Tell me why

[Veetor]

Everytime I see someone asking "Which is the best total war?", the majority of the replies tell "It's Rome".

Now, I ask why, why people say Rome is the best total war? What makes it the best?

Thank you.

[Iolaos]

because it's Rome

[Vindictus]

The fighting overall is much more fun than the rest. I find Medieval Total War II great and all, but Rome has its own glory. It belongs somewhere.

Like on the classical shelf, alongside all the great games made with mankind. Keep it far away from those barbarians!

[Bringer Of Storms]

Yeah, I love Medieval 2 Total War as well, but its very easy to win that game, both on and off multiplayer. Rome on the other hand is much more of a challenge. Also, if you play Rome, then switch over to medieval, you'll notice that the Medieval soldiers are not nearly responsive or good at taking orders as the troops in the Rome game are. Rome troops charge when you tell them to. Troops in the Medieval game seem to take a few seconds to think about it, not to mention they don't even run that fast. They take their time. But still, they are both great games in their own ways.

[Vindictus]

I agree with Bringer. And I find Medieval harder to win because I don't play it as often. The fighting is more realistic, but then again, the more modern the total war game, the better the gameplay.

[caesar_37th]

The combination of easy accessability for new players with a lot of depth once you get into it. Also, the Multi-Player really has yet to be matched by other games which had gotten progressively worse. Adding that the lobby is still the most active of the older games prooves how long this game has been considered the best.

[Magic_8_Ball]

It's simple to get the hang of, but very hard to fully understand. Gameplay styles are still changing around the MP lobby. I suppose most of the people here like Rome because of the multiplayer, mods, or overall feel of the timeframe. If you're into the vanilla campaigns, then it'd be best to look elsewhere since the vanilla campaign of RTW sucks.

[Zarax]

The mods are the true game changer.
No other TW has been so deeply and extensively modded and filled with player love.

[MortenJessen]

Because it really defined TW games. Not making Shogun looking bad at all, but Rome was a first on so many areas. like gameplay, graphics and scope (not counting historical facts/lack of same into it) of variety. And one can keep coming back to it, use mods to add to the vanilla flavor if that is what they want. It just can not get too old, it gets better and better with each year.

[Zeraylph]

I've only played Rome Total War and Shogun Total War.

Unfortunately I haven't played medieval total war. It's just I like the features more in RTW than STW.

You can Naval sea battles, something you can't do in STW, It's unfair for me to say RTW has more variety of factions to play with since, STW is just in Japan. It's just how RTW is.... I can't seem to want to go back and play shogun total war.

I'm checking out a mod pretty soon for RTW

[QQz]

played both rtw and mtw, the era of rtw just feels more fun

[Punic Hoplite]

Because all roads lead to Rome. Therefore, Rome Total War is the end of the road to Victory!

Plus: Carthage.

[Incontinentia Buttocks]

I have played RTW and Napoleon Total War, and I think RTW is far more entertaining.

Having played RTW in the past, and having an interest in Napoleon, I gave NTW a try but I was pretty disappointed.

Although NTW is visually very pleasing, the battles are boring to a degree that can not be expressed in mere words. The AI puts its units (infantry, cavalry, artillery) in the same order, in 1 line, in 99% of the battles. It then proceeds to either wait for you in that same formation, or very slowly walk towards your troops while you try to get your cavalry behind its lines (which succeeds again in 99% of the cases). Moreover, all factions have more or less very similar units. In short: every battle is exactly the same. In RTW on the other hand there is a huge variety of types of units, and - from my experience so far - the AI is far less predictable.

On the diplomatic level, NTW is a bit more sophisticated and stronger than RTW. Still, most diplomatic relations are more or less fixed at the start of the game (France vs Austria, Russia, Britain), which results in very predictable campaigns. But in RTW, with factions having room to expand at the start of the campaign you can come into conflict with different neighbors every single time, leading to completely different stories.

Although I tried the first Shogun TW for some time it just was not my cup of tea... I don't know about other TW games though. Perhaps MTW is somewhere in between?