg[/IMG]
[U][B]Multiwinia
[/B][/U][IMG]http://www.introversion.co.uk/multiwinia/about/screenshots/images/2.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://www.introversion.co.uk/multiwinia/about/screenshots/images/1.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://www.introversion.co.uk/multiwinia/about/screenshots/images/10.jpg[/IMG]
[URL="http://www.facepunch.com/#"]View YouTUBE video[/URL]
[URL]http://youtube.com/watch?v=f3y1YExOA4U[/URL]
[URL="http://www.facepunch.com/#"]View YouTUBE video[/URL]
[URL]http://youtube.com/watch?v=QOv4vRVHcZs[/URL]
And last but not least, can we get a bit of a player base up and running for Multiwinia? I hate that it's died, after seeing how much fun it can be. And the fact that these peopel made Defcon should make any Defcon fans reassured at the gameplay side of things.
:siren:[B]Demo links[/B]:siren:
Darwinia demo: [URL]http://store.steampowered.com/app/1500/[/URL]
Multiwina demo: [URL]http://store.steampowered.com/app/1530/[/URL]
:siren:Non steam here:siren:
Darwinia demo: [URL]http://www.introversion.co.uk/darwinia/downloads/index.html[/URL]
Multiwina demo: [URL]http://www.introversion.co.uk/multiwinia/downloads/index.html[/URL]
Might add more to this tomorrow, it's late here.
My friends an I play Multiwinia once every week or so. Shame that there are only a handful of maps and a 4 player cap.
Yeah, could have done with larger game sizes and more maps, though I don't think they were expecting it to be popular :(
Isn't there a Multiwinia map creator somewhere? Anyway, Introversion are one of my favourite indie devs of all time, from this series to Defcon, and sometimes uplink (not just because they're British).
I have Darwinia+ for the xbl arcade (that includes multiwinia) but absolutely no one plays.
I got them on greenmangaming.com for free before.
It doesn't provide a working ingame code for Multiwinia, so i can't play it. :saddowns:
I bought the Darwinia + Multiwinia pack during the holiday sales. Great games, shame that Multiwinia is pretty much dead.
I have Multiwinia and I'd play if more people did.
[QUOTE=rapperkid04;22745491]I have Multiwinia and I'd play if more people did.[/QUOTE]
And I'd play it if i had it.
See a connection..? :q:
It's good to see at least some people are interested in playing again.
Nobody plays multiwinia anymore. It's a shame, I enjoyed it for the few weeks that there were games available.
Great game, I absolutely love it. Though, there aren't that many games up nowadays.
there are a few sometimes, just not in any sort of large numbers.
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