What is wrong with Rome II's design? Was it a Lack of Focus or was it just Rushed?
It's been a while since I played TW (Since November actually) but recently I convinced a friend to buy Shogun 2 FoTS and we were playing the multiplayer campaign together when suddenly it hit me as to why I did not like Rome II as much as I should have. No it wasn't the large amount of bugs those can reasonably be patched, it was the questionable design decisions and the the clear lack of focus that seems apparent in the game.To clarify my position and inherent bias of the game I'll put together a simple review explaining why I feel the game was not fun in my opinion. This game is playable but that says very little many games are playable but lack soul and polish a game can be playable but still be boring it and bug filled. Skyrim had many bugs on release and still does *cough bucket head* ahem sorry bout that.
I AM A HUMAN AND THEREFORE VERY BIASED. Please accept that ALL reviews are subjective. That said I've put in a decent 95 hours into the game 45 on a Role-Play (Rome) play through and 20 on a Steam-roll (Rome)play through with the others spent on a learning play through at release (Rome/Athens/Gaul). As you can tell I like playing Rome a lot (yes I'm a Roman fan boy)
I dislike most of the design choices taken in Rome II, much of which I feel wasn't necessarily put in to dumb down the game an make it accessible (though it could be argued it was) but in the game designers minds actually provided extra depth/Challenge/Fun.
These decisions include:
1) The reduction of options in Cities evolution.
I was acceptive on this in Shogun 2 because it made sense in the context and was done well. Every City if focused on had potential, you could capture a city with one build slot you can grow it to five. Rome II completely throws this out the door giving you arbitrary city limits Rome having less build slots than other cities? Small towns not getting walls? Excuse me but I'm pretty sure Pompeii was a Small town yet it still had walls and Syracuse (which arguably should be a capital) definable should have walls. This does not make sense in the context of Rome II. In Shogun II you are a Daimyo a military leader it makes sense that you would be focusing on only the key buildings that lead to a victory and not having to deal with building everything imaginable like massive infrastructure, hell the gradual road system would have made more sense here. In Rome II you play as the first true National Governments in the case of Rome, Carthage, Successor States or Egypt yet you are basically limited artificially and more so than in Shogun 2? What the hell! It doesn't make sense that you should be limited from a historical stand point BUT this is a game so let's look at it from a game play point of view. Game design 101 tells us that this is an Artificial Limitation, Artificial Limitations in a game are awful and though every game has them the job of a designer is to make them feel organic and natural, compare Call of Duty's Invisible Wall arena to Red Orchestra 2's "Deserters will be shot!" I know which one I'd prefer. Hell compare Rome I to Rome II's approach Population and Money limited you in Rome I doesn't that feel more natural? In Rome II you are given the Limitation of Money and Space derived from and animation gimmick... what? Please understand gimmicks are meant to enhance and expand the features not be features in their own right. This is justified as a way to add challenge it is something it does do. If that was their intention in the design process then good on them, they succeeded in increasing challenge at the expense of player freedom.
TL;DR City Evolution falls short of every other TW title save perhaps Empire/Napoleon:Total War it was made more "challenging" at the expense of player freedom. Design Mentality = Challenge> Player Freedom
2)The Food System/Squalor System
Really? This again? I absolutely despise artificial difficulty and this by far is the worst design choice I've ever seen in a Total War game. What the hell were the ancient people of the world some sort of proto-communist utopian society who believed the government should centrally hand out food to everyone? I thought we got rid of this feature in FoTS. At least it kind of made sense in a feudal setting (i.e medieval and Renaissance Europe/Japan)it does not make sense in the Classical Era. So let's look at it from a gameplay stand point shall we. While it was reasonably handled in shogun 2 (were only city expansion and markets needed food) the designers of Rome II threw logic out the door and said "Screw it let's make sewers cost food" wait what? It was done to force you into this micro game of balancing your cities and again limiting player freedom to create more of an artificial challenge. It limits player freedom by forcing you to build food building which in turn force you to build temples which require food need I go on? Needless to say coupled with the limited building options and space leads to you to make very little real choices in the development of your cities and villages.
The squalor system is ridiculous and quite frankly worst that Rome I's something I can not believe I'm saying. It couples with the the food system to create them micro game mentioned above. In game a barracks/blacksmith somehow generates as much squalor as a fishery? I'd rather live near a barracks as opposed to a fishery. It's overdone and limits player freedom
Edit: Now I was planning to address multiple points (Allot more than 2) but I have spent allot of time doing these 2 and people may not be interested (also I accidentally posted early) so I'll leave it at these two and see if interest compels me to finish of my last points. It just feels a bit too long to keep interest among anyone (perhaps a video would of been better).
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Originally Posted by JaM
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in from the start and the size just imploded on itself leading to features being stripped out that had been in there since shogun 1 that weren't finished properly because the focus was on the new 
