In the "Age of Discovery" from the 15th to the 18th century, in Europe, batch after batch of navigators, driven by dreams and seduced by wealth, set sail in the sky and sea to explore unknown places. Glory Company's Age of Discovery series of games were developed against the background of this period of history.
"Age of Discovery 4" is an epoch-making work, which accompanies many players to spend happy childhood memories. In 1999, it launched the first version. In this version, there are a total of 4 protagonists that players can choose from. They are the Swedish naval officer Hedram Burgess and the Dutch adventure girl Lilu A. Goth, Portuguese adventurous boy Rafael Castro and Li Huamei from the Ming Dynasty of China. Two years later, Koei Company launched an enhanced version. In this version, three protagonists were added, namely Saeki, a Japanese exiled boy, Woodin, an Arab adventurer, and Tia, an American Indian girl. In 2021, at the request of many nostalgic players, Honor Company made a high-definition remake of "Age of Discovery 4". Below, I will introduce to you the differences between the high-definition remake and the original version. Is this bowl of fried rice worth buying?
First of all, in terms of the main content of the game, the high-definition remake of "Age of Discovery 4" is basically the same as the original version. However, in terms of details and game screens, the main content of the original version has been updated and many original features have been integrated. The content is only available on other platforms, so this work reaches another level in the series in terms of system and gameplay.
1. Change the lifting part.
First of all, the high-definition remake of "Age of Discovery 4" has remade the game's graphics into high-definition. The graphics of the game have been greatly improved. Whether it is static graphics or dynamic naval battles, the graphics of the game are better than those of the main body. A qualitative leap.
The original game screen of "Age of Discovery 4" was stunning in 2000. Even today, the graphics of this game, its beautiful character graphics, beautifully illustrated narratives, and many pictures are still up to date. The only thing about this version that is worthy of criticism now is the game screen on the sea. Honor initially wanted to create a 3D screen, but was limited by the performance and technical limitations of the console at the time, and ended up with a pseudo-3D screen. The high-definition remastered version has completely remade the graphics. The game graphics at sea have been comprehensively improved, and the image quality and ship details can be clearly displayed.
Of course, as a series of games in the Age of Discovery, the game graphics are not the most important. The most important thing is the gameplay and the cultural connotation of the game. In these two aspects, Glory has maintained the original flavor of the game while also adding some new ones. content.
1) Some names of people and places in the game have been corrected: for example, the original partner Song Yifeng was renamed Xue Lihua, Serbia was renamed Seville, Carne was renamed Cayenne, and the capital was renamed Seoul (it was not called Seoul. The mentality of a certain big country in the universe is about to explode. )etc.
2), the game screen has been remade and becomes more beautiful. You can also see the clouds in the sky while sailing on the sea. The pictures of towns and other special events have all been refined, giving us a more beautiful feeling while playing.
3) The enemy in naval battles has been strengthened. He piloted 5 white-board Onishi, and in the naval battle with Turuve's medium-sized and small ships, one of them was bombed and sunk. This was unimaginable in the original version. In the naval battle, the crews of both sides rushed to fight each other. The original version was faster. After the remake, the two sides slowly rushed to the opposite side to confront each other. The speed was obviously slowed down and the experience was not good. Therefore, artillery battles were chosen for subsequent naval battles.
2. New content.
1). Compared with the original version, the remake version adds 23 new treasures, including 3 weapons, 3 pieces of armor, and 17 pieces of equipment. These treasures were originally new treasures in the PSP version, and they are all integrated into the remake this time.
These treasures need to be obtained by exploring the treasures on ancient maps. Compared with the original version, the difficulty has increased a lot, which will be introduced to you later.
2) Added the setting of golden route.
Golden routes, as the name suggests, are money-making routes. In this version, as long as the player runs a route with a profit of more than 500%, the golden route will be recognized, and the player will be prompted to report this news to the trade guild, and the trade guild will thank the player for providing this Valuable information, for the next two years, players will be rewarded with gold coins based on the profits of this route every two months.
At present, the rewards from the guilds are quite generous. The compensation it provides also depends on the profit of the route you offer. Tobacco, cocoa and many other specialties shipped from the New World to Europe were all recognized as golden routes and received large rewards from trade guilds. It’s easier to make money with the remake than with the original version. If popular products can be produced, every route will be hugely profitable. Tobacco purchased from the New World for a few hundred gold coins was sold to Europe. With the support of popular products, it could be sold for more than 10,000 yuan.
The profits from multiple golden routes can also be stacked repeatedly, which means that the more golden routes you discover, the more generous rewards your peers will give players.
3), ancient map treasure map.
When players enter the port continuously in the same sea area, there is a probability of triggering a special event and obtaining 1/4 of the map fragments. If you collect 4 pieces, you will get an ancient map. By exploring the corresponding locations, you can discover ancient treasures and obtain special props. These special props are one of the new treasures mentioned in item 1 above.
Players can find two very close ports to collect map fragments. This can save a lot of time at sea.
After the player follows the instructions on the map to explore and obtain the treasure, the map fragments in the sea area will be refreshed. Players can then continue to brush map fragments in this sea area to gain opportunities to explore new treasures.
Special note: If your fleet is not strong enough, especially if your naval bombardment capability is not enough, you should not explore the ancient map, because during the exploration process, some sea monsters will pop up. These sea monsters are extremely powerful and have high attack speed. The blood is thick and very difficult to fight. It is recommended to use 5 battleships + 4 turrets + continuous firing guns + appoint a wing ship captain + 1-2 flagship gunners before opening the map.
Generally speaking, the high-definition remake of "Age of Discovery 4" is an act of putting old wine in a new bottle. Although it is suspected of selling sentiments, this bottle of wine is still very mellow. Especially in recent years, many classic stand-alone games from 20 years ago have been remade, such as the Resident Evil series, Final Fantasy series, etc., and they have all achieved success. There is nothing wrong with Koei Corporation remaking some of its original classic games. If your pocket is very rich, you can also buy the official version to make up for the regrets of the year. However, I think that the remake of "Age of Discovery 4" can add some development factors that were deleted during the development process, and add some Protagonist choices of special characters, such as Clifford and Hayreddin, will have better results.
Among the classic games of Koei Company, we are even more looking forward to the development of the remakes of "Age of Discovery 2" and "Age of Discovery 3". If these two works can be remade, they will definitely gain greater attention and success.
