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TransGaming Ports 3 Kohan Titles to Linux
Kohan_Rocks writes: "TransGaming today anounced the opening of their new 'webstore' which includes the brand new port of Three Kohan Titles. Probably equally amazing is the distribution method: All three games are available for download only (finally big name games available for download!). I'll probably buy atleast some of these games even though I have the old Loki version of the original Kohan - Loki's wern't network compatiable with windows, TransGaming's apparantly are (and its just such a cool game)."
A Kohan review in less than 60 seconds:
The core idea behind Kohans: Immortal Sovereigns deals with a group of immortal beings who can be resurrected at any time as long as you have their medallion.
The game is in the RTS genre, with some nice features. Micromanagement is largely out, since once you "claim" a resource, it's yours, unless one of your enemies goes to claim it.
Instead of having huge armies, it's organized into squads with 1 leader, 4 "primary" units, and 2 secondary units.
The squad system is unique, and adds some interesting strategy. Each Kohan (the immortal guys) have their own specialty, like "bonus to horse riding units", or "extra healing powers". And, as your Kohans, go into battle, they gain levels to get stronger (and can be carried from mission to mision.) You might want to do things like put the healing expert Kohan in charge of a defensive force, and have them protect the city, while a Kohan who gives bonuses to speed might be sent out to scout out enemy territory and claim mines and such.
One thing to remember - if your Kohan dies, they go back to Level 1 after you pay to "resurrect" them, so you start to get attached and have to weigh sacrificing a Kohan this time to win a battle, playing it safer to win the war, or hitting the "reload" button.
There was a lot to like about the game, and while most levels are usually just "go claim other cities and kick ass", and having a mass of squads in battle can really slow things down, overall Kohan is probably worth your time to check it out.
Now, if they would just make an OS X version, I'd be set....
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
I decided to spring for the original version of Kohan. You pay your money and then get directed to a download site. You get what I'm assuming is a custom version of winex (4mb) and the game (158mb). The manual is available in both PDF and txt formats while the game files are available in rpm, deb and tgz formats (tgz files weren't available but will be shortly according to the site). The internet connection is required because the first time the game runs it downloads a specially modified executable tuned to run only on your system. That part doesn't bother me as I'm the only one I know running Linux and I don't pirate software anyway. However, I am a bit concerned that upgrading my system (I fiddle and reinstall pretty often), or making changes might cause the game to decide it's running on a foriegn system. We'll see.