News Archives: January 2001

Walkers Page Added

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 28, 2001

Angel Jayhawk has been busy this weekend taking screenshots and doing clever things with them. You can see the fruits of his labours on the brand new Zeus Heaven Walkers Page.

What, are you still here ;)?

Awardasaurus!

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 26, 2001

Do you think Zeus was the best PC game of last year? If so, then Daily Radar’s Awardasaurus wants to hear from you! Once again, thanks to award-spotter extraordinaire Angel Thunder for letting me know about this.

Best Strategy Game of 2000?

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 23, 2001

Thanks to Angel Thunder for pointing out to me that Zeus has been nominated as one of IGN PC’s candidates for the title “Best Strategy Game of 2000”. As always with awards like this, competition is pretty stiff, so you’d better get voting :).

HeavenGames Launches Cossacks Heaven

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 20, 2001

HG are pleased to announce the opening of Cossacks Heaven. Here’s what it’s all about:

Cossacks Heaven will be dedicated to feature extensive coverage of European Wars: Cossacks, from basic information such as unit stats, to resources for players to get better at their game. The site includes a download section, powered by proprietary software developed by HeavenGames, for gamers to submit their own customized maps, “mod-packs”, scenarios and campaigns. In addition, the site includes community-building features such as a player’s list, clans directory, and forums.

Read the full press release here.

Zeus Wallpapers

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 19, 2001

Impressions has updated the official site with a wallpaper page, in case you should want to Zeus-ify your desktop.

7 Wonders of the World

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 18, 2001

Angel Jayhawk has just posted a few articles on the 7 wonders of the World. Why here at ZH? Here’s what A.J. has to say about that:

As this list was originally devised by the ancient Greeks, what better place to have more information on the lot of them than Zeus Heaven. Actually there have been many lists drawn up by many a famous Greek, but the lists containing those monument we know best were been compiled by Antipater of Sidon and Phidon of Byzantium.

Raiding, Schmaiding

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 17, 2001

Kraken is busy on the official boards these days – yesterday the UK patch, today this post on raiding, and whether you will ever raid more than 16 units of any product:

No, you can get a lot more than 16. The amount you capture depends not only on the carrying capacity of your surviving raiders, but also on the target city’s production of the commodity you’re stealing. Generally, bigger cities yield more plunder.

Raiding also yields less plunder as the difficulty level setting increases.

UK Patch Available

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 16, 2001

Kraken just posted the following message to the official forum:

Zeus UK patch 1.01 is now available for download right here. This patch is for the UK version of Zeus only. It updates the UK game executable to full compatibility with all other language versions. This means an end to the infamous Horse Ranch bug, among others.

It’s only 472k in size, so it won’t take too heavy a toll on the modem.

Sanctuary Stipulations

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 14, 2001

Vriesea has started a great thread about Sanctuaries, how they work, and how best to speed up their construction. View it here.

It’s prompted me to start a page on which you can find the most useful forum threads. Feel free to take a peek and drop me a line if there are any more which you think should be added.

Kraken on in-game movies

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 12, 2001

Zeus Producer Kraken posted this message to the official forums regarding in-game movies in Zeus (and the lack of them):

Movie-type animations suck down a LOT of art and sound personnel time — the Zeus intro took several person-months to create, for example. All projects have finite budgets and timelines for art, sound, programming, etc. Creating movies either (a) reduces the time available for making in-game graphics, or (b) inflates the project budget.

Most people enjoy cutscenes the first few times they’re shown, but subsequently click through them or turn them off. Zeus’ designer chose to concentrate our art budget on in-game graphics, which is why the game itself has so many splendid animations. How many players still watch the Zeus intro every time you start up the game?

Some of you might have gladly sacrificed a font or two and some custom building animations in favor of victory movies. It’s a matter of personal opinion. My point is simply that cutscenes impose tradeoffs.

D-I-Y Blocks

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 10, 2001

Just a quick note today to the effect that you too can create housing blocks like those in the forum thread I posted about yesterday – click here to take a look at the utility people use to make them (first made by Crassus Pauper, adapted to ZH by Angel Jayhawk).

Blocks, Blocks and more Blocks

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 9, 2001

There’s a very interesting thread in the Zeus Game Help forum right now, detailing some of the housing blocks people use in Zeus. Whether you’ve just picked up the game or have been playing it for a while, this thread and the blocks contained therein will undoubtably be of use to you.

Click here to view current blocks or to submit your own.

More Map Editor

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 8, 2001

Kraken hit the official forums (ouch!) to release some more details about the upcoming Zeus Adventure Editor:

The Zeus Adventure Editor will be the same tool that we used to create the adventures we shipped with Zeus. The required production time involves interface cleanup, documentation, bug fixing and testing, with a bit of new implementation thrown in as well.

Adventure Editor on the Way!

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 5, 2001

Thanks to Sigbj�rn Koks�ter and PCD for alerting me via email and the forums that an Adventure Editor for Zeus is on the way. Impressions’s Kraken posted to the official forums with the following news:

The Zeus Adventure Editor is in production and will be available as a free download. I cannot specify a publication date at this time, but we will of course announce it prominently when it’s ready.

Also, UK Zeusers should look out for a cure to the problem of horse infertility, which should be available in the near future.

Zeus Autorun Problems

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 4, 2001

More from David Masters this morning, which will be of use to those of you who are experiencing problems with Windows’s Autorun feature and Zeus:

1) disable the autorun feature in Win95/98, by taking the following steps:
a) Start | Settings | Control Panel | System
b) Device Manager tab, double-click the CD-ROM folder to expand it, or click on the cross in front of it
c) find your CD-ROM drive (it should be the only drive listed in this folder) and click on it to highlight it, then click the Properties button at the bottom
d) Settings tab, uncheck the “Auto Insert Notification” check box.
e) Click OK, then click OK again.
f) Close Control Panel, and then restart the computer.

or

2) Hold down your Shift key while inserting the CD – this bypasses Windows’ autorun feature (you need to hold it down until the drive light has gone out).

Zeus Tech FAQ

Posted by Angel Reckless Rodent on January 1, 2001

I’m sure this has been up for a little while now, but I’ve only just found it, thanks to the delights of a serious system crash which incapacitated this computer for several days over Xmas…

Anyway, Impressions have posted a technical FAQ on their site – essential reading if you can’t get Zeus to run.

Can I also take thing opportunity to wish all of our readers a happy and prosperous new year :).