Hi all! My name is Pavel Kubat and I am the lead developer and designer behind Aggressors: Ancient Rome. This will be the first of a series of Dev Diaries introducing the game and its gameplay. In this first episode I will tell you the story of Aggressors, of how it all started, how the original idea developed in time and what the current plans for the game are.
The development of the game Aggressors goes way back: it started at the end of 2008 but the origins of the game go all the way back to 1995 when the rules for a board game called Aggressors were set down. It was set in the time of World War II and one game lasted several days. Up to 8 players could play, each leading a different country. Alas, soon it became clear that getting the players together for such a long game will eventually put the game on a shelf in a hope that it will be taken out again one day!
However, it was always my intention to bring the game into a digital form as well and so I set down one day 10 years ago and started programming the basics of the game. First, it was purely a hobby that took couple of hours a day but soon it grew into a passion and later even into a full-time job. Originally, there was no time plan set. Basic features were designed first, the rules have undergone a radical transformation since the time of the board game and the whole concept of the game was reviewed and refined several times.
My original ambition was to build a framework for strategy games that would fully support mods for different types of games with different rules, units and look (historical, fantasy, sci-fi). All these mods would use the same core – a framework called today Aggressors.
This idea of modding was embedded in the Aggressors core from the beginning and to prove the stability and flexibility of the framework, 3 mods of different genres and historical periods were being developed in parallel. However, as the complexity of the project grew over time, it became clear that it was not possible to keep working on all 3 mods at a sufficient level. Eventually the mod Ancient Rome was selected as the first to be finished and polished. Therefore, Aggressors is the title of a brand and Ancient Rome is one of its mods: one that fully represents my vision of the ancient world.
Over the time the number of people who contributed to the development has increased. It was a game which couldn’t be handled by myself alone: the scope of the project has expanded so much and it had become too much to bite for only one man. Kubat Software grew, as grew our list of partners. Starting from the UI and 3D designer to illustrators and content writers, whatever was beyond our limits was outsourced. We were finally able to bring the original vision to light.
About the game
If we were to sum it up: it is a historical 4x turn-based strategy game where players take turns in building their empires.
Aggressors is inspired by other games, such as Civilization IV, Colonization and older hit games, such as Panzer General and Centurion.
With Aggressors we want to simulate historical reality as much as possible. Starting from tile-based maps with elevated terrains modeled according to historical sources, through complex game mechanics to small details such as specific unit types for different nations. The game features many typical 4X factors, like different types of governments that greatly affect the internal political situation, complex diplomatic relations (for instance you can have friendly relations with another player, or deeper ones including alliances with friends or you can even unite with the best allies in federations or confederations) as well as scientific advancements that affect political, military, social and cultural life. But there are also a number of new features and game concepts like army morale, loyalty, supply management, birth rate and many others.
Get more information about the game on its official Product Page!
