Ara: History Untold Review – A Missed Opportunity or a 4X Gem?

Ara: History Untold had potential. The game, at its core, features some fascinating ideas but struggles with execution. While it introduces innovative mechanics, it also gets bogged down by prioritizing the wrong aspects. This article delves into where Ara shines and where it falters, analysing its gameplay, systems, and overall experience.

A 4X Strategy Game with Bold Ideas

At its heart, Ara: History Untold is a 4X (explore, expand, exploit, exterminate) strategy game with an ambitious twist on the genre. It offers players a resource management challenge with an innovative research system, but unfortunately, some of its greatest ideas are buried under unnecessary complexity. The game opens strong, promising an engaging journey through history, where players guide a civilization from ancient times to futuristic eras.

In this game, you take control of a historical civilization and lead them from primitive stages of development all the way into advanced technology. If this sounds familiar, it’s because the game’s foundation closely mirrors the legendary Sid Meier’s Civilization series. However, Ara attempts to distinguish itself with a focus on production chains, resource management, and research prioritization. But does it succeed?

A Promising Research System with Unique Consequences

One of the most interesting aspects of Ara is its research system. Similar to Endless Legend, Ara divides technological advancement into eras. Once you’ve researched enough topics in an era, you can choose to move to the next, unlocking more advanced technologies. However, there’s a catch: any unresearched topics from the previous era are permanently lost. This means certain buildings, units, and even crucial resources are forever unavailable if skipped.

For instance, if you miss researching the wheel, you might unlock it later through a different technology like algebra. However, you’ll never get access to chariots, altering your strategic approach. This dynamic system forces players to carefully consider what to prioritize in each era, and it adds replayability, as different paths lead to varied outcomes.

Complex Resource Management Defines the Game

While most 4X games treat resources as another statistic simply a bonus to growth or production Ara: History Untold makes resources the central aspect of gameplay. The economy and production systems require players to juggle specific resources like timber, stone, and more advanced goods as their civilizations progress.

In Ara, building a structure requires not only construction points but also the correct materials. For example, constructing a workshop might need timber, stone, and metal. From there, the workshop can produce equipment that is essential for crafting other items or boosting production. It’s a cascading effect that forces players to make careful decisions about how they allocate resources.

A Labor-Intensive Process

At first, this detailed approach is refreshing, providing players with a puzzle-like experience as they manage their economy. However, the longer the game progresses, the more bogged down it becomes. Managing each building’s production and ensuring all cities are optimized feels like an endless cycle of micromanagement. With no macromanagement tools to simplify the process, players can easily get lost in a sea of menus.

For players who enjoy factory-building games like Factorio or Anno, this level of complexity might be appealing. However, the cumbersome interface and lack of AI sophistication mean that managing your empire often feels like work rather than strategy.

The Unwieldy Interface and Lifeless AI

Speaking of the interface, it quickly becomes one of Ara’s biggest flaws. The game lacks proper summary screens or map overlays that are vital for managing large empires. For instance, once you’ve built multiple cities, keeping track of each one’s production chain becomes tedious. While item tooltips offer some help, the overall layout of the game’s menus leaves much to be desired. This can make what should be a fun planning experience feel like a chore.

Meanwhile, the AI civilizations you face are often underwhelming. Even on medium difficulty, they struggle to pose a real threat. It’s not uncommon to find yourself outpacing your opponents, even if you’ve neglected your military or made numerous economic blunders. The lack of a challenging AI diminishes the competitive aspect of the game, which is critical for a 4X title.

Beautiful Visuals, But at What Cost?

Visually, Ara impresses. The game world is filled with detailed animations, and each civilization is brought to life with unique architecture and units. However, this aesthetics come at a cost. The game’s map doesn’t zoom out far enough, which becomes a problem as your empire grows. Navigating through the menus and detailed cities often requires excessive scrolling, and the simultaneous turn system, while an interesting idea, only adds to the overall clutter.

The game’s battles, which could have been an exciting feature, fall flat. Combat is entirely automated, with the outcomes revealed before any action takes place. While units are fully animated, the lack of interactivity removes any tension from the conflicts, making them feel more like an afterthought than a key component of gameplay.

A New Approach to City Growth

Ara’s city-building system introduces some intriguing mechanics that shake up the typical 4X formula. Instead of the familiar grid or hexagon systems, cities grow by unlocking procedurally generated regions. Each region provides different resources and building slots, making city expansion a strategic decision. Should you prioritize food production in one region, or focus on gathering timber for future construction?

However, cities are also limited in terms of how many buildings they can construct within each region. This forces players to make tough choices, as the space quickly fills up. The game does offer a system where “experts” can be assigned to buildings, giving bonuses like faster production or increased food output, but this feature doesn’t do much to reduce the overwhelming management tasks that build up over time.

Ara’s Diplomatic and Military Weaknesses

Diplomacy in Ara feels like an afterthought. The options available to players are rudimentary, and foreign relations rarely impact the game in a meaningful way. The AI civilizations lack personality, making them feel lifeless. While the game features many underrepresented cultures and leaders, such as Boudicca and Wilma Mankiller, their influence on gameplay is minimal. Eventually, you’ll find yourself ignoring diplomatic messages altogether.

Similarly, the military aspect of Ara is underdeveloped. Wars are anticlimactic, focusing on individual cities rather than grand battles. Units are represented by icons rather than actual models unless you opt to watch the battle unfold a choice most players will skip after the novelty wears off. In a genre where epic conflicts are often the highlight, Ara’s approach feels like a missed opportunity.

Acts and Eras: A Unique Twist on Progression

Ara introduces a fresh mechanic in the form of acts and eras, which divide the game into distinct stages. Players earn prestige points by researching technologies and completing tasks, with civilizations ranked on a leaderboard. If you fall behind in points, your civilization risks being eliminated at the end of an act.

This system adds a sense of urgency to progression, as players must balance their priorities to avoid falling behind. However, it can also be frustrating, as it forces you to focus on prestige collection rather than fully exploring the game’s vast tech tree.

A Missed Opportunity for Greatness

Despite its innovative ideas, Ara: History Untold ultimately falls short of being a standout in the 4X genre. Its over-complicated systems, lacklustre diplomacy, and lifeless AI prevent it from reaching the heights of games like Civilization. While the research and resource management systems offer something new, they are weighed down by poor execution and excessive micromanagement.

With potential future updates or expansions, Ara could iron out some of these issues and become a more enjoyable experience. But in its current state, it remains a game with great ideas that never quite come together to form a truly compelling whole.

Conclusion: An Interesting Spin on the 4X Genre

Ara: History Untold is a game for players who love resource management and production chains. It offers a refreshing take on the 4X genre, but its shortcomings in AI, combat, and user interface hold it back. For those seeking a complex, puzzle-like challenge, Ara might offer some enjoyment. However, for most 4X fans, it won’t replace the likes of Civilization or Endless Legend.

Final Verdict: 6/10.