While such constraints certainly can be frustrating, they help to break up the occasional monotony that occurs once you've found a city-building pattern that works. Some missions now have time limits, which can make them much more difficult for players who're used to slowly building an infrastructure before tackling the larger mission objectives.
Cleopatra starts off at approximately the same difficulty at which Pharaoh left off, and quickly gets much harder. The first campaign requires that you build the Valley of the Kings by constructing the royal tombs in the cliffs and, as the campaign goes on, that you keep them safe from grave robbers. The campaigns in Cleopatra follow the basic formula of Pharaoh, but add a few interesting twists and challenges. You also need to stock these tombs with luxury items, which makes monument building even more involving. To build royal tombs, you need paint to decorate the walls, and lamps to light the caves where the artisans work. The new industries are essential to the construction of some of the new monuments, the best of which are the tombs. Lamps are made from pottery and oil, of which the latter can only be imported, while paint making requires henna, which can be farmed. You win a mission by achieving set ratings in certain categories, such as prosperity - the quality of life in your city and your overall wealth kingdom - how well your city is regarded by others culture - the amount of civilized niceties available to your people and also by successfully constructing monuments.Ĭleopatra makes the whole process a bit more complex by adding two new industries, lamp making and paint making. And you must create goods for export in order to maintain a positive cash flow, especially when your import costs are high. When certain raw materials - goods or foodstuffs - are not available, you must import them from other cities. You must build workshops to make pottery, linen, papyrus, beer, and other important goods, as well as find and supply the needed raw materials. You must provide the food by fishing, hunting, and farming, and then distribute the food to your residents through markets. You must build the infrastructure of a city by ensuring that your residents have food, water, and the luxuries they want. The minor problems in Pharaoh haven't been addressed, and one new problem has been added, but it's safe to say that anyone who loved or even liked the original will be entirely content with this weighty addition.Īs in Pharaoh, Cleopatra's missions are basically variations on a single theme. Cleopatra adds more of just about everything, from imports to monuments, and makes Impressions' Pharaoh a more complex and interesting game, without disrupting the fine balance of the original. With Cleopatra, developer BreakAway Games hasn't taken such an easy route. Most expansion packs simply add a few new items and missions and assume that fans of the original game will be content to just play more of the same.