Xbox's Latest game (You Have Never Heard Of) - Ara: History Untold

Join me as we dive into Ara: History Untold, a 4X grand strategy game SO balanced it launched with practically NO marketing budget (probably because it's secretly sponsored by the Mexican Tourism Board). We'll be conducting a highly scientific dual playthrough (Greece vs. Mexico) to uncover the truth behind this "perfectly balanced" masterpiece. Expect overpowered leaders, broken combat, micro-intensive madness, and maybe, just maybe, some actual fun.

0:00 - Intro - Welcome to Ara: History Untold!
0:48 - Ch 1. Marketing? What Marketing?
03:25 - Ch 2. Benito's Billions: The Mexican Conspiracy
05:32 - Ch 3. Double Trouble: Greece vs. Mexico SHOWDOWN!
08:39 - Ch 4. Statistical Meltdown: Just How Broken IS It?
10:45 - Ch 5. "Civ Killer"? More Like "Time Killer"
12:06 - Ch 6. Micro Mania: For the 10% Who Like Clicking 700 Times a Turn
14:40 - Ch 7. Combat Chaos: Troop Caps & AI Cheats!
16:42 - Ch 8. The Verdict: Perfectly Balanced Nightmare Fuel (or Future Classic?)
18:40 - Thank you and goodbye!

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New title: Xbox's Latest game (You Have Never Heard Of) - Ara: History Untold

Old title: THE PERFECTLY Balanced Game (You Have Never Heard Of) - Ara: History Untold

#gameplay #strategy #review

[thespiffingbrit]

If I can summarise this game in a single word it is *Baffling*

[wolfybat]

Game publishers watching Spiff play their games must feel like that clip of pages printing out directly into a paper shredder

[TacticatGaming]

They literally told me i couldn't even talk about having EA to the game or post till 1 day before it came insanity ! Whoever made the decision to suppress advertising the game should be fired lmao.

[robertoalamar]

Spiff absolutely kills me every time he does something like mention Civ IV developers when the image on the screen says Civ V. Never stop.

[OldManJnkins]

When I started the video I was kinda wondering why it wasn't tagged as an ad. Having finished the video I can see why it isn't tagged as an ad.

[resileaf]

Spiff: "This is the most perfectly balanced game in the universe... PSYCHE!"
Me: "They had me in the first half, not gonna lie."

[GerrardGB]

This sounds like Spiff started making his usual exploit video, but found so many issues that it ended up as a rant/review.

Still enjoyable to watch though, and I did like the comparison to show how broken a mechanic was.

[voyomaypl]

I won't lie, production chain complexity got me interested. I'll keep an eye for it. But untill then, the factory must grow.

[Smoth]

Hey Spiff, as a long-time follower, this is one of my favorite videos of yours in a while!
I really appreciate that you still maintain the "here is why this is so utterly broken" and show off some hilarious imbalance, but that you have the comparison side-by-side ready to go as a demonstration, and then even dive deeper into the mechanics and suggest some overall concerns and issues.
You're hitting the same level of "oh my, what a cheeky and hilarious British fellow" while also being a touch more informative and impartial than usual! Bravo, my good sir.

[epicddgt]

as a Mexican myself i was perplex to see Benito Juarez appear on the spiffing brit gameplay, so i salute you with my tea !!

[MisterOfu]

Someone on the team really said "I wish I could play Civ and Victoria at the same time".

[TailedArtist]

Hey there! I was a dev on this game, and can offer a bit of insight as to why it turned out...Like *this*. The reason it feels like these mechanics weren't tested...Was because they weren't! The production chains and things were added in the last three-six months by two people who overruled the rest of the design team, which means they didn't get extensive testing in the alphas and betas that players got access to. Instead of buckling down and testing things (like leader traits to make sure they were balanced), the devs were overruled left and right to add in this last minute complete change to mechanics and...Well...Time ran out. Kind of sucks, but glad I got out when I did! 10/10 video, Spiff. Would love to see you dominate as Big Daddy Benito 9000 again...Maybe the game would have been better if we'd gotten money from the Mexican shadow government.

[AerialEmber]

0:16 "If you're a major studio working on a brand-new game, just cancel it" Those words are far more true than probably anticipated 🤣🤣🤣

[Sharky]

I will say, as someone who was on the QA team for the game before the game, lack of communication amongst devs and QA team (8 hours a day of dead silence and not socializing... AT ALL, I'm an introvert, but even I need something), and just, how unfun the game was compared to other 4x games I've played.

It shows pretty much ALL the issues I had personally had with the project, and after it's release. I will say
perfectly balanced 10/10 would be vindicated again!

[davysmith]

If there's one thing I learnt; it's to send Spiff a copy of my game if I make one, with a basket of Yorkshire Gold, some homemade jam for scones, and a note that reads "Break this in 5 days to deploy Jerome "

[shirasho]

The sign of a good reviewer is being able to see that it will appeal to a specific audience even if they don't like it themselves. With that said, if I wanted to play a production game I would play a production game, not a 4X.

[trball_wavey]

Clicked so fast I almost forgot my Yorkshire Tea 👌🏾☕️

[ericb]

oh, when you said "snowballing" that reminded me:
once, when i was playing an older Civilization game, i moved a scout unit into a spot with a "random event" trigger...
and i got an extra SETTLER unit!
effectively giving me a second city on the third turn!

[nitiratp]

I actually really enjoyed the pseudo-review format of this one. Good work, Spiff.

[AlexChec]

The music change at 12:08 really highlighted the descent into micromanagement madness.