Tzar: The Burden of the Crown (PC)

GameSpot editors' review

• CNET editors' rating: 3.0 stars Good
  Detailed editors' rating
  Overall score: 6.4 (3.0 stars)

• Reviewed by:
  Andrew Park
• Reviewed on: 04/18/2000
• Updated on: 05/02/2000
• Released on: 03/31/2000
• Originally published on GameSpot: Tzar: The Burden of the Crown (PC) Review

Tzar: The Burden of the Crown is a solid but derivative real-time strategy game. It looks decent, sounds mostly acceptable, and plays fairly well, but it suffers from a few specific problems - most notably its own lack of originality.

Tzar takes place in the Dark Ages, circa 500-1000 A.D., though it also incorporates elements of fantasy, such as magic spells and fire-breathing dragons. The game lets you play as one of three medieval civilizations: Asian, Arabian, and European. During the course of the game, each of these may develop differently, but as in many other real-time strategy games, they must all begin the game in the exact same way: They must all gather resources, build structures, and amass an army to defeat the enemy.

Tzar has a handful of distinctive features. The first and most obvious of these is its four-part late-game technology tree. Though most missions require you to begin by harvesting resources with your peasants to build an economy then move on to create a basic military, you may also choose from four special guild structures: the warriors' guild, the mage tower, the religious center, and the trade center. Each structure may supplement your kingdom with advanced military (in the form of interesting special units or magical powers) or with economic support (in the form of enhanced economic and trade options). Each of these structures is restrictively expensive, so much so that you won't be able to afford to build even one until you've gathered thousands of resources for your cause. As such, you must choose wisely. Though you may find that certain civilizations' options are more powerful than others, for the most part, these guilds - and the civilizations themselves - are fairly well balanced. And in addition to the guild structures, Tzar also includes magical artifacts that increase a unit's abilities or let it learn a magic spell.

Unfortunately, Tzar has very little else in the way of original content. In fact, you've probably seen most of what Tzar has to offer in another recent game - Ensemble's Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings. Much of what you'll find in Tzar - from its four basic resources of food, gold, wood, and stone, to its medieval, pseudohistorical premise and its use of different real-world cultures - closely resembles Age of Kings.

But while Tzar may have borrowed a great deal from Age of Kings, it failed to inherit several of that game's strategic amenities - and a great deal of its depth (aside from the obvious fact that Age of Kings had 13 different civilizations to Tzar's three). For instance, though you can garrison your vulnerable peasants against enemy attacks, you must do so manually by selecting your peasants and ordering them into your castle; and once they're in, you can tell them all to emerge, but you must manually reassign each to his tasks.

Continue reading

Compare prices for Tzar: The Burden of the Crown

This product is currently not in stock at any of our online merchants.

Email me when this product is available