Napoleon and Shogun II have a better performance than Empire in my computer, why?

[Incendio]

My computer is able to run these Total War games: Empire, Napoleon, Shogun II Fall of the Samurai in max. settings. Shogun 2 Fall of the Samurai Total War drops performance to 20 fps only seconds with naval battle explosions but the performance is still great. I can't understand why with larger armies in Napoleon and Shogun 2 in land battles these games perform far better than Empire Total War in my computer. Let's say I can have 3000 men in Empire Total War and 4000 men in Napoleon and Shogun 2 Fall of the Samurai and still these two games perform better than Empire Total War, I notice some micro stuttering in Empire while in Napoleon and Shogun 2 Fall of the Samurai the land battles are more fluid. Why Empire Total War is unstable in my computer? I'm saving money for a better and more modern computer, hopefully a new computer will run Empire Total War with better performance, but my current computer should be enough to run all these games with no problem:

Laptop gaming Alienware 17 R3
CPU: Intel core i7 6700-HQ @ 2.6 GHz, turbo 3.5 GHz
RAM: 16 GB DDR4 around 2000 MHz
CPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 970m 3 GB DDR5
HDD: SATA 1 TB @ 7200 rpm
Windows 10 Home 64 bits

I can't have a desktop computer but if you know about a gaming laptop that can run Empire Total War fluid with max settings, I would be pleased to know, I have a budget up to 2500$.

Just to remember you, I can play Napoleon and Shogun 2 Fall of the Samurai with a great gameplay experience while I can't play Empire Total War with the same performance, being Empire Total War from 2009 and Napoleon 2010 and Shogun 2 Fall of the Samurai 2012 newer and therefore more demanding in requirements, in theory, than Empire Total War.

[Daruwind]

I have i7 6700K at 4.4 GHz, 32 GB RAM and GTX 1080Ti and you know what? Empire is still lagging especially in prolonged siege battles...

Problem is the age of the game. It cannot utilize more RAM because it is 32bit app and every later game simply improve the optimalization (except Attila perhaps)...so after certain point more RAM/better GPU won´t help at all. Just improve the CPU but game won´t run 100x times faster. DOn´t expect it..

[Incendio]

Thank you for your feedback, at least it makes me feel better that is not a problem of my computer. Is a shame because Empire Total War could be my favourite pc game ever since 18th century is my favourite period of History but this game is unstable on my computer. I noticed that some Nvidia drivers even make it crash and stuttering, I just have to revert to older graphic drivers because of crashes. Hopefully one day someone develop a similar game based on 18th century with better performance. I stopped playing campaigns because of the map lag and sieges as well. I think I will focus more on Napoleon, Shogun 2 and Rome 2.

[Sirlion]

I have pretty much the same configuration, but I'm an MSI guy. I can run all of them just fine, Empire has minor drops but that's to be expected because of the age the game has. Also consider that a single atlas file which stores the texture data for all units in NTW and S2TW can cover more than half, if not all of a faction's soldiers in a given battle while in Empire units load textures individually for each soldier.

[♔Greek Strategos♔]

I have i7 6700K at 4.4 GHz, 32 GB RAM and GTX 1080Ti and you know what? Empire is still lagging especially in prolonged siege battles...

Problem is the age of the game. It cannot utilize more RAM because it is 32bit app and every later game simply improve the optimalization (except Attila perhaps)...so after certain point more RAM/better GPU won´t help at all. Just improve the CPU but game won´t run 100x times faster. DOn´t expect it..

Correct. Resource utilization is non existent above a certain point. You could use Cheat Engine to alleviate a few issues, but that's mostly for the advanced users.

while in Empire units load textures individually for each soldier.

That's because of the awful LOD issues Empire had-has.

[Standard Nerd]

Pardon my ignorance, but what does LOD stand for?

[Leonardo]

Pardon my ignorance, but what does LOD stand for?

I tried to find an explanation for that but couldn't. Anyway, I know this only applies for Skyrim, but it is the most useful information I could find.

I think LOD stand Load Object Data, but I am not entirely sure about that so take it with a grain of salt.

[izzi]

Pardon my ignorance, but what does LOD stand for?

I tried to find an explanation for that but couldn't. Anyway, I know this only applies for Skyrim, but it is the most useful information I could find.

I think LOD stand Load Object Data, but I am not entirely sure about that so take it with a grain of salt.

LOD means level of detail (3D environment). It's used to render different polygons of the same model structure. For example, you have the first lod (lod01), that is the model with the best or highest quality (most polygons) and then you have the second lod, with a lower amount of polygons and etc...This structure is been used that when you zoom in/out to render the amount needed. For example, if you zoom in, you see the best quality model (with the highest polygon count), if you zoom more and more out, you get the lower and lowest model (with the lowest polygon count). This makes the game run smoother (especially when you zoom out), because your GPU doesn't need to render all the highest quality polygons of your model (only when you really zoom in).