eXplorminate note: Bonjour, Jetons un œil à ce nouveau jeu, présenté comme « La Révolution française, avec des mechs »
…Stop panicking guys, the rest of the article is in English haha.
Also, it is worth remembering that Bonaparte is still in early access, so the thoughts below are not necessarily reflective of the final product.
Bonaparte.
French/Canadian games seem to be having a moment now. With Amplitude hyping up Endless Legend 2 (our footage, article and discussion here) , Absolum and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and now also Bonaparte.
To understand Bonaparte, it helps to understand a little of the French soul.
Many moons ago, a young man was travelling through France, when he chanced upon a little tavern, in which he was the only non French patron, and obviously so. To slake his thirst, did he enter. And received he did a little drink, with the instruction to down it, and so ofcourse he did.
That drink was pastis.
If you know, you know.
But that incident, and many others, stayed with him, and created in him the idea that the French are, and this is blasphemy on both sides of the channel, not so different from the English.
But, the differences stand out. France is more rigid, and set in their ideas. France has an Academie Francaise, whose duties include deliberating on what the correct French is and maintaining the integrity of baguettes and berets, whereas the English language is like a global vacuum cleaner, sucking in words and concepts, grabbing ideas from everywhere and putting them to good use. If you have used the words shampoo (Indian), barbecue (latin America) balcony (Italian) or grotto/grotty (Italian) recently, or ‘unfriend’ (Facebook!) or eaten an apple (German) then you are seeing (speaking) this in action.
Ofcourse, there is a certain irony that many of these words eventually do filter into French (le weekend anyone?) and even more ironic that about 60% of English vocabulary comes directly from French, such as les fleurs dans le bouquet que j’ai donné a ma copine.
The French have a very clear idea on what the correct way is to do something, usually food related, and usually passed down through generations. Unlike the British who will happily mix and match and produce something new, quite often terrible, but occasionally revolutionary. Did you know Napoleon was apparently offered a steamship, and turned it down? And thought rifles were a gimmick (but les Verts did for him in the end )
One day I will tell you about the time I proposed mixing mango into a crème brûlée. And topping it with pistachio. Sacre bleu (but damn delicious).
There is something unique about the French psyche, a sort of self assured confidence that does not feel the need for braggadocio (unlike, cliché here, the American mindset) and one that is usually backed up by competence, often excellence.
It is also quite insular, almost resistant to outside influences.
And how did the French get to this? How did a region that was historically rather fragmented during the medieval era (see map below) became so monolithic. How and where and when was the decision taken to use oui for yes instead of oc?
In a (simplified, massively) word:
Napoleon. As in Bonaparte. As in this guy:
Who is you in this game, and who can be a woman if you choose.
Link One:
“He also aimed to render irreversible the principle of the unity and indivisibility of the Republic, and later the Empire, a direct inheritance of Revolutionary doctrine. Unity was to be pursued in several directions at once, namely: constitutional, jurisdictional (with the creation of a single Tribunal de Cassation for the whole of the territory), and administrative (with the uniform parcelling up of the country). Napoleon hated nothing more than a fragmentary state and social dissolution. These decisions were never challenged, and his principles of political and administrative unity must have contributed significantly to the reinforcement of national unity.”
Link Two:
“ France remains the most centralized state in Europe”
So, to understand modern France, you need to understand Napoleon Bonaparte and the Revolution. To understand the game Bonaparte, you benefit from knowledge about the revolution. And this is important, because if you don’t know this history, or don’t care, then Bonaparte loses much of its appeal. Sadly, even as a Francophile (yes, french fries, not freedom fries, steak hache instead of hamburger!) and someone who studied Napoleon, and lived in France for a year (I was the one who was subjected to the pastis ambush, if you haven’t figured it out) and who has travelled quite a bit in France (I can recommend Sète), the game never quite comes together, and is lacking a certain je ne sais quoi.
On paper, or as an elevator pitch, it sells itself.
The French Revolution, plus Mechs.
Those mechs are not universally welcomed:
But I think they are brilliant, but also a bit of a missed opportunity. And, that is a feeling I kept returning to as I played the game. I found myself more in love with the idea of the game than the game itself, like a muted version of Paris syndrome.
The mechs show up early, in the game’s version of a tutorial, which does a decent job of telling you what to do, i.e click this to move, click this to attack.
As far as I can tell though, the game will always move through this sequence. By way of contrast, Spellforce: Conquest of Eo gives you the handy option to skip the initial combat tutorial, and also the entire first week of the game, and get right into it.
Broadly speaking, there are 2 parts to the game, a strategic map and a tactical (battle) map. So far, nothing revolutionary (sorry) there.
Starting with the tactical map, it looks pretty good, decent artstyle, easy to read. The battlefields are not too small or constrained, but neither are they too large. Combat feels quite chess or boardgame like. What I mean by that is the fights here feel like I am playing with my Gearloks but on a larger scale and not quite so satisfying.
Units have regular HP, decreased by damage received, and morale, in blue. When this depletes, the unit automatically and immediately capitulates and just…disappears. It does not work like morale in the real world (running away, causing a rout) or in numerous other games, so it really does just feel like a 2nd HP bar. The effect is a bit jarring.
Also jarring are the combat animations, and 2 seemingly small things that tipped my thinking of the combat from serviceable into tedious:
There are some nice touches though, such as the idle animations, or the comforting (for you, not your enemies) thud and shake as your mech moves.
The strategic map is a depiction of France at the time, divided up. At first glance it looks like any Paradox Grand Strategy game, or a Total War game. But the similarity is just visual. How you interact with the map is rather different. Unlike a TW game, you are not going to just build up an army and march them onto your enemies, capture their province and that is that. No, it is a bit more complicated here. The strategic map has 2 modes, one is military, and the other is political, or propaganda. The most important thing to note here is your number of actions is very limited. You can move an army (and fight) or you can engage in propaganda.
When you do a propaganda action, you pick one of your heroes, and then you have to click through a few vignettes, before a confirmation of your success.
And this happens every time. Again, like in combat, rather an awful lot of clicking, and again, it does feel like playing a board game, as in I can almost imagine a boardgame where you move a unit, roll a dice, pick up a card and read its effects. This is not prima facie a bad thing, but it did make me want to play Merchants and Marauders, and it did not feel like leaning into the strengths of using a computer system for your calculations.
That is a wordy way of saying Bonaparte really does not feel much like a computer game, and the effect is jarring to me., because I have been conditioned by so many games to expect certain things. Like, if I select a unit and right click on an enemy, that means attack, it doesn’t mean bring up a confirmation window every.single.time.
It seems, at least initially, that the only targets for combat are Rebels, and if you are on someone else’s territory, you are limited to propaganda. But I never felt I understood the value of the propaganda action.
There are glimmers of greatness here, hints of beautiful things, like how each strategic turn is effectively a mini turn, punctuated periodically by the convening of the National Assembly, to debate stuff, propose laws and vote on them.
I am not that much of an expert on this period of French history (and to be honest, slavish adherence would not benefit the game here) but the feel of the events is perfect. It does feel like a tumultuous parlement where matters of great import, whose effects we know will echo through the next centuries of France’s (and by proxy, nearly everyone else’s) path, are being debated. Do we confiscate the property of the nobles (Eat the Rich anyone?) or allow individuals to take over public land?
The mini turns forming into greater turns does seem to follow a script, as order deteriorates and decisions are forced upon you. This works very well to not just tell you the story of the revolution, but to make you feel it, experience it. But, it does mean the experience has a tendency to feel on rails, and sometimes things don’t quite match up, like if I am a committed Royalist, why would I call the King useless ?
Another thing that never quite comes into its own is the use of phlogiston. From the games description, you would think phlogiston is some sort of wonder fuel, enough to kick start an industrial revolution, like what coal did in Britain, only able to power mechs. Instead, phlogiston is an alternative theory to explain what oxygen does in combustion (you need fuel + air (specifically oxygen) + heat to create combustion, and if you pile on a load of carbon dioxide onto a fire, you can extinguish it.) More pertinently, I never saw a strategic imperative that would shape my decisions. By this I mean, in this alternative universe, France wins the 7 years war, which means they are dominant in North America. Imagine if North America is the main source of phlogiston. Then it needs to be transported. Below are the main ports of France:
Now imagine if controlling those meant you could control Phlogiston. Now you have a strategic direction. Then, contrast that with the need to control the seat of government (Paris,) the King (Versailles) and the wine (Bordeaux!) and the beret manufacturers and so on. Competing needs! Instead, each province seems roughly the same in terms of resources.
Finally, the thing I liked least about this game, is how the turns are sequential and how I am obliged to watch the screen dance around as everyone else carries out their move, and how this is a sudden overload of information that is hard to process, and also does not seem relevant. Indeed, my main complaint of the game is this enforced passivity, for example how in each combat turn I get this little movie. It feels like I am being yanked into and then out of the game, and to a degree this occurs in the strategic map too, with the parlement sessions being a whole mini game that pulls me out of my attempted map painting. At least with those you can plan ahead a bit.
I came for a strategy game, instead I got an interactive story-cum-boardgame. Who can I recommend this game to?
- My favourite time in the game
- realising the game would let me support the rightful Royal and crush peasants. Or, maybe the quote “This is not America,” which made me smile.
- My worst time in the game
- the end turn screen movement
- Did the game match my expectations/preconceptions
- Not quite. I was expecting something like X-Com with mechs (although XCom does have machines) all dressed up in revolutionary France, with the obligatory beret. I got a lesser version of a grand strategy map, a lesser tactical experience but a whole load of beret (And story!)
I can recommend this game to people who want an interactive experience where you can roleplay one of the most iconic moments of history. I cannot recommend it if you are deeply interested in strategic tension, tactical nuance or indepth mechs. Will I be playing it again? Most likely yes, if only to see what happens if I decide Le Roi doit mourir.
I truly think the game has potential, but right now the actual act of playing the game is not enjoyable. As a piece of interactive fiction it is superb.
Also known as BBB in many places, Andy is well known for his love of strategy games of all types, especially the Age of Wonders series.