Empire : Total War
- Thread starter Ronwue
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It's not just the tech trees it just has the same feel as a civ game to me. It feels more slow paced and methodical than previous total war games and places more interest on taking time to make technology then making your army and conquering everyone.
Dont take it the wrong way I really love the game but there is just something about the game that makes me a little less enthusiastic about playing it. I'm gonna play this game until it dies though and then I'll play it a little more but I look back on Rome and Medieval a little bit more fondly because of it.
Dont take it the wrong way I really love the game but there is just something about the game that makes me a little less enthusiastic about playing it. I'm gonna play this game until it dies though and then I'll play it a little more but I look back on Rome and Medieval a little bit more fondly because of it.
Youy probably right but never I liked Civ series that much. And when the mods start to come out for Empire(theres already a music and an unlock all factions mods) the game will gain new life, just like Rome and ME2. Hopefully there will be an Empire:Total Realism mod.cannot_aim said:
Thought so, just wasn't sure if they used the English or German spelling, so I put both.
Edit: this is aimed at Ronwue's last post, I thought I hit quote.
Edit: this is aimed at Ronwue's last post, I thought I hit quote.
You can't hear cannon and musket fire? Of course they're in there, and they sound amazing! I can't even imagine what setting would disable these sounds.Ronwue said:
And just because you didn't play Shogun doesn't mean you should say that Medieval was the start of the Total War series.
Yet another good itteration of this tremendous series...
A few kinks, but like all TW games, they seem to get better with Age.
You have to remember that there are NO games that are as complex TW. FPS games are scripted with opponent AI taking second fiddle to GFx and RTS games are again scripted with like 20 levels...
TW games just cannot be painted with a brush that has touched any other game, especially CIV. CIV is a computerised Board game... good it is but TW is is not.
I have spent every minute after work and social time spent on this game from release and I look forward to getting my hand on the modding tools!
A few kinks, but like all TW games, they seem to get better with Age.
You have to remember that there are NO games that are as complex TW. FPS games are scripted with opponent AI taking second fiddle to GFx and RTS games are again scripted with like 20 levels...
TW games just cannot be painted with a brush that has touched any other game, especially CIV. CIV is a computerised Board game... good it is but TW is is not.
I have spent every minute after work and social time spent on this game from release and I look forward to getting my hand on the modding tools!
There are games more complex than TW. Master of orion III (which was not that good) was one of them and some of the games from Paradox Interactive which seem to be just like TW are more complex in my view. But that doesn't make a game. In master of orion III the complexity was shit, and I have yet to find a way to play the Paradox games.Bretty said:
Europa universalis? Thats your paradox game. Yeesh that game turns my brain to putty as well. In concept, I love it, but its just so drawn out I have been unable to do it.Ronwue said:
Now MOO3, there you have tugged on my heartstrings. That was a terrible game, and I waited and waited and waited and bought it on release.
I'm a big fan of empire at the moment, and enjoyed your comments. (though I cannot figure out this whole naval combat thing.)
In the special forces edition you get 5 or more unique units to some factions. In the normal version you dont get.Luke_446 said:
But the units themselfs arent amazingly godly or anything. They just have more stats and better detail in them. Its up to you if its worth the extra cash or not.
In the special forces edition you get 5 or more unique units to some factions. In the normal version you dont get.
But the units themselfs arent amazingly godly or anything. They just have more stats and better detail in them. Its up to you if its worth the extra cash or not.[/quote]
thanks i was just wondering why it was like ten pounds more which for 5 units seems a bit steep but if im going to get it i may as well get the whole game.
But the units themselfs arent amazingly godly or anything. They just have more stats and better detail in them. Its up to you if its worth the extra cash or not.[/quote]
thanks i was just wondering why it was like ten pounds more which for 5 units seems a bit steep but if im going to get it i may as well get the whole game.
I tried the game, and based on a few hours of gameplay with the Road to Independance and a bit of Grand Campaign, I'm thoroughly disappointed:
1. Technically, the game is a mess. Random crashing for no apparent reason is common. It took a "patch" from a torrent site to get the game (ORIGINAL game) to stay stable long enough to play a bit, and even so it crashes at random. Also, the game doesn't let me use anything higher than Medium settings, even though I get smooth performance with those and see no reason to lock the higher settings out. As it stands, the game looks worse than Medieval 2. Maybe it would look better, but the game doesn't permit me to try the higher graphics options.
2. The Campaign map improvements are nice, but the entire thing is laid out in a slightly confusing manner. Revamping a ton of the game concepts is fine, but then you're supposed to provide a bit more than a vague tutorial.
3. Battles are broken. Unit AI is nonexistant. Units randomly ignore orders, perfom actions you did not order them to (an attack order and a move order should be easy to identify), break formation, etc.
So far, it's the worst Total War experience I've had.
1. Technically, the game is a mess. Random crashing for no apparent reason is common. It took a "patch" from a torrent site to get the game (ORIGINAL game) to stay stable long enough to play a bit, and even so it crashes at random. Also, the game doesn't let me use anything higher than Medium settings, even though I get smooth performance with those and see no reason to lock the higher settings out. As it stands, the game looks worse than Medieval 2. Maybe it would look better, but the game doesn't permit me to try the higher graphics options.
2. The Campaign map improvements are nice, but the entire thing is laid out in a slightly confusing manner. Revamping a ton of the game concepts is fine, but then you're supposed to provide a bit more than a vague tutorial.
3. Battles are broken. Unit AI is nonexistant. Units randomly ignore orders, perfom actions you did not order them to (an attack order and a move order should be easy to identify), break formation, etc.
So far, it's the worst Total War experience I've had.
I'm still unsure whether or not I like this game. I dunno... It's gone all 'power diplomacy', and less about the battling.
One of the biggest things to note withing Empire that seems to have been missed is with the expansion of the campaign map came a few... weird changes.
For example, France is no longer a couple of povinces, instead france itself is one MASSIVE province (as is spain) that can be taken in ONE fight (when you take paris). Also each of the theaters when put together might make the same size as MTW/RTW/MTW2 but each of the theatres is quite small (you can get from one side of europe to the other pretty dang fast).
As britan I sat there for about 14 years twiddling my thumbs before deciding to try a fight (the Huron Confederacy), They actually took an outpost i had in the americas, but I was able to get troops in there retake the outpost then take the Huron homeland within about 10 turns. Then on of my allies got into a scrap with france and I shrugged and invaded them wiping them out within 4 years (totally...).
All in all I think that the grand campaign was hit to hard with simplification in terms of # of provinces in europe (at least). One thing I think that they shouldn't have done was the addition of india. India feels in terms of size about as big as europe itself, and most of the provinces are at least as big as France by itself. I've yet to try sending my military in there, but it seems like they could have dropped india completely and expanded europe and had a better game for it.
On the technical side, I haven't fought with bugs as much as some others seem to have. The graphics seem to be degraded from previous installments on the battle map, but a part of me wants to blame that on the fact that you're using rifles rather than swords for the most part. The AI is dumber than a box of rocks, often running strait into a kill scape you set up (by standing on a hill with your troops in a very wide U shape) and get diced to pieces. Arty seems to be useless except to knock down fortifications, which I don't believe was historically accurate. I mean I've sat there and pounded away at an advancing army taking out about 15 people in the time it took them to get from their deployment spot to being within my armies range. The only time hitting an army with artillery was ever useful was when my first barrage at a troop deployed near a wall, took out the enemy general by a fluke.
I think most of my dislikes will be fixed by the mod community, but I still think that Europe should be larger than india.
Edit: I did want to add that oddly, if you win by large margins it'll still be called a "close" victory. If you win by STUPIDLY large margins it'll be called decisive, I've yet to have a Heroic victory.
For example, France is no longer a couple of povinces, instead france itself is one MASSIVE province (as is spain) that can be taken in ONE fight (when you take paris). Also each of the theaters when put together might make the same size as MTW/RTW/MTW2 but each of the theatres is quite small (you can get from one side of europe to the other pretty dang fast).
As britan I sat there for about 14 years twiddling my thumbs before deciding to try a fight (the Huron Confederacy), They actually took an outpost i had in the americas, but I was able to get troops in there retake the outpost then take the Huron homeland within about 10 turns. Then on of my allies got into a scrap with france and I shrugged and invaded them wiping them out within 4 years (totally...).
All in all I think that the grand campaign was hit to hard with simplification in terms of # of provinces in europe (at least). One thing I think that they shouldn't have done was the addition of india. India feels in terms of size about as big as europe itself, and most of the provinces are at least as big as France by itself. I've yet to try sending my military in there, but it seems like they could have dropped india completely and expanded europe and had a better game for it.
On the technical side, I haven't fought with bugs as much as some others seem to have. The graphics seem to be degraded from previous installments on the battle map, but a part of me wants to blame that on the fact that you're using rifles rather than swords for the most part. The AI is dumber than a box of rocks, often running strait into a kill scape you set up (by standing on a hill with your troops in a very wide U shape) and get diced to pieces. Arty seems to be useless except to knock down fortifications, which I don't believe was historically accurate. I mean I've sat there and pounded away at an advancing army taking out about 15 people in the time it took them to get from their deployment spot to being within my armies range. The only time hitting an army with artillery was ever useful was when my first barrage at a troop deployed near a wall, took out the enemy general by a fluke.
I think most of my dislikes will be fixed by the mod community, but I still think that Europe should be larger than india.
Edit: I did want to add that oddly, if you win by large margins it'll still be called a "close" victory. If you win by STUPIDLY large margins it'll be called decisive, I've yet to have a Heroic victory.
I've had a heroic victory - I think I lost about 15 men to almost 1000 or some such silliness, heh.
Artillery's fine - 6 units if it in one army broke several enemy platoons before they got into rifle range, and then continued the bombardment as they stood there trading musket balls. Less expensive than replacing all those squishy troops.
A couple of nice features not already mentioned:
-Diplomacy is streamlined, and the addition of being able to make expensive state gifts makes it much easier to open negotiations - something I struggled with in previous games.
-Unit reinforcement and recruitment can now be made whilst the army is on the march. New units will automatically move to join the army once they are produced, and being able to reinforce your men after a full tern has passed no matter where you are adds flexibility and momentum to your armies. With enough cash you can just keep on rolling >
-There are now only 2 turns to a year - I believe there were 4 in Medieval 2. Unit movement distance is much larger than it was in previous games, and there's now the addition of a large zone of control around each army and fort. Should an enemy enter it you get the option to attack, and if you enter an enemy's zone you cannot move past without attacking them first. This allows you to set up forts in chokepoints much more effectively than was possible in Medieval.
-Cavalry is now almost exclusively a harrying force - charge a group of riflemen from the front and expect HEAVY casualties. Charge through your own men and watch both sides suffer. Move them through cross-fire and see the horses just melt away. However, charge them into the flank of an engaged enemy line and you can break their entire battlefront with perhaps a single cavalry unit. Good times
-Taxes are now raised against middle and lower classes separately, allowing you to either please the masses (resulting in higher population growth) or support the industrialists, looking to build future prosperity (albeit with less in the coffers for the time being).
-If you are counter-attacked during a siege your troops can deploy cavalry traps and raised trenches for cover, and artillery can dig in, becoming much better defended at the cost of being immobile and limiting the fire arc.
I've not had much trouble with bugs or any such - it's crashed randomly (mem leak) twice, but both times the end of turn auto-save meant I didn't loose much noticeable progress. Looks nice, sound effects could do with being bulked up but are ok. One thing is the naval combat - kinda suck horribly at it, and I swear the AI doesn't always obey the same wind laws that I'm saddled with, heh. That, coupled with the occasionally (though not persistently) deaf units, refusing to turn to meet the foe, or ignoring an attack order, are perhaps my only real peeves after having completed the mini-campaign 'Road to Independence', which btw is a very nice way of introducing you to the game in a more structured way than launching into the grand campaign straight off.
Artillery's fine - 6 units if it in one army broke several enemy platoons before they got into rifle range, and then continued the bombardment as they stood there trading musket balls. Less expensive than replacing all those squishy troops.
A couple of nice features not already mentioned:
-Diplomacy is streamlined, and the addition of being able to make expensive state gifts makes it much easier to open negotiations - something I struggled with in previous games.
-Unit reinforcement and recruitment can now be made whilst the army is on the march. New units will automatically move to join the army once they are produced, and being able to reinforce your men after a full tern has passed no matter where you are adds flexibility and momentum to your armies. With enough cash you can just keep on rolling >
-There are now only 2 turns to a year - I believe there were 4 in Medieval 2. Unit movement distance is much larger than it was in previous games, and there's now the addition of a large zone of control around each army and fort. Should an enemy enter it you get the option to attack, and if you enter an enemy's zone you cannot move past without attacking them first. This allows you to set up forts in chokepoints much more effectively than was possible in Medieval.
-Cavalry is now almost exclusively a harrying force - charge a group of riflemen from the front and expect HEAVY casualties. Charge through your own men and watch both sides suffer. Move them through cross-fire and see the horses just melt away. However, charge them into the flank of an engaged enemy line and you can break their entire battlefront with perhaps a single cavalry unit. Good times
-Taxes are now raised against middle and lower classes separately, allowing you to either please the masses (resulting in higher population growth) or support the industrialists, looking to build future prosperity (albeit with less in the coffers for the time being).
-If you are counter-attacked during a siege your troops can deploy cavalry traps and raised trenches for cover, and artillery can dig in, becoming much better defended at the cost of being immobile and limiting the fire arc.
I've not had much trouble with bugs or any such - it's crashed randomly (mem leak) twice, but both times the end of turn auto-save meant I didn't loose much noticeable progress. Looks nice, sound effects could do with being bulked up but are ok. One thing is the naval combat - kinda suck horribly at it, and I swear the AI doesn't always obey the same wind laws that I'm saddled with, heh. That, coupled with the occasionally (though not persistently) deaf units, refusing to turn to meet the foe, or ignoring an attack order, are perhaps my only real peeves after having completed the mini-campaign 'Road to Independence', which btw is a very nice way of introducing you to the game in a more structured way than launching into the grand campaign straight off.
Does anyone else miss the speech that your general would give at the start of each battle? Why did they get rid of that? I thought it added character to the battles. I also liked how it used to zoom to a defeated general in battle so you could actually see him get killed.
The new "size" of the map doesnt really bother me, I thought there were way too many cities before and I much enjoy the farms and such scattered throughout the map.
My main complaint is the AI. I understand that a game like this is probably difficult to setup AI for, but why are the enemies so ridiculous? You'd think they would have finally got it right this time... One battle where the enemy sent in reinforcements I just stood on the other side of a river, with all my lines setup in a U formation. The computer just sent in cavalry after cavalry unit straight into them, not even all together, they did it one at a time. I've seen many other occasions where the CPU seems to have no clue what to do at all and simply keeps reorganizing their lines and moving around the map in a completely non-tactical manner. When things like that happen it just makes me think of auto-resolving each battle because 70% of the time its going to be the CPU doing something totally stupid.
It sounds like I don't like the game but I'm having fun with it still.
The new "size" of the map doesnt really bother me, I thought there were way too many cities before and I much enjoy the farms and such scattered throughout the map.
My main complaint is the AI. I understand that a game like this is probably difficult to setup AI for, but why are the enemies so ridiculous? You'd think they would have finally got it right this time... One battle where the enemy sent in reinforcements I just stood on the other side of a river, with all my lines setup in a U formation. The computer just sent in cavalry after cavalry unit straight into them, not even all together, they did it one at a time. I've seen many other occasions where the CPU seems to have no clue what to do at all and simply keeps reorganizing their lines and moving around the map in a completely non-tactical manner. When things like that happen it just makes me think of auto-resolving each battle because 70% of the time its going to be the CPU doing something totally stupid.
It sounds like I don't like the game but I'm having fun with it still.