With the upcoming release of Rome Total War 2(yay), I felt it would be appropriate to ask the Escapists to reveal their personal favorite game/mod of the venerable RTW series and why. If you feel like it, share some of your favorite moments and memories. Mine is Europa Barbarorum, a total conversion of the original Rome that completely sweeps away the original in terms of graphics, depth of gameplay, and (an ungodly) devotion to historical accuracy.
Poll: Your Favorite Total War Game
- Thread starter DovaChiief
- Start date
Rome by a long shot. It wasn't the first Total War game I played (Medieval was my first), nor was it the last (working slowly on a Shogun 2 campaign) but Rome hit all of the right buttons and the modding community really kicked off for that game. Since, due to it being on Steam before they allowed modding, many games have faltered because we get the vanilla editions. I have nothing against those who play vanilla but when I want a real Ancient Roman campaign, I go for the the mods.
Plus, Ancient Rome is my favorite time period and loading up the Civil War (FREE as the creators call it) mod to play as Caesar rampaging through Gaul...priceless.
Plus, Ancient Rome is my favorite time period and loading up the Civil War (FREE as the creators call it) mod to play as Caesar rampaging through Gaul...priceless.
If Rome 2 lives up to my expectations (*and I've got a good feeling it will) then it'll be Rome 2, if not Empire Total War with mods. It's an era rarely covered militarily in games and is generally seen as polite gentlemen treating war like a friendly game of chess, it showed people it wasn't. I also think Empire total war was the bravest leap ever done in the series and despite it's failures it succeeded overall in what it set out to do.
I honestly hope that Creative Assembly get alot of inspiration from Paradox's Crusader Kings games and puts it into their Overworld campaign section, then Rome 2 will blow me away. There is no reason they shouldn't be able to do it either except for Sega saying "Nonono dumb it down for our audience."
I honestly hope that Creative Assembly get alot of inspiration from Paradox's Crusader Kings games and puts it into their Overworld campaign section, then Rome 2 will blow me away. There is no reason they shouldn't be able to do it either except for Sega saying "Nonono dumb it down for our audience."
I've never tried Rome with mods. When I got Rome it was before i knew of any modding communities and their fantastic works... I wonder if I can find my old copy floating around my parents basement.redknightalex said:
Much as my first was RTW (haven't tried any mods yet), I think my favourite has to be Medieval II; mainly for the campaign map stuff being expanded since Rome, going back to Rome it feels a little barren on the strategic layer, although I'm sure the AI still doing bone-stupid things when outnumbered is one of the disadvantages of the Total War series...
That being said, haven't really got into Empire or Napoleon yet, despite owning both; haven't dedicated the time, cuz I know I'm going to love it
That being said, haven't really got into Empire or Napoleon yet, despite owning both; haven't dedicated the time, cuz I know I'm going to love it
Rome for sure! I've spent so many hours campaigning in that game, it's ridiculous, though I'm not a fan of Barbarian Invasion due to the fucking cheap hordes.
All of the other Total War games don't hold my attention as thoroughly for some reason, probably because I love the Roman era.
The Middle Earth mod for Medieval 2 is pretty awesome, though.
All of the other Total War games don't hold my attention as thoroughly for some reason, probably because I love the Roman era.
The Middle Earth mod for Medieval 2 is pretty awesome, though.
I tend to have a blast in all of them though my least favorite right now is medieval 2 because there's no Darthmod for it. Darthmod for those who haven't used it changes everything and makes the games so much better. Darthmods do a lot of things like make the AI worth a damn, add new units, increase unit sizes (in Empire Total War I've seen 600 men in a regiment), fix unit balancing, and a whole bunch of other things.
http://www.moddb.com/company/darthmodproductions
http://www.moddb.com/company/darthmodproductions
I have to go with Rome. It's the one I always go back to. It was relatively simple and straight forward in many ways that they have never recaptured since. But sometimes the mechanics would feel very game-y and you couldn't help but exploit it. Like having your trade across the Aegean-sea producing more income than all your taxes put together or you routinely razing your biggest cities to the ground because no amount of garrison could keep them from rebelling or skipping agricultural buildings because they would lead to unsustainable population growth later in the game. But Empire is a close second because I love the way they redesigned the economics system to make it more real, controllable and dynamic. Combat was boring as hell thought.
Rome - It hasn't aged well visually, but it has the best variety of unit and culture types in the series, and it feels the most like an epic TW game.
Medieval 2 was pretty good, but it placed too much emphasis on support units like merchants and diplomats, the sheer number of them turned into a clusterfuck and took up too much game time.
Shogun 2 is pretty great, they finally found a nice way to keep the support units in check while making them extremely useful, but variety wise it just can't compete with Rome. Every faction can recruit all the basic unit types, only the 'hero' companies differentiate them, but it's only stat boosts to units that every other faction has access to.
Empire and the recent rash of Line Infantry TW games can fall in a ditch. I really enjoy Fall of the Samurai, but I don't think the TW franchise is meant to handle firearms past that historical period.
Medieval 2 was pretty good, but it placed too much emphasis on support units like merchants and diplomats, the sheer number of them turned into a clusterfuck and took up too much game time.
Shogun 2 is pretty great, they finally found a nice way to keep the support units in check while making them extremely useful, but variety wise it just can't compete with Rome. Every faction can recruit all the basic unit types, only the 'hero' companies differentiate them, but it's only stat boosts to units that every other faction has access to.
Empire and the recent rash of Line Infantry TW games can fall in a ditch. I really enjoy Fall of the Samurai, but I don't think the TW franchise is meant to handle firearms past that historical period.
Either Medieval 2 or the original Shogun.
They're quite different games because of their age and budget gap. Shogun 1 involved chess-like pieces and simpler city-building and war mechanics, but in my mind it was such an innovative and intellectual game, whith good graphics for the time and excellent replay value and longevity. It really stood out of the strategy games at the time, as it still does today.
Medieval 2 was essentially a rebuffed Medieval 1 (which used the original Shogun's game engine) but running off a polished Rome engine on a bigger map of North Africa, Europe from Scotland and Sweden southward, western Russia, across all of turkey, Syria and Israel. Not sure why they included North-east america in the last 50 or so turns, as it takes nearly 20 turns to travel across the Atlantic! Not worth going there other than for sightseeing and the Aztec's were surprisingly tough. I only managed to gab about 3 cities with 3 full-sized armies. My worst rate success rate in that entire grand campaign. But yeah, Medieval 2 was just a bigger and more enhanced Rome. I enjoyed Rome, it's my third favourite of what I've played, but it didn't seem refined enough.
So those are my 2 favourites. I haven't played Empire, Napoleon or Shogun 2 as my computer isn't powerful enough, but I've just bought a new one so I picked up Shogun 2 for £8 in the Steam Winter sale. I'm looking forward to playing it once the computer's delivered!
They're quite different games because of their age and budget gap. Shogun 1 involved chess-like pieces and simpler city-building and war mechanics, but in my mind it was such an innovative and intellectual game, whith good graphics for the time and excellent replay value and longevity. It really stood out of the strategy games at the time, as it still does today.
Medieval 2 was essentially a rebuffed Medieval 1 (which used the original Shogun's game engine) but running off a polished Rome engine on a bigger map of North Africa, Europe from Scotland and Sweden southward, western Russia, across all of turkey, Syria and Israel. Not sure why they included North-east america in the last 50 or so turns, as it takes nearly 20 turns to travel across the Atlantic! Not worth going there other than for sightseeing and the Aztec's were surprisingly tough. I only managed to gab about 3 cities with 3 full-sized armies. My worst rate success rate in that entire grand campaign. But yeah, Medieval 2 was just a bigger and more enhanced Rome. I enjoyed Rome, it's my third favourite of what I've played, but it didn't seem refined enough.
So those are my 2 favourites. I haven't played Empire, Napoleon or Shogun 2 as my computer isn't powerful enough, but I've just bought a new one so I picked up Shogun 2 for £8 in the Steam Winter sale. I'm looking forward to playing it once the computer's delivered!
I haven't had a computer powerful enough to play Empire and Shogun 2, but out of the rest it's a toss up between Rome and Medieval 2. I found the troop controls and AI better in Rome than Medieval 2, but I always got an alarming amount of satisfaction assassinating French and Spanish princesses (not sure what that means about my state of mind, and whether that implies deep issues with women from France and Spain or not).
I'll go with Medieval 2.
I'll go with Medieval 2.
Medieval 2 is the only one I've played so far. I recently finished a grand campaign as England, and I'm currently trying to defend the holy land from a Timurid invasion. It would be easy if those damn elephants weren't so OP.
I bought Shogun 2 during that latest Steam sale, but I have yet to download it. The size of the file makes me want to download it at a Starbucks. Bandwidth caps are no fun.
I bought Shogun 2 during that latest Steam sale, but I have yet to download it. The size of the file makes me want to download it at a Starbucks. Bandwidth caps are no fun.
For me, it's Medieval 2. It was my second Total War game, and the first that really sucked me in. Plus, I just don't like what they've done with town-building in the latter games. I liked it more when there was a ton of different buildings to construct that had various effects.
Medieval 2, simply because I love that time period. I had my share of fun with Rome: TW too, since you have war dogs there. I mean, you can cover your enemies in wardogs, WARDOGS!
And elephants, gotta love elephants.
And elephants, gotta love elephants.
It's easier if you hide behind tall sturdy walls. All those fancy horsemen and elephants sure are powerful, but they can't climb ladders or siege towers. Even if they manage to break down the gates or breach the walls, cavalry is still no good when fighting in the narrow streets, and the AI isn't smart enough not to trample half its' army with its' own elephants if forced to fight in a city.MrBenSampson said:
It?s a very close tie between Rome and Medieval 2.
But the mid to end game of Rome as the Roman families just clinches it for me. You reach that point when you?ve got 20 plus cities and tons of cash to fund your full stack armies. You start to steam roller your competition and it gets a tad boring.
And then seemingly out of the blue (at least your first play through) you?re suddenly caught of guard by the civil war.
What were your safe secure heartland cities, garrisoned by peasants to maintain public order, are suddenly the frontline, being assaulted by troops just as good as yours.
It takes what should be a boring part of the game and makes it one of the most intense experiences. Do you focus on dealing with the other families, and pull your veterans back from existing fronts and risk losing the outer territories?
Do you leave Italy and take the time to secure your borders before turning back to retake your cities and cleanse Rome?
Yeah I fucking love Rome. I might need to start again.
But the mid to end game of Rome as the Roman families just clinches it for me. You reach that point when you?ve got 20 plus cities and tons of cash to fund your full stack armies. You start to steam roller your competition and it gets a tad boring.
And then seemingly out of the blue (at least your first play through) you?re suddenly caught of guard by the civil war.
What were your safe secure heartland cities, garrisoned by peasants to maintain public order, are suddenly the frontline, being assaulted by troops just as good as yours.
It takes what should be a boring part of the game and makes it one of the most intense experiences. Do you focus on dealing with the other families, and pull your veterans back from existing fronts and risk losing the outer territories?
Do you leave Italy and take the time to secure your borders before turning back to retake your cities and cleanse Rome?
Yeah I fucking love Rome. I might need to start again.
Rome: Total War remains to be favourite to this day. It has aged pretty wel and while Empire improved on a lot gameplay-wise, it never felt quite as immersive and abundant in atmosphere as Rome did. I could play that game for days on end before I could tear myself away from my campaign to conquer all of Europe with my Julii.