AntRush!

General Off Topic Chat and Discussions

Moderator: ooper01

Post Reply
dinoman9877
Posts: 77
Joined: Sat Sep 17, 2016 7:03 pm
Location: Covington, Kentucky

AntRush!

Post: # 35289Post dinoman9877
Sun Apr 22, 2018 3:51 am

I have recently discovered that a small game once thought lost to the depths of the endlessly growing internet has been dragged back to the surface by its creator. I wish to share it with fellow ant lovers so that it might see the light of day again.

AntRush is a top-down RTS where the player takes control of an ant colony and fights to establish dominance against their rivals until only one remains. The game isn't going to wow you graphically, as an excerpt from the developer's blog will tell you, but it's not graphics that make a game.

In a nutshell, it's Starcraft with ants (and termites too).

There are five species of insect the player can choose from:

Common ant: These are your typical pavement ants, really. They have no special abilities, just a normal worker and soldier caste. A jack of all trades and master of none.

The Gliding Ant: The gliding ant is much like the Common ant, minus a few key differences. As the name implies, they can glide. Soldiers can drop down from the tree tops into the enemy's nest itself, taking them completely by surprise. Of course, such tactics aren't without their risks. The gliding ants can be injured or die on impact and may find themselves separated from their allies in combat when the defenders respond. The thorny bodies of the soldiers help them act as their own ally in such a circumstance, as enemies suffer damage for each hit they deal to a gliding ant soldier.

Slave-maker Ant: The Slave-maker ants are not an easy species to master. They are unable to produce a worker caste, only a solider caste and a scout caste. Scouts are weak but fast, meant only to look for opportunities for the soldier ants.
The soldiers are able to function as workers, however they are not as efficient as the workers present in other colonies. The main function of Slave-maker soldiers is to fight and steal. Slave-maker soldiers are able to steal developing ants from other colonies and place them within their own hatcheries, allowing them to artificially expand their economy or military power by stealing it from others.
Their queen is thin, mobile, and a powerful fighter, unlike the other queens in the game. This is good because she can join the army in invading enemy colonies, and if she can kill their queen, the survivors immediately join her (as opposed to instantly dying as they do in normal circumstance.) However this comes with the risk that if you underestimate your enemy, a gameover is nearly guaranteed.

Termite: Termites, rather obviously, are not ants. These are are the turtles of the game, based around staying out of combat as much as possible and defending their home with powerful defensive units while building up an offensive army to wipe out the competition. To balance their sit back and build up playstyle, their workers are not very efficient, and strip away the food they harvest quickly, meaning that the termites must ever expand their foraging grounds and risk encounters with the enemy to build their might. But the name of the game IS defense for the termites, and they excel at it. On top of the soldier, they also possess the Tunnel Guard and Elite Tunnel Guard.
The Tunnel guard is a stronger but more expensive unit that cannot move beyond a colony's territory. They are meant only to defend the colony's borders from attack, and they do a good job of it.
The Elite Tunnel Guard is a vruiser. These termites are so large that they do not even fit in the defensive bunkers, and cannot normally move above ground. They are insurance in case the defensive lines should fail. When the enemy ants break in, suddenly they are face to face with a true terror. At this point, this is a battle they CANNOT afford to lose. If I recall correctly, the Elite Tunnel Guard is not bound by the restrictions of their smaller sisters. When the enemy ants break in, they leave holes in the ground that the Elites can crawl out of, unleashing their might, which can then be used against the enemy's nest.
Termites can also produce anates, which replace the queen or king should either die.

And finally, Leaf-Cutter Ants: The leaf-cutter ant is an economic powerhouse, which is good because everything is expensive.The Leaf-cutters possess two worker castes, the Minim and the Mediae. The Mediae function as normal workers and are best used for tending the queen and harvesting food. The minim work in the Leaf-cutters unique Fungus gardens, which provide a bonus to food harvested when leaf-cutter workers bring food to a silo. They can also build a Waste Chamber which...I'm sure has a use, I just do not know what it might be.
The Leaf-cutters also possess two castes of soldiers, the minors and the majors. Minors are just regular soldiers. It's the Majors that are the crux of the Leaf-cutter army. These large soldiers make a formidable foe to lesser soldiers. Leaf-cutter soldiers also do something that other ants do not: They automatically protect workers. They will follow a worker that is out foraging food, effectively forming the highways this species is so well known for and ensuring that their economic expansion may continue safely.

If anyone has any questions or would like to discuss the game here, feel free to do so. I hope my fellow ant lovers enjoy this game as I do. :D

dinoman9877
Posts: 77
Joined: Sat Sep 17, 2016 7:03 pm
Location: Covington, Kentucky

Re: AntRush!

Post: # 35290Post dinoman9877
Sun Apr 22, 2018 3:52 am

Here are the links required for the game. I ran out of space in the above post to place them due to the character limit:

Here is a link to the blog post with the free, full version: http://lordofthestack.com/blog-entries/antrush-returns

These following files, however, are also necessary, due to the game's lack of support for a multitude of years and, more sadly, lack of online servers. They are provided by the user 'VonHeer' on the Bay12 forums. I can attest that they work, but I know that in circumstances like these, dealing with old games, people may not be so trusting of such files. However without these two files, the game will give you error messages and refuse to run.
http://originaldll.com/file/sdldotnet.dll/32674.html
[URL]http://originaldll.com/file/tao.sdl.dll/32679.html[/URL2]
Simply place these in the AntRush folder that the installer creates.

Yaanger
Posts: 1
Joined: Tue Oct 05, 2021 6:29 am
Location: Chicago

Re: AntRush!

Post: # 83574Post Yaanger
Tue Oct 05, 2021 6:30 am

Thanks a lot, i was searching this game really long time! Thx guys!
come on and play https://www.9winz.com/fruit-slots - thats awesome game at 9winz.

Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 19 guests