Etherlords Reviews

Several attempts to play Etherlords only ended in computer lockup. I use a Pavillion g7 with windows 8.1 and have only had one other (solved) issued with about 70 different games played thru Steam. The game just freezes and you can hear the sound sticking. Only Ctl/Alt/Del will get you out. With that being said I bought the game bundled with Etherlords 2, which works fine and seems like a significantly better game than the original, which I was only able to play in tiny segments. In summary, don't bother with Etherlords, but Etherlords 2 has so far been enjoyable for a follow the path and battle monsters with trading card deck, turn based battles. The battles are interesting due to strategic card play depending on luck of the draw cards. I think I will get bored with this long before it ends, but Etherlords 2 is a well thought out game, despite it's predicessor.

Game crashes within 5 minutes from start up, i have tried all of the proposed fixes with absolutely no change to the crashes. It is an older game, but that's not an excuse to sale a non functional product. I'm a big fan of retro strategy games, but buying this one was a complete waste of time and money.

Seems like a fun game. It's old though and has quite a few bugs. Hero specialisation doesn't work, during campaigns, you can't upgrade your deck (it's a deck-building game). Even though there are places to get more spells for your deck, and it does indeed show in your hero's character page that their deck is now different. Entering into combat still gives you the standard starter deck, which makes progress almost impossible and rather uninteresting. I also couldn't launch the game from Steam. Had to open the folder and launch the .exe. I think I have 3-4 hours of game-time at this point. I get that it's an old game and all that, but a patch to make it playable on Steam isn't too much to expect when the company decides to put it up on said platform. I would've loved to play this more, but it's just not working properly, so I can't.

The game is awesome, and long ago I played it a lot. Yet now I have Windows 10, and on Windows 10 this games constantly freezes, so it's impossible to play. If you have Windows 10, then there is just no point in buying this jewel of turn-based card-based combat. I would love a remake, though.

Great game i played it years back on (old) CD's (for Windows Xp) so glad Dev's put it on Steam and made it work on win 7+. If it crashes for you try using this guide made by "s-4" and it should work fine (like mine). Open (Edit) the file "Run.cmd" in the root directory of the game and write the word "rem" before the line "set __COMPAT_LAYER=WIN2000". Must have: "rem set __COMPAT_LAYER=WIN2000". And save your changes. Windows 7 SP1 x64 Steam will count your playtime with this fix, only "downside" of this may be that after you end playing... Etherlords.exe will still be running (it don't do much, just stays there) but can be closed with Task Manager. Hope it helps, have fun playing this incredibly amazing game :D

Yes, I don't recommend it despite completing one of the campaigns (vitals), here is the pros and cons, if you can live with the cons go ahead and buy it, doesnt cost the world. + unique races with their individual card lineups + there is a learning curve to appreciate + I had no problems running it (on my old computer in admin mode) + challenging varied enemies + 50h playtime if you do both campaigns I'd say + it felt a bit like offline Hearthstone with 3D battles, the age shows tho - even if you turn off all the gimmick closeups etc, battles take their time - can take some hours until all the mechanics are clear (the castle stuff was/is irritating all the way) - the AI seems to cheat a bit in the leveling and spell availability department - the whole overworld game for ressources and discovery is increasingly annoying - the multiplayer part of the game is dead, but probably was great in its heyday, you are left wondering what alot of the castle abilities are good for - the campaign win conditions tend to be either too easy or confusing (you have to use a castle ability for one of them), usually once you got your hero up to speed its over - the last campaign mission / boss is a bitch (I only did him with vitals, maybe the other 3 races have an easier time to find a working setup), left a bitter taste, due to having to use an extremely niche bordering on exploiting lineup to win it (on hard, which is the 3rd highest of 5 difficulty options)

Update 01.04.2021 With all the help from different reviews, I got the game working again. The card combat system in this game is surprisingly entertaining and efficient. There are many different cards and deck construction possibilities. Campaign takes a while (and some dedication). But there are also many preconstructed decks available, which let you duel against the (not completely stupid) ai right away. You can also cunstruct decks without having to unlock cards.

Doesn't work on Windows 10 (freezing screen in game)!!!! Pretty sad :( Now I've started Etherlords 2, seems to work pretty good on Win10.

One of the old school classics. Since the game was developed by Nival (Russian based), western market might not be familiar with the game. However there are few points why you might be interested to play this game even though it has been 13 years since it was released: - Game is Hard. No kidding, even normal difficulty will have you thinking over on what kind of strategy and builds you must use to win every campaing map. - Game is played out on a strategic map (similar to HOMM) & tactical battles (collectible card game). Some points to think before trying it out: - Game is Hard. It is a double edged sword...when playing campaign, think of it like a puzzle game (remember HOMM campaigns with impossible odds, but when you knew a particular trick it became easy). - Game runs on a locked 4:3 resolution. - Game pace is rather slow (you can improve it by choosing various game options, but still) However, I would recommend it to anyone born in 20th century. There is also a sequel which is nearly the same but improved (oh the times when sequels were actually good).

[i]Etherlords[/i] is a strategy defense combined with a neat and challenging card game combat hailing from Nival Interactive, a small Russian development team that will take on the formidable feat of developing [i]Heroes of Might and Magic V[/i], eventually later on. As a side note, alongside its quite improved sequel [i]Etherlords II[/i], the game holds a special place for me; meaning many frustrating hours of deck building and combat practice during 2001-2004. I was about to shed tears of joy when I first managed to beat this one! In the world of Ether, there comes a time when the way to the Temple of Time is finally open. The old legend states that whoever holds dominion over the Temple shall rule the power of Ether, the substance of all magic and creation. Four distinct nations of the realm: druidic Vitals, aloof Kinets, fierce Chaots and decaying Synthets all begin a race towards the Temple to challenge the master of the world: the White Lord. Only one shall succeed and overcome the challenges of becoming the next White Lord. As the saying goes: "The Ether enslaves the ones who obey it, and destroys the ones who do not". I suspect that neither European nor American market are familiar with this challenging and enjoyable series, so I'll try to make a resume for the game dynamics. In its essence, [i]Etherlords[/i] is a strategy game which presents the player an isometric map with a capital city, resources to gather and monsters to challenge. With each combat your hero overcomes, he/she levels up to unlock a selection of abilities. You have to make sure that you protect your base and gather needed resources to wage war at the same time. Here, we basically have a [i]Heroes of Might and Magic[/i] alternative. The combat itself on the other hand, is a variation of [i]Magic the Gathering[/i] card game where your hero and the enemy faces each other, with monsters to summon and spells to alter the battlefield. Here is where things get complicated: you will be collecting the spells throughout the strategy map and you will have a limited number of spells that your deck may hold any given time. For each spell acquired, you will also need the appropriate resources which determines how many times that spell can be cast. Thus, you have to establish a careful balance between the game's strategy and card game elements. Easier said than done, this restriction quickly becomes tricky to handle. When you decide to change one card, you can easily find yourself travelling to the other side of the map, while an enemy hero silently marches towards your capital. Graphics are fairly outdated, but still charming enough in my opinion. The environment and character animations are colorful exaggerations that we are already familiar from [i]Warcraft III[/i] or [i]King's Bounty[/i] series. Camera settings are usually a bit distasteful, inconveniently choosing to focus on random figures, but hey! No one promised an A+ game. What we have here is an old, challenging strategy and card game that certainly doesn't hold hands with the player. There is a truckload of negative reviews about the game out there, complaining about constant crashes or not being able to run the game at all on modern systems. These issues are long gone. The worst that you should be expecting is that you may have to run the game from the directory rather than the Steam shortcut which doesn't record playtime. Otherwise, it works fine. The campaign is fairly long - with two concurrently occurring separate scenarios. You can always run an independent strategy or dueling session too. I strongly suggest giving [i]Etherlords[/i] a chance if you either enjoy strategy or card games, or that you'd be curious about a successful combination of the two. Take it when you're feeling up for a challenge. Please also check out Lady Storyteller's Curator page [url=http://steamcommunity.com/groups/ladystoryteller#curation]here[/url] - follow for regular updates on reviews for other games!