Like many great stories, Ara: History Untold is broken into three acts. Each act contains a different set of technological eras that mimics the progression of technology over the course of recorded human history.
Act 1 begins with the Ancient History era and continues through to the Bronze Age and the Iron Age before ending on the Antiquities Era. In Act 2, players will experience the Early Middle Ages, the High Medieval Ages, and the Renaissance until reaching the Enlightenment. This leads to Act 3, which represents some of the most recent technological eras of humankind - the Machine Age, the Atomic Age, and the Information Age - and ends with the unpredictable Future Age.
While advancing to the next act is exciting and oftentimes represents a thriving Nation, it is not guaranteed. During the transition between one act to the next, Nations are sorted into different tiers based on their relative Prestige, and the Nations with the lowest amount of Prestige are removed from the game. Prestige is gained from a number of sources in a variety of categories we'll get into later including culture, warfare, science, religion, and more. To ensure that they survive to see the next act, players can complete quests, research technologies, create Triumphs and Improvements, and employ a plethora of other strategies available to them.
A screenshot of some notifications presented to this player showing one of their achievements and what tier they landed in at the end of the Act.
Once the Act Transition is complete, players are given more information about their relative standing amongst the world's nations, which can be a powerful tool in determining if and how they want to pivot their strategy as they head into the next act.
A screenshot of the detailed Act Transition screen showing the Nation's statistics like population, prestige, and more.
We can't wait to share more about Prestige and other systems in the upcoming weeks, so be sure to stay tuned!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2021880/Ara_History_Untold/