Can CA recover from Rome 2 ?

[dvk901]

TBH, I don't think CA cares much about what anyone thinks of their games. According to what I've read, they sold six times as many copies of Rome2 through pre-orders than they did RTW in total. Good marketing (though deceptive) was probably the driver for that, and, the fact that RTW was so popular to so many people. That's a lot of change when you think in terms of millions of copies at $60 a pop.

What drives all the patches and last minute antics to fix the original disaster? DLC, of course. Here again, you have an incomplete offering that lacked the Greeks and Seleucid for heaven's sake, and you want to get your money for those DLC's at $10 bucks a pop for say, a million of them. Yeah, some patches would be a good thing, would they not? It is a self-driven process to protect the product, and protect the ability of the product to make even more money.

I don't fault CA for this at all (except the deceptive advertising). These companies HAVE to make money or they go away for good. The modern day way of doing that seems to be Steam and DLCs. Ok, I can live with that. But what is disappointing to me is that Rome2 is NOT an improvement on RTW. People say that the graphics, Vanilla to Vanilla, are better. So What? You can't credit them for that, because if they weren't better people would laugh them off the planet! So what's improved? Battles. Not so far. The Strat map experience? Different, yes, but a stretch to call it anything like improved and even MORE intuitive and feature filled that the original.
At best, it's just 'different'. Some like it, many don't. For me, most of it is pure rubbish. But for others it's great because they like the simplicity. That's ok too. As a modder I always tried to listen to what people wanted in their game and address that if I could.

But then I come back to the deceptive advertising and hype. This just jams in my throat and chokes me. I had little reason to trust CA before, and none now. It will take a miracle for them to recover from that...(even if they did care).

[PointOfViewGun]

As I said:
Statistics are slippery things, anybody can look at them and see what they want to see. Not to say statistics are useless, just slippery.

How come you're not making this argument in AlQamar's thread? You posted in that thread. The whole purpose of that thread is to use statistics. Yet, not a single word was used by you on how slippery statistics can be when it's used to show misleadingly how bad Rome II was. Double standards?

[alQamar]

I challenge you to find a single post from CA about the fundamental gameplay issues people complain about (family tree, torching gates etc.) which says anything substantial. Since TWC was down so much, I have spent a lot of time reading .com, and I have not seen any.

Now about the hostility: CA brought it on to themselves. Here is the story in three points:

1. The game has bugs, balance and optimization problems - it's just like any other TW game, people are upset that CA still can't figure it out, but this is a temporary issue and can be fixed.
2. CA made stupid gameplay decisions. Now they are locked in defending them and can't change these without admitting that they were wrong. The CA apology was about the greater than average bug presence and not anything gameplay related. I doubt they would ever admit any mistakes and change anything in that - this breeds hostility. Especially when the PR character says that the communication with the fans will be better just to go back to total silence mode....
3. The light year difference between the actual release and the marketing bs makes many people think that they were lied to - no wonder they are hostile.

So while #1 is typical for CA releases and would result only in people being upset but not hostile, points #2 and #3 are new problems and the main reasons of hostility.

I would be very interested if Suketh will accept this challenge and does not evade talking gibberish and being nitpicking on certain things.

Follow up this posting and subsequent ones to see how broken the game is. I do not see a single point people keep defending this crap game.
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...php?p=13314323

@The Sutekh
Or do you really believe there’s a single player who has actually enjoyed those things?

I guess his answer: he will skip your entire statement and hangup on this single line as he hates absolute statements he can disproof easily.
There is a single player around, and it may be at least himself without feeling exposed.

Or will answer to it with a single line instead of going it through by every statement.

So a game that is still a top 10 seller, and most played game on Steam is on life support? I can't imagine what a game that isn't a top seller is then. Dead?

Too bad in the business world, sales are what determines a success. It doesn't matter how "good" the game is, if it sells, it gets more games. If it doesn't sell, it's dead. Simple.

Also I take the user reviews with a grain of salt, and this is a rare game where I say the Critics are right, and the users are all horribly, horribly wrong. Rome 2 is a good game. Worthy successor to Rome 1.

^^

Lmao

In the top ten. Have you seen all the 'blockbuster' games it is competing with and if you notice the steam graphs, less and less people are playing the game.

Thanks for saving my time answering this trolling post thoroughly.

How come you're not making this argument in AlQamar's thread? You posted in that thread. The whole purpose of that thread is to use statistics. Yet, not a single word was used by you on how slippery statistics can be when it's used to show misleadingly how bad Rome II was. Double standards?

A valid question indeed Suketh.

What features did Rome have that Rome II doesn't have?

Now I caught you having double standards mate!

Question above asked and got presented a proper answer you turned around you point in the next post. You are talking about hysteria and false claims of others so often and now you got things presented you switch your question to the opposite. Shameful dispray.

One thing that stands out for me from Rome is actually having diplomats to initiate diplomatic relations with other factions. I personally have no desire for a family tree. It rarely added anything to my gameplay. I also founded having a general with dozens of traits to be quite unrealistic and pointless. Rome II still has a lot of trait options, maybe even more than Rome but it more realistically assigns them to characters. I wouldn't really fret over having less diplomatic options such as not sharing map information or giving regions to an other faction. The difference in buildings buildings is still something I'm considering.

On the other hand, what does Rome II have that Rome didn't have?

Have a read here
You could accept this list at least most of it if you do not include personal preferences like Kaza did and you do declining your personal need for a family tree.

http://forums.totalwar.com/showthrea...nt-from-Rome-1

Putting aside the whole point of whether CA was deliberately lying to the customers or was just this incompetent or whether it's a problem at all, the numbers do speak for themselves. It is true that people who complain are more vocal, and it is also true that TWC members and assorted others complaining on .com or Steam are a minority compared to the entire customer base. At the end of the day, CA made a load of money on preorders, and their marketing and game development strategy to cater for a wider fanbase paid off.

I think there are two interesting questions here.
1. Did they make enough money by now so that they could take a hit on DLC sales (if DLC sales were a large part of the profit before)?
2. Can they repeat this with future titles, banking on casuals* (returning or new) to deliver a profit even if their hardcore fanbase declines?

* casual = player for who a TW title is just one of many purchased games.

If the answer is yes to both, then this is a good business strategy regardless of how much someone hates it. CA's reputation will certainly take a hit and they won't be seen any better than any of the other money-hungry companies delivering the bare minimum, but that would count for little.

I am very curious how many of those casual and veteran players will launch the game after a dlc release and if we clearly see a high peak again in the Steam stats like it was usual on former releases like fall of the samurai etc. or if the impact of a DLC will be minor.

Based on what exactly?
Empire: Total War - 78% never captured 100 regions
Napoleon: Total War - 68.4% never played for 30 hours
Total War: Shogun 2 - 71% never became Shogun
Civilization V - 77.8% never beat the game on the Cheiftan difficulty level
Europa Universalis IV - 81.8% never conquered a province
Mount & Blade: With Fire and Sword - 88.3% never started a main storyline quest found in the three main factions
Suddenly that 30% figure is looking pretty good, no?

This is correct. I still cannot grasp why a good portion only buy a game for having it not playing it. Especially Civ5 makes an evidence here with over 30% never played the game (not found a ruin which you do after 5 minutes gaming.

[stackero]

How come you're not making this argument in AlQamar's thread? You posted in that thread. The whole purpose of that thread is to use statistics. Yet, not a single word was used by you on how slippery statistics can be when it's used to show misleadingly how bad Rome II was. Double standards?

As I said:
Statistics are slippery things, anybody can look at them and see what they want to see. Not to say statistics are useless, just slippery.

I Don' feel the need to reply to every post in this thread, whether I agree with them or not. and if your keeping such good track of my postings then you'll know, I never quote statistics, not that I recall anyway. Because there 'slippery'.

But will sometimes respond to a post using poor examples to make a point. Double standards are in the eye of the beholder.

Good gaming.

[stackero]

TBH, I don't think CA cares much about what anyone thinks of their games. According to what I've read, they sold six times as many copies of Rome2 through pre-orders than they did RTW in total. Good marketing (though deceptive) was probably the driver for that, and, the fact that RTW was so popular to so many people. That's a lot of change when you think in terms of millions of copies at $60 a pop.

What drives all the patches and last minute antics to fix the original disaster? DLC, of course. Here again, you have an incomplete offering that lacked the Greeks and Seleucid for heaven's sake, and you want to get your money for those DLC's at $10 bucks a pop for say, a million of them. Yeah, some patches would be a good thing, would they not? It is a self-driven process to protect the product, and protect the ability of the product to make even more money.

I don't fault CA for this at all (except the deceptive advertising). These companies HAVE to make money or they go away for good. The modern day way of doing that seems to be Steam and DLCs. Ok, I can live with that. But what is disappointing to me is that Rome2 is NOT an improvement on RTW. People say that the graphics, Vanilla to Vanilla, are better. So What? You can't credit them for that, because if they weren't better people would laugh them off the planet! So what's improved? Battles. Not so far. The Strat map experience? Different, yes, but a stretch to call it anything like improved and even MORE intuitive and feature filled that the original.
At best, it's just 'different'. Some like it, many don't. For me, most of it is pure rubbish. But for others it's great because they like the simplicity. That's ok too. As a modder I always tried to listen to what people wanted in their game and address that if I could.

But then I come back to the deceptive advertising and hype. This just jams in my throat and chokes me. I had little reason to trust CA before, and none now. It will take a miracle for them to recover from that...(even if they did care).

Good Post. Rep ya +1

[super_newbie_pro]

euhmm....

Can CA recover from Rome 2 ?
Yes they can. But no they will not do it.
The communauty can do it !

What do you think to ask permission to others guys developp others "little" mod and integrate them to all big mods ?
it would be great that someone goes up to a team all together into one big mod, major, which radically changes the game with each other's work, rather than everyone makes his little mod in the corner ... Volunteers?
I think to the little mod "new traits" : http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...e-2TPY-HOTFIX)
I think to the little mod "new cities" : http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...13-New-Screens
I think to the little mod "new sea" : http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...R-WATER-III-HD
I think to the little mod "4 turn / year" : http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...a-(10-10-2013) )

The little mod on the new sea + the little mod on new traits + the little mod with new cities + the little mod 4 turns per year + the familie tree (when ? who ? CA ? mods ? we dont know for the moment, but maybe CA in next months) + possibility to move all members of all families in cities like Rome 1 + unlock slots in all cities + 10x more buildings = A real Rome 2 !!

Dont wait CA, do it !! The communauty will win !!!

[stackero]

euhmm....

Can CA recover from Rome 2 ?
Yes they can. But no they will not do it.
The communauty can do it !

What do you think to ask permission to others guys developp others "little" mod and integrate them to all big mods ?
it would be great that someone goes up to a team all together into one big mod, major, which radically changes the game with each other's work, rather than everyone makes his little mod in the corner ... Volunteers?
I think to the little mod "new traits" : http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...e-2TPY-HOTFIX)
I think to the little mod "new cities" : http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...13-New-Screens
I think to the little mod "new sea" : http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...R-WATER-III-HD

The little mod on the new sea + the little mod on new traits + the little mod with new cities + the familie tree (when ? who ? CA ? mods ? we dont know for the moment, but maybe CA in next months) + possibility to move all members of all families in cities like Rome 1 + unlock slots in all cities + 10x more buildings = A real Rome 2 !!

Dont wait CA, do it !! The communauty will win !!!

Have to admit super_newbie, you make good sense, and your proposal is awesome.

However,... yes, I know there's always a 'However'. Rome 2 is still in such a bad state, in my opinion, that we still have to rely on CA to take the game far enough before modders will be able work their magic fully on Rome 2 before you can fully realize your proposal.

It still needs so much work; AI, Campaign,Battles, sieges,naval battles and more. Lets hope for the best. But I expect the worst, having to rely on CA.

And that is what we call a big 'However.'

Still your proposal deserves a rep +1. Excellent Ideas. Excellent post

Good gaming

Edit; All TW titles normally have had modders forming multiple teams to make a mod they want to see, but Rome 2 is going to need the modders to try to come together as one to improve this game when the opportunity arises. But again, another 'However' sneaks in.

[zonks40]

This is correct. I still cannot grasp why a good portion only buy a game for having it not playing it. Especially Civ5 makes an evidence here with over 30% never played the game (not found a ruin which you do after 5 minutes gaming.

The 30% are probably the copies sent to reviewers, it's obvious they don't play the game.On another note, it seems set that Warhammer is the next in line and is in development, so it seems they are moving away from the historical periods, I'll be interested to see how they market that one.

[pyj99]

It is funny that with all the negativity in the forum

42.46% of the people who took the pain to answer a poll on a similar topic "Enjoy and play this game"

To be honest CA has managed to recover quite well from a disastrous release with all the patches and now the game is up to par with previous TW release
(and better than Empire in my opinion 1 month after release)

So I have no doubt that the studio will survive and I definitely hope taht they wil continue to do Total War games

[Rittsy]

I don't think CA are ever going to come out and say "Rome II was a disaster. We're sorry." So if that's part of what you see as a 'recovery' it wont happen. However if in the next game we see them running public-betas (closed or open), having fans/popular community members come into the studio to play a pre-Alpha build (however limited) and evolving how they develop their games than yes, they could recover.

Even if the next game is another buggy mess but it has the features and some of the depth the TWC fans want I think the general opinion could turn around to become more positive. Just remember they are owned by a public company so they are limited in how openly they can talk about a game, even a few years down the track. So it is possible that they'll recognize their mistakes; but it's unlikely they will ever outright admit to them.

[alQamar]

The 30% are probably the copies sent to reviewers, it's obvious they don't play the game.On another note, it seems set that Warhammer is the next in line and is in development, so it seems they are moving away from the historical periods, I'll be interested to see how they market that one.

Probably not, 30% of all copies sold and activated were sent to reviewers in nearly all games around.
But apart from that, it would have been pleasant explanation indeed. Thanks for this delightful joke zonks!

[PointOfViewGun]

I would be very interested if Suketh will accept this challenge and does not evade talking gibberish and being nitpicking on certain things.

I'm not sure if you're deliberately being misleading or if you're just bad at reading a forum thread as I respond to that post 4 posts below his post with enough proof to show what a failed challenge it was.

Now I caught you having double standards mate!

Question above asked and got presented a proper answer you turned around you point in the next post. You are talking about hysteria and false claims of others so often and now you got things presented you switch your question to the opposite. Shameful dispray.

No double standards. Just your and other's inability to have a discussion based on a particular context. Your false accusation is even more hilarious when you yourself quote my own post that answer my own question. Of course, unique features doesn't mean that one has to like every single one of them. I asked a question about Rome. Some answered it then I provided my own answer and moved on to Rome II. Don't whine because I'm not bashing Rome II in my every post. You're trying to pick a fight for no reason.

Have a read here
You could accept this list at least most of it if you do not include personal preferences like Kaza did and you do declining your personal need for a family tree.

http://forums.totalwar.com/showthrea...nt-from-Rome-1

That's a really bad list. A lot of things in the last are merely content (Less 2D art in the campaign (buildings...etc), Cinematic view when your general dies in battle and when the wall/gate is breached, etc.). Some of them are simply in Rome II (Ability to upgrade walls, Fleshed out general speeches, etc.). And, some of them are just plain senseless (Drag and drop of unit cards to merge units, etc.). That doesn't mean they're all bad but you might wanna revise it if you want to promote it as a good list.

As I said:
Statistics are slippery things, anybody can look at them and see what they want to see. Not to say statistics are useless, just slippery.

I Don' feel the need to reply to every post in this thread, whether I agree with them or not. and if your keeping such good track of my postings then you'll know, I never quote statistics, not that I recall anyway. Because there 'slippery'.

But will sometimes respond to a post using poor examples to make a point. Double standards are in the eye of the beholder.

Good gaming.

Whatever floats your boat. You're gonna have to do better than that to explain why it's not double standards though. This one didn't do much.

[Radzeer]

I'm not sure if you're deliberately being misleading or if you're just bad at reading a forum thread as I respond to that post 4 posts below his post with enough proof to show what a failed challenge it was.

Actually, no, you completely failed to provide any evidence whatsoever apart from twisting my posts in a way that supports your opinion, and then accusing me of semantics which ironically is a proof of your double standard approach. Your denial runs very deep, so I won't continue any discussion on this with you, I just wanted to set the record straight. Your posts do have some entertainment value though, so feel free to continue posting logically unrelated nonsense.

[PointOfViewGun]

Actually, no, you completely failed to provide any evidence whatsoever apart from twisting my posts in a way that supports your opinion, and then accusing me of semantics which ironically is a proof of your double standard approach. Your denial runs very deep, so I won't continue any discussion on this with you, I just wanted to set the record straight. Your posts do have some entertainment value though, so feel free to continue posting logically unrelated nonsense.

I didn't accuse you of playing semantics on this issue. It was on how enjoyable Medieval 2 sieges were compared to Rome II sieges. So, there goes your setting the record straight down the drain. It's easy to see that I'm not the one in denial. Try harder next time.

[stackero]

Actually, no, you completely failed to provide any evidence whatsoever apart from twisting my posts in a way that supports your opinion, and then accusing me of semantics which ironically is a proof of your double standard approach. Your denial runs very deep, so I won't continue any discussion on this with you, I just wanted to set the record straight. Your posts do have some entertainment value though, so feel free to continue posting logically unrelated nonsense.

Two thumbs up.

In just one paragraph, says it all. Cuts like a knife.

[Anna_Gein]

It was oh how enjoyable Medieval 2 sieges were compared to Rome II sieges.

Let's see how "bad" are M2TW sieges :

- AI who build multiple siege equipments before assaulting the settlement. check
- AI able to use correctly all its siege equipment. Check.
- AI able to use correctly its artillery to create multiple breach before assaulting the settlement. Check.
- AI who position its troops as to prevent the enemy from entering the city and to repel back them at the walls. Check
- Interesting Tower system with defence active only when friendly units are near. Check.


Finally M2TW sieges not that bad. R2 don't have any of theses which is a bit problematic as the AI does not have any idea as to how it is supposed to attack or defend during siege battles. The major problem with M2TW sieges is that defending units don't flee out of the map but always regroup at the city plaza to automatically make a death stand there. Though it seems that CA understood how annoying it is as we don't had it since 5 titles.

Even the unit pathfinding is better in M2TW than in R2. At least we don't get the silly line of soldier after they collide with one building on M2TW.

[PointOfViewGun]

Let's see how "bad" are M2TW sieges :

- AI who build multiple siege equipments before assaulting the settlement. check
- AI able to use correctly all its siege equipment. Check.
- AI able to use correctly its artillery to create multiple breach before assaulting the settlement. Check.
- AI who position its troops as to prevent the enemy from entering the city and to repel back them at the walls. Check
- Interesting Tower system with defence active only when friendly units are near. Check.


Finally M2TW sieges not that bad. R2 don't have any of theses which is a bit problematic as the AI does not have any idea as to how it is supposed to attack or defend during siege battles. The major problem with M2TW sieges is that defending units don't flee out of the map but always regroup at the city plaza to automatically make a death stand there. Though it seems that CA understood how annoying it is as we don't had it since 5 titles.

Even the unit pathfinding is better in M2TW than in R2. At least we don't get the silly line of soldier after they collide with one building on M2TW.

Well, tell that to Radzeer. He thinks that Medieval II's siege AI still sucked as well. I think it was awful. Your checks didn't always worked well. Medieval II also had the worst path finding AI in cities with positioning troops on walls in a coherent form to be almost impossible. Sallying was a mess.

[stackero]

Let's see how "bad" are M2TW sieges :

- AI who build multiple siege equipments before assaulting the settlement. check
- AI able to use correctly all its siege equipment. Check.
- AI able to use correctly its artillery to create multiple breach before assaulting the settlement. Check.
- AI who position its troops as to prevent the enemy from entering the city and to repel back them at the walls. Check
- Interesting Tower system with defence active only when friendly units are near. Check.


Finally M2TW sieges not that bad. R2 don't have any of theses which is a bit problematic as the AI does not have any idea as to how it is supposed to attack or defend during siege battles. The major problem with M2TW sieges is that defending units don't flee out of the map but always regroup at the city plaza to automatically make a death stand there. Though it seems that CA understood how annoying it is as we don't had it since 5 titles.

Even the unit pathfinding is better in M2TW than in R2. At least we don't get the silly line of soldier after they collide with one building on M2TW.

Excellent Post Anna_Gein. M2 sieges are so far ahead of R2 that it makes you wonder how could it be that the same company made both games.

[Almogaver]

I don't know about that. Sieges in the original Rome and Medieval II sucked really hard. It's amazing how nostalgia works on human beings.

[stackero]

I don't know about that. Sieges in the original Rome and Medieval II sucked really hard. It's amazing how nostalgia works on human beings.

I used to hate doing sieges in both games R1 and M2 but they sure beat the hell out the broken sieges in R2.

Anybody says different is either lost their memory or sure is easy to please. As I lay sieges in Roma Surretum 2.5 I no longer hate the sieges as much I use to after playing R2 sieges.

Siege equipment works and the soldiers use them properly. No flaming javelins to burn down gates and... Ah heck, we've been here before. You get my point.