جــــــــام غـــــــــــــم

I received a review copy of E:C through Alex at Logic Artists (full disclosure: a free copy) two weeks prior to the release of the game. That Friday had been hell and by the time I had trudged home from the office I wanted to lie down and sleep through the rest of the weekend, however, that was not to be. Seeing the steam key in my email lit up my evening and I immediately installed the game. Some fifty-six hours of near continuous play later, I had finished my first complete campaign and was ready to jump into another and see it all again. In order that one might explain how and why the game was so engaging, so engrossing and so thoroughly compelling, it is best to start at the beginning.
The first thing that the player should notice is the music. The backing track as the game runs through its loading sequence is minimal, Spanish guitar accompanied by drums. It recalls Neil Young’s ‘Dead Man’ soundtrack—it sets the tone and pitch of the game, while remaining entirely unobtrusive. This stylised soundtrack will accompany the player throughout the game, varying depending on particular circumstances of play (exploration, combat, etc.) Once at the menu screen, I explored the graphical and gameplay settings. The range of graphical settings are varied, and the game supports 1920x1280 resolution, which came as a pleasant surprise. The gameplay settings are what really shone through, however, as I was presented with a panoply of adjustable sliders and multipliers which have an observable effect in play. The named difficulty settings (Cortés (normal), Pizarro (hard), and Aguirre (insane)) also go a long way to set the tone of the game. As Capitán, you along with your band of Conquistadores(accompanied also by your encomienda of servants and slaves) must follow in the footsteps of these men, or alternatively, make your own history.