Empire:Total War..

[Tricky]

Is anyone else getting excited or bought this then?i cant wait,i love the Total War games & this one looks mighty fine!

zzZhgqeD0SM

[EvilNed]

I'm so there... If I can afford it, or have the time. Not sure if my computer can cope with it 100% tho. But I'll get it eventually, for sure. Just need more RAM.

Can't wait to conquer the world. As Sweden, nonetheless! Hakkapelle!

[Eyebiter]

Demo is on steam now

http://store.steampowered.com/app/10620/

[Mike70]

i love the total war games, esp. Rome: Total War. i have a mac so, as computer games go, i am a bit behind the times. not too long ago i finally got a copy of RTW and found it to be akin to computer crack. that has to be one of the best strategy games ever. the historical battles on there are fun as all hell, though i'll admit knowing exactly what the opposition is going to do in detail has helped me win most of the those. the battle of carrhae is a complete and total bitch though. talk about a crappy situation...

i also got my hands on Age of Empires III but haven't really played through it yet.

[AcesandEights]

Everything after the original Medieval Total War has pretty much been downhill, favoring graphics over actual AI. I hope, hope the trend will finally reverse itself.

[Tricky]

Medieval total war 2 was good,im still hammering it now!(the holy roman empire has a tough time,being surrounded on all sides,damn) I do agree that the AI can be daft at times though,such as when an enemy lays seige to you,but when you get to the battle they just stand there & dont attack so you have to march all your troops outside the walls to provoke them!or they field around 1000 peasants against your 1500 strong army of heavily armoured knights,archers,cannons & cavalry :rolleyes: i get really frustrated when you order your troops to run down a routing army,but they just run alongside them & dont attack. Hopefully these minor niggles have been sorted out for empire :)

[AcesandEights]

Well, they have supposedly had the same team, for the first time ever, working on both the diplomatic and Battlefield AIs, so they work in concert. I guess they're battlefield AI was also tuned to AIs movement phase and the two AIs never agreed with one another, so that's why you'd have a weak nation on the brink of extinction ally with you one turn, then declare war on you the next.

[Tricky]

I wonder if Denmark will still be a bunch of arse on the new one,they were a pain in medieval 2! :mad:

[AcesandEights]

Okay, I downloaded it off of steam and just did a historical battle. First off, I'm damn surprised I could get the game to run on my rig, though I had a few hiccups, I'm not sure if that's because of low specs on my comp or this being a demo/wonky Steam situation.

The battle A.I. seemed decent enough in this outing, bearing in mind it was a pre-set battle. And damn, did artillery rough me up...but some fine Hessian bayonet charges carried the day.

[LoSTBoY]

Got my copy a few days early methinks :)

Off to play!!

[Tricky]

Let me know how it is dude!im having an operation in the next few weeks & il be off work for a fortnight at least while i recover,so il need something like that to keep me entertained seen as il be housebound!

[AcesandEights]

Got my copy a few days early methinks :)

Off to play!!

Nice, it's all authenticated through Steam, so if you got a boxed retail version early and they're allowing downloaded sales to be played today, you should have no problem.

Have fun with the probable sub par AI and lack of immersion that has become the hallmark of the Total War series...and yes, I'll be downloading a copy tonight probably, myself :dead: :)

[LoSTBoY]

Yep Ace, they let me authenticate the game on Steam so no worries there.

I only had time to have a look last night, did the Naval Battle Tutorial and started a Campaign to see what the map was like.

The Naval battles are going to take some getting used to, might have to bone up on some Naval battle strategies. :D

Didn't know where to begin when the Grand Campaign began, a lot more detail than previous. There were so many different ships you could hire/build I just gave up and went to bed. :p

I'm going to have to give myself some time on this, I have next week off so will do so then.

Tricky, this will be the perfect game to keep you busy while you recover, good luck on the Op mate.

[AcesandEights]

Well, Steam has made a royal mess of the release. :mad:

[LoSTBoY]

Well, Steam has made a royal mess of the release. :mad:

Why is that, mate? I was able to install and play with no problems. :confused:

[mista_mo]

this is sorta related, but I had to Validate Dawn of War 2 through steam as well, and I had no problems whatsoever with the install, validation, or anything...

also, I believe most strategy games have sub par AI as the Developers goal is to get people to play online against other individuals, not play comp stomp games all the time.


unrelated again, but Dawn of War 2 kicks so much ass.

[AcesandEights]

We'll see, I was lucky, it only took me about 7 hours to download the game last night, which is fortunate, compared to many others. I've heard of a few people that it took 13 and 24 hours or worse to download. WHo knows how much of that is true, but they are clearly having a problem and the inability to download without activation prior to the game release is definitely a part of it.

As far as AI is concerned, I agree with you, Mo, however the game actually sacrificed functional A.I. by adding game options and bells and whistles without programming their own A.I. to make use of those options properly. Also, the campaign A.I. has been dreadfully sub par since Rome and, in some respects even before. It's just annoying to see A.I. degrade as the game franchise progresses in other areas.

When I get home we'll see how well (and if) the full game runs on my rig. *crosses fingers*

[mista_mo]

hmmm, can you not just buy the game retail and install it and then activate it with Steam?

I'm pretty new to this whole steam thing, and tbh, only got it for DOW 2.


Maybe it just sucks?

I've never played any games in the total war series, but i've never really played a RTS with super awesome AI...Hell, even the much lauded starcraft boiled down to unit spam..

How is it any different though? I know in the original dawn of war, the comp would jsut let its squads die in a firefight, and never retreat them...

Mods fixed that however, and with one particularly awesome one, the AI would actually dance it's units, and retreat when needed, and use special abilities more, AND have an actual build order...instead of spamming units, it'd create an order and then tech up as soon as it got the resources, raiding your strategic points, decapping them, and hitting support structures in your base, so as too break your economy..

for the AI, i'd keep an eye on the modding community, and scoop up a decent AI mod asap..

[Tricky]

Medieval:Total war 2 had very hit & miss AI,sometimes the computer would attack you with a well balanced force with a mix of units & they would pull your army to pieces in a good,hard fought & tense battle,but more often than not it just throws a huge army of the weakest units available supported by a couple of cannons or catapults & a "generals bodyguard" unit at you,who stand there for ages without attacking,and then rout as soon as you send cavalry & knights charging at them!
The campaign map AI could be quite annoying at times too,especially when a foreign diplomat stands outside one of your cities & keeps gesturing that they want to deal with you,but they never actually do anything,and you have to sit through the animation each turn because theres no way of skipping past the computers moves,you can just speed them up a bit by hitting space!its also annoying that the vast majority of your merchants & assassins are completely useless & fail every mission you send them on!
Despite those gripes i did love the game though,i still play it a fair bit now & ive put countless hours into it! :)

[AcesandEights]

Ok, I'll say I was able to play this game for a few hours lastnight and am damn impressed. In fact, this is the most impressed I've been with a Total War product in a number of years. The scope and dimension of the game have expanded, the immersion of the game is back to a good degree and the A.I. (admittedly from what little I've seen) is on a decent par, especially considering it will be patched up a bit and modded up as time goes on.

Overall...I'm pretty damned happy now. :)

[Tricky]

So guys,you've had a couple of weeks at this game now,whats the verdict?i get paid on tuesday so il likely pick it up in the next week if its worth having! :)

[AcesandEights]

So guys,you've had a couple of weeks at this game now,whats the verdict?i get paid on tuesday so il likely pick it up in the next week if its worth having! :)

Tricky, to be honest, I'd wait a month or two and check back here or at twcenter.net to see how the patching process has gone. There's been a lot of issues that annoy some people. The current A.I. is incapable of moving troops by boat, which is a problem in the age of empire, and means Great Britain has a horribly easy time at the game. Additionally, there's a lot of load time issues, memory leaks and CTDs for people playing the game and some other pain in the butt issues. The zone of control feature is broken on the campaign map rendering strategic movement largely worthless, (for example--try defending at a bridge and see how well that works). The reinforcement system is broken and the enemies reinforcements almost a;ways pop up behind you (even when a raging river is between you and the original armies placement).

This game is easily the most audacious from CA in a while and the game packs immense potential, but only if it's patched.

Here (http://www.crispygamer.com/gamereviews/2009-03-17/empire-total-war-pc.aspx) is a hard but fair review of the game.

Here (http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=238876) is a fair, but incomplete, list of the current game play issues.

This game was shipped well before it was ready, almost certainly by the urging of the publisher Sega.

[AcesandEights]

Well, Tricky? Did you fall victimn to the siren call of the Total War series, or are you waiting it out a bit?

They just patched the game (first three patches have all been to try and address memory leaks and CTDs) and people re still reporting mixed results. The next patch will supposedly address game play matters. I'll update with more details when I have them.

[Tricky]

Im still waiting it out at the moment,im putting off buying any new games til my op so ive got something to do while recovering!i have downloaded the demo from steam though & it seems pretty decent,it has a sea battle,some tutorial missions & a big land battle.The graphics dont seem quite as impressive as medieval 2 as far as the units go in land battles,even though im running it on ultra settings,they are still bloody good though!
Thing is if Operation Flashpoint 2 is released on the present launch date,then il be picking that up instead,no question!i still play the first Op flashpoint from time to time & cant wait for the new one!

[AcesandEights]

No worries, Tricky. I'll definitely post updates on the game, because it does really have a lot of potential.

In the meantime, I'm not even playing Empires. I downloaded the well regarded mod for Rome, Europa Barbarorum (http://www.europabarbarorum.com/), and have not been disappointed. The sheer scale of the upgrades and volume of history these guys have poured into this game is nothing short of incredible.