Ara: History Untold News

[p]Version 2.0 keeps players in control without the overwhelming micromanagement.[/p][p]The crafting queue is gone.[/p][p]The crafting quotas and priorities system is in.[/p][p]It is very straightforward:[/p]

1. [p]Set how much of a thing you want[/p]
2. [p]Decide what priority it has, if any, of the things the crafter can build.[/p]
3. [p]There is no step 3.[/p]

[p]This lets you set your nation up as a well-oiled machine. Once you set it up, you will never be interrupted with a “crafter idle” message again because they are never idle – unless you want them to be due to having enough of whatever item they were crafting and you want those resources to go elsewhere.[/p][p]Let’s take a look:[/p][p][/p][h2]Crafting at the city level[/h2][p]Here we have a weaver. This is one of the more complicated supply chains in the game and yet now, it’s just so obvious and simple once you get past the excessively gridded looking UI.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]So here I always want to have 25 rope in my nation. That’s because a lot of construction projects, especially Triumphs, need rope. So, I set that to 25. Once I have 25, it goes to the next item: fabric. However, if at any time I go below 25 rope, it will switch back to working on rope until I get back to 25.[/p][p]Then I have fabric which is used everywhere, but if I do manage to stockpile 30 fabric, it’ll go down to the tunics which use fabric. I only need, say, 10 of those. Tunics, in turn, are an element of garments. I only want to keep a stockpile of 5 since it’s just used as an amenity and as long as I have 5 spare, I should be good to go.[/p][p][/p][h2]Crafting at the national level[/h2][h2][/h2][h2]Late Game: Self Manage[/h2][p]So, you’ve taken over an enemy city on around turn 600. I know in early game, you were so diligent about every little thing in the cities you care about, but the city of Zamora? I conquered it. And I don’t care. I mean, I care, because I’m a really caring kind of dictator, but I don’t care care and the game is asking me to set up the 17 little shops in this conquered city. This is where you just let the Zamorians handle it. They seem nice. They lived here. They know what’s up. So, in 2.0, there’s a new button next to “Rename”:[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]. . .and the next turn it has set up the entire priority list here. Sure, it put “Indoor Toilets” as the lowest priority, but we’re not here to judge. This is a place of love. Not a place of sanitation. We wouldn’t want to shake hands with the Zamorians, but as you can see, it set up the priority list and it intelligently chose ingredients, and it made sure I have lots of money before using that (I’m running a huge surplus). It didn’t fill some of the slots with anything because I didn’t have enough of that in stock, but someday, we will have toilets, because as soon as that first toilet is done, it’s going to London. It needs it.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]I’m not sure what it says about me that I have a slot for “Piano” but not a slot for “Toilet” in housing improvements, but it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to touch that piano.[/p]

[p]Soft Power. Strategy games favor focusing on warfare, but culture and influence have mattered far more in shaping the world. While this may seem, to some, to be a change in the post-World War II era, it has been true going all the way back to the Bronze Age: culture and influence matter.[/p][p]Civilization IV lead designer Soren Johnson made cultural influence a major focus of Civ IV, forever changing 4X strategy games. In fact, when we teamed up to make Offworld Trading Company, we wanted to make a game in which you had to achieve your ends using what amounts to culture and influence.[/p][p]Now, when Ara: History Untold shipped, it included a religion feature. The goal, successfully achieved or not, was to use it as a means to get more prestige. As a player, I want multiple game mechanics to choose from to achieve my strategic objectives. When they put me in charge of Ara, I was adamant that we find a way to get culture and influence in the game. Moreover, it could not be a DLC or expansion. As a premium, first-party Xbox Games Studio title, the new features involved deserved to be a part of the base complete experience, no matter how large.[/p][p]So here they are in Ara v2.0![/p][p][/p][p][/p][h2]Adding Culture and Influence without Redesigning the Game[/h2][p]To do it right, we needed to implement it so that it feels like it was always part of the game design. So, how do you do that? Well, we already have the concept of religion allowing you to pick verses that give your nation various buffs and abilities; we already have the idea of obtaining "claims" when cities level up; and we already have a 'Quality of Life' system: Happiness, Health, Security, Education, and Prosperity. I'd argue that this game was ready-made for culture and influence.[/p][p]Therefore:[/p]

1. [p]Cities should generate Influence points just like they generate Research. The bigger the city, the more Influence it generates.[/p]
2. [p]You add a new quality of life stat: Culture. High Culture greatly increases Influence generation; low Culture reduces it.[/p]
3. [p]Influence becomes a currency that you use to buy and sell claims and new traits. I feel dirty writing that, but it's true![/p]

[p]As part of this, we were also able to address two long-time requests from players:[/p][p]First request: Cities shouldn't be stuck unable to expand simply because they don't have enough local food. Las Vegas is a thing.[/p][p]Second request: Slow down the city leveling up speed as you end up with a massive city before the end of the Iron Age![/p][p]Before Culture and Influence, we didn't really have any game mechanics to solve those two requests. Now we did. Nations focusing on culture can buy claims and expand cities out in the middle of the desert if they want and we could also make it so that city size (in terms of regions) was a balance between food availability and culture.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][h3]Cost of Claims and Traits[/h3][p]Each time you buy a claim or trait, the cost goes up. As your nation grows and generates more influence, the cost of enhancing it will also go up. Additionally, 10% of the cost of a claim or a culture trait is based on how many other nations have done the same. So, while not overpowering, there is a slight inflation in cost based on how much other players are doing it.[/p][p][/p][h2]But what about Cultural Conquest?[/h2][p]But what about using influence as a tool of conquest? This was a lot trickier. Because Improvements are built per region and are not simply part of the city, we couldn't implement this like Civilization IV did. We needed a way to nibble away the edges of someone's nation where the two of you are bumping up against each other, but we needed this to be a pretty big deal. After all, you might have the Pyramids in one of these regions, and having it get taken over by cultural influence would be extremely frustrating.[/p][p]Therefore, we needed cultural conquest to be a deliberate act rather than a passive expansion of cultural influence. This dilemma led to the creation of a new unit. . .[/p][p][/p][h3]The Agitator[/h3][p]We struggled a lot with what to name this unit. We liked Agent Provocateur, but no one can spell that word. It's like restaurant. No one can spell it right. Well, I can't anyway. So, we eventually settled on Agitator.[/p][p]The Agitator can be sent into a region and then spend a claim's worth of Influence. The Agitator shows up with the new tech called Revolutions. This comes at the end of the Renaissance era when normal region claims start to matter less because most of the regions that matter are claimed.[/p][p]Now, using the Agitator will make computer players very, very angry. In fact, it makes them angry enough that they will potentially declare war on you even if you're stronger and they're busy with other wars. Like I said, it makes them really mad and they will tell you, but they won't necessarily go to war with you either. It depends on your relationship history.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][h3]Not so fun when it’s done to you[/h3][p]Initially, we had it set up so that you would put the Agitator in a region, press the incite rebellion button, and if the region was adjacent to your territory, it would flip. However, we then had the AI utilize it. Well, obviously, then we learned this is a stupid game for jerks. After a few minutes of insisting that I was taking the game "back to the store," we came up with the idea of it taking 10 turns and sending notifications to let you know it was being done to you, so that you could react.[/p][p][/p][h2]Fleshing out gameplay[/h2][p]Having Culture & Influence gives players an additional set of tools to execute their strategy. It also helps us with our long-term goal of ensuring that each Act of the game plays differently. You don't want Turn 500 to play the same as Turn 50. You want the gameplay in a game like this to evolve and grow over time.[/p][p]Hopefully, you find this mechanic as fun and interesting as we do. We will, undoubtedly, have to tweak some values over time as someone, probably you, figures out some way to exploit it in an interesting way. I say to you: Bravo. Good job! Because soft power is the most exploitable power.[/p]

[h2]Ara: History Untold v2.0 Revolutions Update Expands Historical Strategy Through Culture and Influence[/h2][h3]Ambitious historical strategy game prepares for first anniversary by adding nation specific units, unique leader traits, cultural conquest, AI updates and much more[/h3][p][/p][p][/p][p]Stardock Entertainment and Oxide Games, in partnership with Xbox Game Studios, announced Ara: History Untold – Version 2.0 today. Dubbed the Revolutions Update, version 2.0 is a massive expansion of new features and content.[/p][p]Informed by community feedback, the Revolutions Update adds a new Culture and Influence System, gives each nation its own unique unit, gives greater player control while simultaneously reducing micromanagement, improves performance, includes a major AI revamp and much more.[/p][p][/p][h3]Key Features:[/h3]

• [p]Culture & Influence Systems: Cities gain a new quality of life category called Culture. Culture generates Influence, a new currency used to acquire cultural traits and expand territory through claims. This creates meaningful alternatives to military expansion.[/p]
• [p]Agitator Unit: Introduced with the Revolutions technology at the end of the Renaissance, Agitators can be sent into adjacent foreign regions to stir rebellion and, through Influence, bring those territories into your nation. This unlocks a second form of conquest in Act II: ideological subversion.[/p]
• [p]Per-Nation Units: Every civilization now commands unique historical forces, from Mongol Horse Archers to Japanese Samurai, adding tactical depth and flavor.[/p]
• [p]Leader Redesigns: Every leader has been reimagined with unique mechanics, traits, and abilities, ensuring more replayability and personality-driven diplomacy.[/p]
• [p]Priority & Quota Crafting System: Micromanaged production queues are replaced with smarter stockpile and priority controls, freeing players to focus on high-level strategy.[/p]
• [p]Adaptive AI: A more dynamic and personality-driven AI responds to player performance, making diplomacy, warfare, and resource management more challenging and believable.[/p]
• [p]Map Generation Overhaul: Realistic natural resource clustering plus new exclusivity rules modeling historical trade and competition.[/p]
• [p]High DPI UI & Visual Update: A sharper, scalable UI built for modern displays, with new accessibility and customization options.[/p]
• [p]Performance Boosts: Major engine optimizations deliver faster turns, smoother framerates, and reduced CPU usage.[/p]

[p]Ara: History Untold offers a fresh take on historical turn-based strategy where players can build a nation that spans all of human history. Heavily inspired by player feedback, the v2.0 update delivers new and refined features that make the game more approachable for new and existing players.[/p][p][/p][p]“We’re really excited to bring Culture as a game mechanic into Ara,” said Brad Wardell, Chief Executive Officer for Stardock and Oxide. “The role of ‘soft power’ cannot be overstated.  While military conquest remains the most direct way of expanding one's territory, we really wanted to give players other means of expanding their control of the world. This is especially true in the late game when the explore and expand parts of the game have reached their maximum.”[/p][p][/p][p]Ara: History Untold v2.0 – "The Revolutions Update" is currently available as a preview right now.  It is scheduled for final release on September 24, 2025.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p]

[p]Multiplayer will not save your game.[/p][p]Strategy games must have computer opponents as a first-class game mode. They aren’t there to be “practice bots”. Even in games that are allegedly “multiplayer-centric”, fewer than 20% of players will press the multiplayer button, let alone actually play it.[/p][p]Yet many strategy games just handwave, putting in interesting computer opponents. You, reading this, know the folly of that, and yet they still do it. Why?[/p][p]There are two main reasons why computer strategy games tend to have bad computer opponents:[/p]

1. [p]The game design kept changing until the 11th hour, making it impossible for the engineers to have the time to write a competent computer opponent.[/p]
2. [p]The engineers making the computer opponents are not necessarily great strategy game players.[/p]

[p]Ara: History Untold shipped with pretty decent computer opponents, for the first act anyway, but if you survived the first act, it was kind of a cake walk. Today, we’re going to discuss how 2.0 revolutionizes the AI in this game.[/p][p][/p][p]The development of Ara: History Untold was a long, winding road. Throughout the years it was in development, many ideas were tried and discarded. At one point, there was a playing card system. Needless to say, it meant that the AI team was constantly having to rewrite the way the computer players played the game based on design changes.[/p][p]The attacking and conquest system in the game was pretty stable for a long time, and it shows. The AI is actually pretty good at picking targets to attack. Although as the game progresses and the supply chains become more sophisticated and the number of different items, recipes, and units grows, the AI really begins to struggle.[/p][p]Let me walk you through what the AI had to figure out in this game to be competitive in Act 2:[/p]

1. [p]Cannons and Riflemen need gunpowder.[/p]
2. [p]Gunpowder needs to be produced in an Armory.[/p]
3. [p]An Armory can’t be built unless you have concrete and steel.[/p]
4. [p]Concrete requires a cement plant OR, in a pinch, a Ceramics shop (which is busy producing lots of other things).[/p]
5. [p]To get concrete fast, you need a resource that is currently called “sculpting material” (we need a better name, please suggest some in the comments, I will make sure it gets localized!).[/p]
6. [p]Steel really needs a forge, and the forge needs metal ingots.[/p]
7. [p]Metal ingots have to be produced by taking copper or iron and smelting it.[/p]

[p]If you made it this far, you have probably figured out that the AI struggled with this, and this is what we focused on for version 2.0.[/p][p]We also had to deal with problems where the AI recalculated what its strategy was and abandoned things in favor of its new strategy. Not a terrible idea, but in a game where it can take quite a few turns to build something, it really messed with the AI’s ability to get anything done.[/p][p][/p][hr][/hr][h2]Section 1: The Improvement Hunger System - Breaking the Goldfish Memory Syndrome[/h2][h3]The Problem: AI suffered from "Goldfish Memory Syndrome" - each turn evaluated improvements as if seeing them for the first time, leading to:[/h3]

• [p]Abandoned construction projects (average: 47% completion rate)[/p]
• [p]Strategic flip-flopping (changing priorities every 2.3 turns on average)[/p]
• [p]Ignored beneficial improvements (some waiting 100+ turns)[/p]
• [p]Unpredictable behavior patterns frustrating players[/p]

[p][/p][p]I would argue this is analysis paralysis, but the result was the same: the AI struggled to finish things. Kind of like humans, actually.[/p][p]The solution: Hunger.[/p][p]The game already had an AI alignment system that could calculate how important something was; it simply lacked a concept of time. That is, over time, even something not that important starts to bubble up to being pretty important. So, we implemented a starvation system similar to what you’d have in a preemptive multi-tasking task scheduler.[/p][p][/p][h3]Example:[/h3][p][/p][p]So even though “on the ground” realities might adjust the bias of something being built, over time, it would accumulate a “hunger”.[/p][p]In the example above, a city improvement with a bias of only 6 has waited 93 turns to be built. That’s a very long time. Despite short-term priority being much less than the others, it has waited a lot longer and has bubbled to the top. This ensures that the AI actually builds things and doesn’t easily get distracted by a short-term change in strategy (within reason, we have a Crisis system too).[/p][p][/p][hr][/hr][h2]Section 2: Dynamic Crisis Response System - Intelligent Emergency Management[/h2][p]Sometimes, you run into an emergency and just have to put off that Bakery that’s been waiting a long time. How do you do that?[/p][p][/p][h3]Architecture Overview[/h3][p]The Crisis Response System operates on a three-tier escalation model with dynamic bias adjustment:[/p][p][/p][p]This is where having AI developers with an understanding of strategy games comes into play because it’s subjective. You essentially come up with a list of things that are a crisis, rate them, and let the game respond.[/p][p][/p][p]Examples:[/p]

• [p]Enemy at the gates: That’s an emergency![/p]
• [p]Critical units can’t be built because you lack gunpowder: That’s a crisis![/p]
• [p]Quality of life in Happiness has dipped below 30. That’s a warning.[/p]

[p][/p][hr][/hr][h2]Section 3: AI Priority/Quota Crafting System - Strategic Resource Management[/h2][p]There is also the challenge of figuring out how much of something you need to have in storage.[/p][p]For example, in v1.4, the AI frequently ran out of wood, food, or materials because it was using them up on crafting things faster, so you’d end up with cities not able to grow because they were running out of resources. This is where the 2.0 AI really shines. It can intelligently monitor your stockpiles and adjust, every turn, how much it is willing to accelerate crafting by providing it with an ingredient.[/p][p]Something requires 10 food to accelerate? Should you use it? Well, maybe, maybe not. In 1.4: YES. In 2.0: IT DEPENDS. How much food do we have? Are we running a surplus?[/p][p][/p][hr][/hr][h2]Section 4: Sophisticated Amenity Selection System - Contextual City Intelligence[/h2][p]Choosing the right amenities is hard, and once again, the challenge here is being reasonably good at strategy games so that you can give some guidance to the AI on what to pick under what circumstances. There are times when Health, which speeds up city growth, is really important, and there are times when having high security matters for training units.[/p][p][/p][h3]Special Case Handling[/h3][p]It was also important that each leader played differently. So when deciding what matters, the AI looks at the traits of the nation and/or the leader to bias what it actually picks. This goes through the entire game.[/p][p][/p][hr][/hr][h2]Section 5: Adaptive AI[/h2][p]Even with all these changes, we want players to feel challenged regardless of what difficulty they play (well, except the beginner ones, go get 'em!).[/p][p]This game has a lot of difficulty levels. It is also a game that takes many hours to play. So, picture this: You choose Duke level. Is Duke hard? It depends. It’s slightly above the “Normal” one, but what if I get in, I’ve put in 5 hours, and I’m now just running away with it? That’s not great. The solution: Adaptive AI. The AI figures out if it’s losing to the human player, and if the OPTION is enabled (and it can be turned on and off in the Options menu), then it will start playing smarter and harder to keep up with the player. I have no doubt we will be having to tweak and balance this system further. We’ve started it pretty conservatively to be safe, but we can definitely let it put its foot on the gas if necessary.[/p][p][/p][hr][/hr][h2]Section 6: Personalized AI Players[/h2][p]Another area we wanted to explore with 2.0 was having AI players play differently from each other and act differently towards each other. In 1.4, I would get pretty frustrated with my “friend” of centuries suddenly declaring war. Why is a nun trying to murder me after hundreds of years of agreements?! So, we put in a lot of work that we hope is noticeable in having the computer players feel more…well, human in how they interact.[/p][p][/p][p]The consensus with v1.4 is that the computer opponents play a decent game in the first act, but if you survive the first act, it’s a cakewalk after. With version 2.0, having played all the way through it is substantially better.[/p][p]My 20+ hour play-through at Duke level (not highest, but above normal) had me barely survive Act I. Act II was pretty challenging still. Act III stayed challenging, but I was starting to pull to the top. This is in contrast with 1.4, where by the time I got the Renaissance age, I had multiples of what the other players had. When I did my playthrough, Agitators weren’t really finished yet, and that could really result in some interesting dynamics (Agitators are a new unit that can convert a region you have adjacent to them to their side).[/p][p]Now, at the lower difficulties, we made the AI make more mistakes. The 1.4 and earlier AI had a fantastic system for “making mistakes”. The AI would, in effect, roll dice, and if it failed its dice roll, it would do something non-optimal. This only takes effect at lower levels, but makes the game feel more like you’re playing a less skilled human. In version 2.0, we expanded on that for picking improvements to build, as well as turning a blind eye to threats from other players, so that it’s less aggressive.[/p]