Epicness vs. Historical accuracy

[Tullaris]

I was wondering. Myself I find historical accuracy very important when it comes to Total War games. I really want to feel like I'm there, even if this makes the gameplay slower and more difficult. Fantasy units, too quick battles and unrealistic features break immersion for me.

I can imagine others prefer a arcadish aproach where quicker and spectacular gameplay and somewhat fantasy units are welcomed. It could be argued that, especially for the broader audience with less historical interest, the more arcadish approach is overall more prefered.

For the Creative Assembly this is a delicate matter. They need a balance to appeal to the broadest set of gamers to be able to develop these kind of games. An example: In Shogun 2 every warrior, down to the last yari ashigaru, is uniformly dressed and possesses some form of armor. Obviously this was historically unlikely but it adds a certain epicness. Even in Shogun 1 they added the Kensai, a single super samurai capable of killing entire units.

Which is why I added this poll:

How do you assess the balance of epicness vs. historical accuracy in Shogun 2?

[kentuckybandit]

I am all for historical accuracy, but I got my degree in history and it makes me happy. I am also a firm believer in history making a better story than anything you can make up.

[Maizel]

I think all Total War games so far have had a good balance between gameplay and historical accuracy. In my opinion at least.

While I often read suggestions from other players about something that should have been represented in the game somehow that I agree with, I think as a whole, the TW games have struck a good balance.

I do not think historical accuracy should be maintained at the cost of gameplay though.

[Jedi1]

Why do they have to be mutually exclusive??

[Maizel]

Why do they have to be mutually exclusive??

They are not always. But sometimes, they could be.

For example, History will tell you that only a small portion of an army were actual samurai, while in the game it is very possible to have several samurai-only armies. While I would have preffered to have less plentiful samurai, I can understand why CA chose to make the game as they did. A lot of people, including myself (despite the above), think that Samurai are badass and are a major draw of the game.

[TigerKarl]

I think we can't yet judge whether Shogun 2 is the one or the other.
For me i would highlight another thing as most important: I want a good dynamic in the campaign.
Like looking at your current game, going back to a savegame from 20 rounds ago, playing those 20 rounds and seeing a totally different picture at the map. I want the campaign to be interesting and not static at all.
So in Empire the Campaign was boring for me as nothing extraordinary really happened, whereas the campaign of Medieval 1 was so fun and dynamic.

[monsterfurby]

Hm, I actually always thought that historicity was something that helped "epicness", while the opposite would be arcade/casual gameplay.

[Chlodwig I.]

I was wondering. Myself I find historical accuracy very important when it comes to Total War games. I really want to feel like I'm there, even if this makes the gameplay slower and more difficult. Fantasy units, too quick battles and unrealistic features break immersion for me.

I can imagine others prefer a arcadish aproach where quicker and spectacular gameplay and somewhat fantasy units are welcomed. It could be argued that, especially for the broader audience with less historical interest, the more arcadish approach is overall more prefered.

For the Creative Assembly this is a delicate matter. They need a balance to appeal to the broadest set of gamers to be able to develop these kind of games. An example: In Shogun 2 every warrior, down to the last yari ashigaru, is uniformly dressed and possesses some form of armor. Obviously this was historically unlikely but it adds a certain epicness. Even in Shogun 1 they added the Kensai, a single super samurai capable of killing entire units.

Which is why I added this poll:

How do you assess the balance of epicness vs. historical accuracy in Shogun 2?

I'll vote when I played the full game


I can't get the micromanaging of units on the battlefield and the managing of my empire matched with the word "arcadish"
so could you explain "arcadish" to me?

[kAISER9701]

They are not always. But sometimes, they could be.

For example, History will tell you that only a small portion of an army were actual samurai, while in the game it is very possible to have several samurai-only armies. While I would have preffered to have less plentiful samurai, I can understand why CA chose to make the game as they did. A lot of people, including myself (despite the above), think that Samurai are badass and are a major draw of the game.

In another example, ambush mechanics is hard to develop just like how the real-life Battle of Okehazama of Oda Nobunaga played out. Not just unit details, but the actual mechanics of battle in Total War are standardised when in actuality, some epic battles would require unique mechanics unlike other battles.

[Makrell]

Epicness is awesome and adds a lot of cool story. Like the Amazons in RTW for example

[Jackhammer]

I'll vote when I played the full game


I can't get the micromanaging of units on the battlefield and the managing of my empire matched with the word "arcadish"
so could you explain "arcadish" to me?

If you played King Arthur the RPG Strategy Game, that is an example of an arcadey battle engine - where unit formation & manouever descended into basically a rugby scrum with absolutely no tactical finesse required or used.

[Nordmann]

Hard to tell from the demo, but it seemed about the right balance from what I've seen. Always room for improvement of course, but it's already a vast improvement over previous TW titles. Yes, I'm looking at you 'flaming pigs'!

[RO Citizen]

I think Shogun has them both.

[Dynamo11]

In my opinion you can't have a 100% accurate game if you have the chance to make the Shimazu the Shogunate. As long as we don't get lasers then I think CA has done a good job trading off the 2

[Nordmann]

In my opinion you can't have a 100% accurate game if you have the chance to make the Shimazu the Shogunate. As long as we don't get lasers then I think CA has done a good job trading off the 2

This.

In general they should strive for authenticity, but however much time and effort you put into it, there are always going to be errors or deliberate deviations for gameplay purposes. The former is certainly less noticeable in Shogun 2 than in previous titles, and the latter I can live with.

[Erwin Rommel]

History dictates that I cannot have a full stack of elephants hording around, stomping on Romans, as the Seleucids, invading via Sicily.

Epicness dictates, nay, demands screenshots in a debug camera of the epicness of such a premise.

[dutch81]

I think TWS2 seems to strike a nice balance ... as have the last few games such as NTW & ETW & MTW2. I did not care for many of the largely fantasy units in RTW and this was the big reason that I was particularly drawn to mods such as EB & RTR which did strike a nice balance by getting rid of these units, especially since the AI had a tendency to spam these units and lets face it it was no fun to fight a pitched battle against a stack of siege equipment or flaming pigs!

[Creaky]

In general they should strive for authenticity,

I like this word, and I think it's an important one. A game could never be historically 'accurate', simply because it's a game, not a re-enactment (and even then it's extremely difficult). But it needs to strive for a feeling of authenticity - that is, it needs to feel appropriate to the setting, and if it takes a few innacuracte steps (such as katana cavalry), but in doing so helps build a game world that feels real without compromisng on fun, then it's a good job.

From the demo, Shogun 2 seems to be doing great.

[Thefallenhun]

I have to say I'm a bit dissappointed my daimyo doesn't wield 6 katanas and ride his horse straight up walls.

[Becephalus]

I think TWS2 seems to strike a nice balance ... as have the last few games such as NTW & ETW & MTW2. I did not care for many of the largely fantasy units in RTW and this was the big reason that I was particularly drawn to mods such as EB & RTR which did strike a nice balance by getting rid of these units, especially since the AI had a tendency to spam these units and lets face it it was no fun to fight a pitched battle against a stack of siege equipment or flaming pigs!

Pretty much what I would have said, though I lean a bit more to the side of history.