Elemental: War of Magic Preview and Screenshots

The folks at Colony of Gamers have cranked out some PAX-based impressions of Stardock's Elemental: War of Magic, while two new screenshots have surfaced at Shacknews. From the article:
The camera controls offer a unique element, whenever you zoom out, the game converts into "cloth map" mode, turning the map into a cloth map and turning your armies/Sovereign into pewter figurines. You can play the game like this the entire time. Which starts to become more necessary when you have larger and larger armies. Zooming in has a fun effect too, you'll see tons of detail that really makes your cities and buildings come to life, such as people, grass, barrels etc. We were informed that the beta will be done completely in cloth map mode, in order to make it the best it can be.

You have a limited amount of tiles that you can use to build your city up, depending on the city's level. You'll build things like house, farms, etc. All of these buildings contribute to your town rating, in what I assume will dictate how many troops it can hold along with other things.