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Games Entertainment

Kohan for Linux Ships 117

Posted by michael from the save-loki dept.
kdgarris writes: "Kohan: Immortal Sovereigns, a real-time strategy game is now available for Linux from Loki. The announcement is not yet on their website, however. A demo was made available earlier this month."
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Kohan for Linux Ships More

Kohan for Linux Ships

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  • ...were greatly exaggerated, it seems. What a releif!
    • I'm downloading the demo now. Screenshots look very nice, and I've been waiting for a good strategy game for Linux for a long time. I will be happy to buy the game, and support loki. I really hope this game release will help them, and we'll see more products from them in the future.

  • Been out for quite a while... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Chagrin ( 128939 ) on Thursday August 30, 2001 @02:52AM (#2233875) Homepage
    I downloaded the demo on August 10th, so it's been out for quite a while, really.

    ...and of course, like all of their demos, it installs and plays flawlessly.
    • ->...and of course, like all of their demos, it installs and plays flawlessly.
      Not only their Demos, all their products are of excellent quality.
    • After the last article on /. about Loki being in a bit of a rotten situation, I ordered Descent III and the Demos CD. I must say, I'm really impressed. Not only was the shipping and handling of my order perfect (I live in The Netherlands), but ALL the demos (and of course Descent III) installed and played perfectly (even our Windoze gamers were impressed, not in the least by the ease of install). Kudos to Loki!


    • Yes, I've played through the demo. It is quite excellent. I'm thinking of ordering the game.


      It is a good strategy-game. You build towns and upgrade them (new buildings are in the town, not separete buildings like Warcraft). And you build mines and outposts. Unlike in other similar games, you can't control one unit alone. You form companies, which can consist of up to 7 units. And you have a support-zone around your towns, so that if you loose men in a company, you only go back into a support-zone, and they will automatically be resupported with units.


      The companies are also divided into 'front line' and 'support'. If you have units you don't actually have a big use for anymore, you disband them, because in this game, you pay your units salaries.


      It is very difficult to control your companies during battle, because they fight their own life. And if it gets too rough, they will retreat. That is quite nice, because if you have a hero in a company, he may flee when almost everyone is dead, and then you keep him :)


      Well, maybe some windozers already know everything about this game, but this is to the other slashdotters.

  • Loki just "don't get it".

    It's about freedom maaaaaan, don't enslave me!

    They should open source their products and sell support for them, require freedom!!!

    (this post is a joke if someone didn't get that).
  • I've been playing around with the demo for a while now, and all I can say is, that if you haven't tried it, do it. It's a great game, and I'll buy the Linux version as soon as I see it on the shelf here.
    • I've been playing around with the demo for a while now, and all I can say is, that if you haven't tried it, do it. It's a great game, and I'll buy the Linux version as soon as I see it on the shelf here.

      With all the problems that Loki is having, I doubt that this game will ever get shelf space...I don't seem to recall seing T2 or SMAC on the shelves at all. I'd recomend just ordering from Loki directly like I'm going to when I get some money.

  • Another site to buy Kohan (Score:3, Informative)

    by lmd ( 413644 ) on Thursday August 30, 2001 @03:19AM (#2233906) Homepage Journal
    Kohan is also available at Tux Games [tuxgames.com] and its a little cheaper as well. Disclaimer: I don't work for them or have any affiliation with them. I just have their site bookmarked.
    • Yeah, but if you do it from Tux Games, loki isn't getting all the cash. Tux has some overhead and loki has sold it to them for less than $46. Given that loki is in chapter 11, I've paid them directly.

      • Re:Another site to buy Kohan (Score:1, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward
        I've actually heard that Loki doesn't like their contractors that sell games on their behalf. One of my colleagues contacted them and they said that they'd rather you bought from a 3rd party supplier, like Tux games, because paradoxically Loki makes more money this way.
        I know it's all messed up, but that's how it is.

  • I'm no game player (save for Quake) but I'm ordering a copy. Games are what can help drive people to a platform, so I figure it is a great way to do my part to (hopefully) keep Loki alive, as well as to bring another game (and another reason) for somebody to migrate to Linux.
  • I downloaded the demo when it was released and, wow, the game sucks big time. Graphically it looks like one of those really bad RTS games that came and some years ago to follow Command and Conquers and Warcrafts success. The interface and feel is not much better.

    So, now there is a commercial Linux RTS. But what does it help, when it's soo bad?

    • Kohan is apparently a rather traditional fantasy RTS, but also a pretty darn good (as in "Done Right"). At least that's what I get from reading the reviews.

      Gameraider [gameraiders.com]

      Gamespot [gamespot.com]

      Gamerankings [gamerankings.com]

      I am going to give it a try.

      --Flam,
      who has never played games as little as the time when he was paid for it.

    • Re:Seriously (Score:4, Interesting)

      by jandrese ( 485 ) <kensama@vt.edu> on Thursday August 30, 2001 @09:52AM (#2234523) Homepage Journal
      I respectfully disagree with your accessment of Kohan.

      Caveat: I've only played the demo.
      • Graphics: The graphics are beautifly drawn 2D sprites that move quite fluidly. The Backgrounds are quite varied although they game draws them a little weird (when you walk next to a large mountain the entire mountain draws, even the stuff that's well outside of your LOS). Personally I think pure 3D is a bad idea when you have lots of units on the field (it's hard to make out the differences between polygons when each unit is only half an inch tall) so I commend Kohan on it's choice here.
      • Friendly unit AI: The pathing in this game is acceptable, but not phonominal. The stuipid units (zombies for instance) seem to get stuck more often than the smart ones for some reason. Also, if a unit gets too far seperated from it's company it will be "lost in the wilderness" and you will have to wait in your supply zone to regnerate it. The battle AI is ok, but basically it just runs each company into each other and see who's left standing. The Morale bar is a very nice touch though. It is rather frustrating at times to see some stuipid unit just walk around your back lines instead of walking _around_ some obsticle to engage the enemy. This is very noticable in the only multiplayer map in the game, on the left side there is a town on the top of the map. At the beginning of the game when you attack the town all of it's milita will appear in the crevace behind the town and attack your only your front unit. The rest of your units will just sort of mill around and wait for the guy in front of them to be killed.
      • Enemy AI: Pathing and attacking are the same as friendly AI. The computer's strategy is generally to build up one or two companies and attack (at least in the demo). The computer is also very expansionist, building towns everywhere it can (which is very important to your economy). The computer will launch surprise attacks and will send companys down to attack some poorly defended towns you might have. Unfortunatly the demo AI doesn't have enough smarts to build armies big enough to combat a 3 or 4 army strong force for long. Once you get 6 armies (especially if you use beastmen/Grenadiers/Skeletons/Bone Reavers) all together you can pretty much just run over the rest of the computer's defenses. Fortunatly Kohan supports (at least in the Windows version) pluggable AIs, which promise to keep the game interesting. There's also multiplayer, but I havn't seen many people on the demo multiplayer servers yet.
      • Interface: The games interface does like to throw up lots of windows everywhere, but once you get the hang of the interface it's pretty fast. My only beef with the inteface is that it is fairly hard to manage a large number of towns (although there is a mechanism to make it easier--a town list---I havn't gotten the hang of using it yet).
      • Fun factor: Honestly I consider this the best RTS since StarCraft. It's one of the first ones in a long time to offer something different in terms of gameplay, and I rather like how you don't have to micromanage everything in the game, and in fact you CAN'T micromanage the battles (which means higher level players will be the ones with superior strategies instead of the fastest clickers).
      • Story: There is something about an immortal race of beings that get converted to artefacts (amulets actually) when they die. You are one of those beings and are trying to piece together your lost history (apparently sleeping for 100s of years makes you forget). Most RTS games aren't heavy on the story (although StarCraft did a pretty decent job here, I was ready to kill that bastard Arcturus when he let Kerrigan die), and the demo doesn't give a lot of indication one way or the other to how much the story means to the game.
      • Misc: I really liked the ability to change your units defensive stance in order to increase it's movement rate. You can even go on "forced marches" when you need your units to be somewhere quick, but don't expect them to fight since they'll be too fatigued to move after running half way across the continent.

      My verdict: 4.5 out of 5. If you like RTS games, but are tired of "he who clicks fastest wins" this is definatly the game for you. Strategy (but not RTS) fans will also want to try the demo, you might like it. FPS only players and "twitch gamers" should probably look elsewhere as well, unless you're ready to give up the speed drip. Benchmarking sites are going to ignore this game because it doesn't even come close to pushing the limits of my computer, but it should run on most any reasonably modern ( Personaly I hope this takes off. I'd like to see more people online to play against, and I do believe that it is an excellent game, and Loki did an excellent port.
      • Caveat: I've only played the demo.

        Ditto. My copy of the full version is somewhere in the mail...

        The stuipid units (zombies for instance) seem to get stuck more often than the smart ones for some reason. Also, if a unit gets too far seperated from it's company it will be "lost in the wilderness" and you will have to wait in your supply zone to regnerate it.

        Cool! I hadn't noticed either of these details. You sound like you're annoyed at the pathfinding's imperfections, but I'd say these sound like features, not bugs.

        higher level players will be the ones with superior strategies instead of the fastest clickers

        Yup. The 'strategic RTS' (as one review called it) aspect is what I think I like best about the game.

        There is something about an immortal race of beings that get converted to artefacts (amulets actually) when they die.

        My impression is that the amulets are artifacts created to trap the immortals rather than an aspect of them dying.

        • There is something about an immortal race of beings that get converted to artefacts (amulets actually) when they die.

          My impression is that the amulets are artifacts created to trap the immortals rather than an aspect of them dying.

          That comment came from the fact that whenever one of your Kohan heros kicks the bucket on the field, you get his "amulet" back, and you have to pay to convert the amulet back into a usable hero.
          It will be cool if you don't have to babysit special units like you do in other RTSes (usually the mission statement is something like: Do so and so, XXX must survive).

          I got an email the night of the 27th saying the game shipped, so I'm expecting it to show up today or tomorrow.
      • Starcraft is about more than just being "a fast clicker." Sure, it helps, but even more important to being good at the game is good strategy, aggressive expansions, and (MOST IMPORTANTLY) constant surveillance of the board. If you have these three things down, "fast clicking" really isn't that much of a concern anymore.

        Magius_AR

  • now that I can no longer use 'gee uhh, Windows crashed' as an excuse to why I suddenly disappeared in a game of Broodwars before getting my ass tromped yet again ;)

    But seriously, I've played Starcraft with Wine with fairly decent results... don't see any reason to get this except the usual 'ppl won't make games for linux unless we buy them' (which I admit is true). Usually I play on our Win machine.. it's there, and if we didn't use it for games it would probably feel pretty pointless *G*
  • The subject says it all really.

    Of note: I'm in Australia, and it takes 4-7 days to get stuff shipped here from Loki, using their standard international service. Last stuff I ordered from Loki took 4 days, so I'm hoping I'll have it in about 24-48 hrs.

    Loki sent me a note on the afternoon of the 27th (their time, morning of the 28th here) telling me my copy had shipped.

    If anyone in Melbourne (Australia) goes to the PC-IT trade show, you can probably get to see the game in action, assuming it turns up in time, on the LUV (Linux Users of Victoria) stand.
  • This isn't a FPS for once! Horray! We now have a RTS for us all to play; first of its kind on Linux. Personally, I downloaded the demo, and I love it! I'm getting a copy... again, sure beats having to play a bunch of FPS (especially after giving the roommate a whoppin' for like the umteenth time) Point-and-shoot gets boring.

    • What do you mean first of its kind on Linux? Why does everyone always overlook Myth2? Myth2 (and Myth for that matter) was a great game! It's about as RTS as they come.. but it doesn't fit the Warcraft/CC style that I guess everyone needs to see before classifying a game as an RTS. But the Myth series has far more strategy than any of those other games. There is also another game -- Theocracy -- which fits the Warcraft/CC style that has been around just about as long as Myth2 from what I can tell.
  • As far as i know Loki is going to port Halflife and counterstrike to linux, the reason is popular demand :) i hope that more games will be ported to linux, for rebooting with windoze to play a game annoys me pretty much
    • Now that would be fanfreakingnice to see. Half-life and Counterstrike in Linux.

      I know a lot of people who keep Windows partitions just for Counterstrike.

      I for one had to give it up for Linux. There's no point in keeping a 2 gig partition just to play a game, even if it is the best game ever made.

      Loki, saving Linux users from Partition grief since 1998.
      • Yeah baby! No need for that stinkin winme partition anymore! Not to mention how sick sick I was of that built in game with that built-in game where it gives you this funky "an error has occurred" dialog and you gotta see how many of those you an click in sequesnce before you get the big blue screen and restart your computer.
    • Where did you hear Loki will be porting halflife? That's news to me.. As far as playing halflife in linux, it runs almost perfectly under wine and there is a nice little howto for you to read at lhl.linuxgames.com [linuxgames.com]. If you are keeping windows around just to play halflife/cs.. you could have deleted your windows partition long ago..

      • Truer words were never said. I played HL through to the end without a hitch under wine. I failed at the VERY end just like I did when I first played it under doze...


        How the f*ck do you beat that last giant floating baby? I invariably "beat" 'im, his head split open like a ripe banana, but by that point I am nearly out (or am out) of ammo of any kind. I once jumped over and landed on his split-open head, managed to stay atop for hours (I left the computer to do other things) with a book holding down my ctrl key so the character would just stay there and beat the crap out of the baby's split-open head with the crobar. Didn't work.


        You have the baby's head split...so what next?

  • This'll give the sailors something to do in those boring hours between journeys then..

    I also wasnt aware that there were ships using Linux now.. I guess that erases the following scenario: "Yes.. just one more bomb and we will win the war" "Doh"
    • Damn your hide. I came here all ready to post something lame about Linux Ships, and you had already done it.
      I hope you're just really happy with yourself.

  • Slick installer... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by CurlyG ( 8268 )
    On the strength of this piece I went to lokigames.com to get the demo.

    Their generic installer app is a testament to the way that gaming-related companies can occasionally surpass even the best efforts of absolutely everybody else in terms of making a software task, no matter how essentially complex or problematic, slick, stylish and user-friendly. I went the get the Kohan demo and ended up, by choice rather than coercion, downloading the mpeg preview movie, the Simcity 3000 demo, and a few other things.

    Admittedly I'm getting between 36-40kb/sec (thank $DEITY for DSL) without which I might curb my curiosity a tad, but that too can be partially atributed to the sensible automatic choice of planetmirror.com as the closest server.

    It's Gnome compliant, of course, and takes my theme just nicely.

    Whatever Loki's financial situation is at the moment, the quality of their approach to the installer says a lot about the way they go about their work.

    Now go show 'em you care: Download the demos... /. the bastards...
    • It's Gnome compliant, of course, and takes my theme just nicely.

      It seems to support KDE fine, too (it added itself to my menu and such)...so much for the "horrible burden" of having to support different window managers/"desktop environments" that the minimally clueful among pundits have mentioned a few times...GO Loki!

      Choice Good!

  • I am a coder and rarely play games and for what I use it for linux is supreme....but I must admit that when I do try to play games on linux it is just a pain in the arse. I really think that the market for linux platform games is limited to Quake and this will not sell many at all.
  • "freedom"(as in beer) is one thing....but capital is what is gonna keep a great company like Loki alive and the fact that they port windows-made games to Linux (100% internally) and release the source should be appreciated in and of itself(that's true "freedom"). I don't mind shelling out my hard earned sponduli for a quality product. The demo to Kohan was awesome and I'll be ordering my full-version in the next few days. And if it's anything like the demo......i don't mind tellin ya..... I'll be racking up the hours playin online.
  • Does anyone know if the version Loki is selling will install on Windows as well as Linux with the same CD without downloading additional software?
    • Does anyone know if the version Loki is selling will install on Windows as well as Linux with the same CD without downloading additional software?

      They won't.

  • Will the Linux and Windows versions be compatible multi-player wise?

    To chime in, it really is a good game. I can't testify to how "original" the company scheme is but I can't think of any other major RTS' with anything close to it.

    The unit autonomy is also nice. You don't have to worry about your troops being too stupid to fight and just standing there as their comrades get cut down. If the ZOCs overlap, they fight. That simple. Cities deploy their militias automatically when under seige. It's all very nice.

    It also takes out a lot of the RTS tedium in building. No peons, units automatically heal and replace themselves. There are building decisions and dependencies but you have to actually think and not just mindlessly go up the tech tree.

    And the opposing AI ain't half bad either.

    The campaign isn't really anything you haven't seen before and is pretty easy as you're given lots of powerful units to start each scenario off with and your heroes accumulate experience through the course of the campaign.

    All in all it's a good game.

  • After reading the descriptions and reviews of Kohan, I've been eagerly awaiting the Linux port. I don't play many games these days, but this one's nice.

    I like the demo. Not being expected or able to micromanage or "resource rush" (i.e. produce 100 peasants/workers/whatever then quickly build up a massive army and rush them all over to your opponent) makes the game much more enjoyable for the way I tend to play them.

    I do wish there were a little more documentation with the demo, though. While I "get" the 'production ratings' of stone, wood, iron, etc., I DON'T "get" how you tell what your current stockpile is. (i.e. I couldn't see anything happening when I slipped into negative production ratings)...

    Presumably the documentation with the full game explains it, so I should see it in a week or so once I've had a chance to order it...

    • I DON'T "get" how you tell what your current stockpile is

      That's easy: You don't have a stockpile of anything except gold. Kohan is pretty strictly pay-as-you-go for other resources.

      I couldn't see anything happening when I slipped into negative production ratings

      Run your mouse across the ratings and wait for the tooltips to pop up... It appears that you can substitute gold for any other resource, so if you have a shortfall of, e.g., 2 iron/minute, you automatically make up for it by spending 2 gold/minute.

  • Is a "Linux Ship" a boat where everyone rides for free and it never sinks?
  • I've been wanting Age of Empires on Linux for a while, here's my chance. Kohan is very very similar, which is okay because AOE is a great game. Rock on Loki, my order is on it's way!
    • Now that's what I call service. for my Kohan order:

      has status of entered as of 2001-08-30 10:43:51
      has status of preauth as of 2001-08-30 10:44:41
      has status of approved as of 2001-08-30 10:45:00
      has status of postauth as of 2001-08-30 11:08:16
      has status of shipped as of 2001-08-30 11:08:44

      Loki is doing one hell of a job keeping my business, wish more companies were like this.

  • Kohan is a real time fantasy strategy game with a lot of design enhancements that solve problems that have plagued RTS games. Note: I've only played the Windows version.

    It deals with forces on the company level, not individual troops. Most similar games like Warcraft, Age of Empires, etc. would require you to give orders to each individual in a troop, which results in annoying clickfests. In this game, you form companies of seven individual units each (one leader, four front line troops, two specialists) and simply give orders to the companies as a whole. Most of the time you're only dealing with half a dozen companies or so, so unit management is infinitely easier than it has been with any game of this type before.

    Also, companies replace their losses on their own over time, including specialists, which takes a lot of the micromanagement out of combat. It also makes the computers tendency to kill your special units a lot less annoying. You won't have to do a minute of furious clicking to replace your losses, you'll just to direct your surviving companies to a safe place to heal.

    Finally, they've done away with the most of the annoyance of upgrading bases. You don't have to place individual buildings, you just direct your towns to build whatever improvements you can afford. Again, most micromanagement is removed.

    All that being said, Kohan feels a little flat. Most missions aren't really that difficult, and upgrade paths are obvious and rarely diverted from. Visually, the game is lacking, too. For instance, your companies troops form up in hexagons, a formation rarely found on the battle field :)

    From a game design viewpoint, though, it's an amazing piece of software. I bet the next true classic of the genre will be the one that shamelessly rips off the good ideas in Kohan and weds it with a more visually appealing combat engine like the one in Age of Empires.

  • I cannot find a copy of the Press Release on the Loki site, but there is a copy of it here [linuxgames.com] at linuxgames.com.
    While I am on the subject, Tux Games [tuxgames.com] is expecting our latest stock of Kohan to arrive with Fed-Ex later today, so order now [tuxgames.com] and you should get it shipped tomorrow morning.

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