a potentially controversial thought.

[Wilder]

I may be in a small minority on this, but I feel pretty compelled to express this:

The original Rome was pretty crap. Well not crap, but certainly one of the weakest (in my opinion tied with Medieval 2) among a stellar seres. I played Rome and Medieval 2 and enjoyed them but happily cast them aside when many of the problems and serious design flaws were solved, for newer and oddly less beloved but superior titles. Yes I think Empire is better than Rome, please don't kill me.

It was plagued with rebels in inappropriate places that would appear for no reason, and important factions and areas, in fact most of the world, was represented as rebels. The cities were inevitably moving toward rebellion, no matter how well managed, and had to be periodically massacred to be kept in check. The units moved inhumanly fast and died in an arcade like frenzy of death, giving the impression that they were strange and delicate robots, and giving the battles a much less strategic focus. The factions where colorful but cliched stereotypes that had little to do with history, or even offered a compelling narrative, most could not produce basic unit types like archers until fairly late in the game. And many of the units simply did not work that well, phalanxes would drop pikes and fight with swords for no reason, chariots were useless, etc.

All of this is particularly frustrating, when you consider that none of these problems existed prior to Rome. I will always stand by the original Medieval as my nostalgic favorite, and not Rome (and, I think if you disagree with my on that point, you more likely than not never played the original Shogun or Medieval). My whole point, I suppose, is that while the period is exiting and I am very much looking forward to this game, I hope Rome one is very far from the minds of the developers.

Thank you, and as stated previously, please don't kill me.

[Destraex]

It is probably ironic that Rome and M2 were so successful. I agree with your comments in general about Rome1 lesser than the preceding titles. Many hate ETW, NTW and S2 in comparison to R1 and M2 although I am not sure why.

[Aeneas Veneratio]

It is probably ironic that Rome and M2 were so successful. I agree with your comments in general about Rome1 lesser than the preceding titles. Many hate ETW, NTW and S2 in comparison to R1 and M2 although I am not sure why.

Rome and M2 offered a diversity not seen in NTW, ETW or S2. Playing another faction was actually another experience to the other factions you had previously played. In the newer games the biggest differences between the factions were voices (ETW and NTW), colours and starting positions. This was especially obivious a replayability flaw with S2.

Not sure why CA decided to give us a battle map editor for S2 really, since there is no particular Japanese battle I care enough about to replicate.

[daelin4]

RTW compared to Empire and Shogun2 was very primitive and simple. Perhaps that quality was one reason why it was so fun to play. I mean sure you can't manage a faction-wide tax rate, or had a firing arc graphic for your missile units to see how far away they can shoot, but you could still order your heavy cavalry to run down those bastards and hear their screams and the clashing of weapons. RTW is very arcadey, but it's still fun. It wasn't about trying to be real, it was trying to command armies to kill other armies, and your army happened to be Roman and thus had names like legionaries, even if they weren't exact historical replicas.

[Humble Warrior]

Well Rome wowed a lot of us because of the graphics. I have to say I was one of those people. I didn`t believe it was possible to make thousands of fully 3D troops as part of whole armies on an affordable home PC, even when CA said that they could do it- I considered it hype, even then. I remember I would just sit back and watch MY Roman army marching around the place close up even if they didn`t really need to! I was that amazed by the graphics. Reminds me of when I saw Tekken on the original Playstation for the 1st time.

Of course, after a little while, the actual AI problems and cracks began to show although nowhere near as bad as Empire. And they fixed up Rome relatively quickly. But I do agree that troops moved too fast (I remember whining a lot about that one they ran as fast as horses, faster sometimes) and there was a lot of dumb stuff about it.

I can`t agree with you on MTW2, I thought, and still think it`s fantastic for depth and gameplay plus the added 3D graphics. That said, I still believe that MTW original is one of the best TW games only lacking a bit in the graphics department, so, for gameplay, realism and history it actually beats every other TW. STW did not have as many things you could do as MTW.

STW2 is way better than Empire, but everything is in my view. On it`s own, STW2 is about the level of MTW2, but with slightly improved AI, and much better animations, for most parts of the game.

[Rome2ftw]

I just dont know where your coming from on these complaints. My cities almost never rebelled, and im not even good at managing them. Units move to fast? I could run faster than them in real life, and they got tired out extremly fast. Considering you said you like the newest total war games you really cant complain about how fast soldiers are killed, seriously do a comparison. Over all Rome is my favorite so far because of the raw diversity in the game, the different factions, different types of units, different types of strategies you have to use to fight different factions. And the simple fact is it's the game I always keep coming back to. and HOLY they really dumbed down the seige battles in the newer games am I right?

Im not mad at you for not liking Rome, but I dont really see how you can make the complaints you did..whatever though, your opinion not mine.

btw, yes I did play Shogun 1 and medieval 1.

[sobchack]

rome was my favorite by far. best faction diversity of any tw to date. Also had far better sieges than empire, napolean, and shogun (imo)

"The units moved inhumanly fast and died in an arcade like frenzy of death, giving the impression that they were strange and delicate robots"
if i only read that sentence i would have sworn you were talking about shogun

[Armatus]

Thank you, and as stated previously, please don't kill me.

There is no need to kill you, because your worries are based on a different engine made between what 2002 and 2004?

You said you like Empire right? Well I think R2 will be much closer to that then R1, so what if any aspects do they need to improve from the current Shogun?

[Sir Winston Churchill]

I may be in a small minority on this, but I feel pretty compelled to express this:

The original Rome was pretty crap.

*gasp*

Well not crap, but certainly one of the weakest (in my opinion tied with Medieval 2) among a stellar seres.

*double gasp*

I played Rome and Medieval 2 and enjoyed them but happily cast them aside when many of the problems and serious design flaws were solved, for newer and oddly less beloved but superior titles. Yes I think Empire is better than Rome, please don't kill me.

You make it hard not to with statements like that.

It was plagued with rebels in inappropriate places that would appear for no reason, and important factions and areas, in fact most of the world, was represented as rebels.

Well yes isn't that the point of rebels? They always do happen to show up at the worst places at the worst times for no apparent reason. I mean look at those bloody Americans, rebelling over tea (joke)! But in all seriousness, that is the point of rebels (or better named in Med II, brigands). Sometimes people would try to kill people for no real reason known. They were bandits, and they were there to keep you on your toes. Rebel "nations" were used to represent factions that CA could not represent at the time. To be honest, I'm curious to see how they'll pull it off in Rome II without seriously undermining a ton of actual factions they produce. It'll be hard for them, judging by history, to actually flesh out each faction or, heaven's forbid, make them playable.

The cities were inevitably moving toward rebellion, no matter how well managed, and had to be periodically massacred to be kept in check.

Yeah, that sounds pretty realistic to me. People are never happy, and back then, swords made them happy.

The units moved inhumanly fast and died in an arcade like frenzy of death, giving the impression that they were strange and delicate robots, and giving the battles a much less strategic focus.

Well you have to give them credit what with it being the first attempt at fully 3D animation. It worked pretty well in my experience, sans an army of Marvel Flash's.

The factions where colorful but cliched stereotypes that had little to do with history, or even offered a compelling narrative, most could not produce basic unit types like archers until fairly late in the game.

I agree with you on this, and this was one of the many complaints there were at Rome at the time. Nobody really liked American Romans. Hopefully they'll make a better go at it this time around.

And many of the units simply did not work that well, phalanxes would drop pikes and fight with swords for no reason, chariots were useless, etc.

Well I wonder about that "no reason" part. If attacked in the flank I would see them do this and to me that seems natural to drop a long-ass pike for a sword in a CQB situation. Chariots being useless? Well, I mean, they kind of were. I don't know what you mean exactly by that term, but they still did the trick for me at times.

All of this is particularly frustrating, when you consider that none of these problems existed prior to Rome.

Well you had 2D sprites and diplomacy was either "alliance" "war" "peace".

I will always stand by the original Medieval as my nostalgic favorite, and not Rome (and, I think if you disagree with my on that point, you more likely than not never played the original Shogun or Medieval).

Which is ironic since besides Shogun I there were no other titles before Rome. I have played both, and Shogun is still my nostalgic favorite for reasons sometimes even I don't know. That's nostalgia.

My whole point, I suppose, is that while the period is exiting and I am very much looking forward to this game, I hope Rome one is very far from the minds of the developers.

But I hope Empire is too, along with the thinking they were using at the time. Disagree if you must, but before Empire, there was no DLC. That's something I'd like to see go, but as I'm sure many will flock to remind me, there is no chance of that "these days". I still look to Kingdoms and die a little inside thinking of what once was.

Thank you, and as stated previously, please don't kill me.

You are welcome, and you shall be spared.

[DarthShizNit]

Gonna say that I kinda have to agree.

Love Rome, and Barbarian Invasion is one of my favorite settings ever, but yeah, while it was all great at the time, going to Empire or Shogun now and then going back to rome of med2 and I just cringe at the bad interface and controls. I now, I've been spoiled not having to sack entire cities because they don't like their own poop, have no control over the economic workings of my empire and all that.

I still play it to this day because I enjoy the diversity and the setting (go Carthage!) but yeah, in my opinion the total war series has only gone up since the days of rome. ANd I'm glad we get to take all of those improvments and take them back to Rome again .

[daniu]

Which is ironic since besides Shogun I there were no other titles before Rome.

Except Medieval Total War maybe.

[Sir Winston Churchill]

Except Medieval Total War maybe.

I was referring to other titles other than Medieval which he said was his favorite.

[Red Hue]

When Rome hit the shelf the boards were Hate Central. Most said that they gave up great game play for eye candy.

It was the buggiest release only exceeded by ETW. Its screwy naval invasions drove people crazy, just like the games that came after.

The patches came very slowly.

But it was modable. Many of the bug fixes were done by moders. Jack Lusted was one of them who smoothed out a lot of the problems.

Many of the official patches made more problems than they fixed. So much so that I played the game mostly on one of the early patches for the whole time. But I played it for ever. The last time I think I played it was while I was waiting for ETW to get fixed.

Some of the Mods were Great! They made the game for me. I think it was RTR that had a map that went all the way to India. Maybe it was just a big map mod.

To be fair to CA, RTW was developed by the brand new branch in Australia. They didn’t last too long. It was the first 3d engine and had some teething problems.

Anyone who didn’t have the game on release day just will have no idea of the level of discontent that the community felt. The flame wars were epic. Those who thought the game could be saved or that it was good were attacked by those who thought it was bad or didn’t like the 3d.

To my mind it was worse than the ETW release. Though with ETW the magazines and gaming sites jumped on board to criticize the game after they were charged with “just hyping what the industry had to say”.

There were a number of CTD issues. Generals committed suicide or just died almost as soon as they came on the map. People had big issues about the historical accuracy and especially with some of the units. Oh, and let us not forget the AI issues… That is both the campaign and battle AI.

AI controlled reinforcements were worthless. Do you know how much controversy AI can generate?
Also those who thought bribes were ok vs. those who hated them.

I do hope they bring back bribes though. That was accurate. You could not depend on your mercenary troops or often your allies.

I am not quite sure but that controversy may be what lead to TWC. It was not around until more than a year after RTW came out.

Anyway, love or hate, I hope TWR2 has as few problems on release as S2.

[Prnn]

Well yes isn't that the point of rebels? They always do happen to show up at the worst places at the worst times for no apparent reason. I mean look at those bloody Americans, rebelling over tea (joke)! But in all seriousness, that is the point of rebels (or better named in Med II, brigands). Sometimes people would try to kill people for no real reason known. They were bandits, and they were there to keep you on your toes. Rebel "nations" were used to represent factions that CA could not represent at the time. To be honest, I'm curious to see how they'll pull it off in Rome II without seriously undermining a ton of actual factions they produce. It'll be hard for them, judging by history, to actually flesh out each faction or, heaven's forbid, make them playable.

I should not be dealing with thousands of bandits all year every year.
There is simply no justification for all these rebels, and my main focus should not be dealing with malcontents.

[Yojimbo]

Stopped reading after the word crap. You are on ignore.

[Wilder]

Stopped reading after the word crap. You are on ignore.

ouch.

Well at least I managed to provoke a little heat.

*gasp* *double gasp*

*sigh*
I know, I Know

Well yes isn't that the point of rebels? They always do happen to show up at the worst places at the worst times for no apparent reason. I mean look at those bloody Americans, rebelling over tea (joke)! But in all seriousness, that is the point of rebels (or better named in Med II, brigands). Sometimes people would try to kill people for no real reason known. They were bandits, and they were there to keep you on your toes. Rebel "nations" were used to represent factions that CA could not represent at the time. To be honest, I'm curious to see how they'll pull it off in Rome II without seriously undermining a ton of actual factions they produce. It'll be hard for them, judging by history, to actually flesh out each faction or, heaven's forbid, make them playable.

I really couldn't disagree more. Both in history, and for gameplay purposes, there needs to be a clear cause and effect for rebels. Sure there were periods and places where bandits became enough of a problem to force the military to deal with it, but those where in times of chaos and neglect, and still fairly rare. There is a reason Robin Hood comes from the 12th century and not the 1st. Roman era rebellions had a very clear cause (think Spartacus, Maccabees). And what is more, history aside, fighting a million samey often small rebel armies every other turn simply is not fun. A subjective claim, yes, but I think I am not alone in that.

Additionally portraying all those tribes and nations as rebels really does a disservice to them. the were "actual" factions, and while perhaps not as well known that is not a reason to portray them, somewhat bizarrely, as rebels. Rebels against what? I recognize that CA back in the day had some serious constraints, newly acquired by sega, trying to establish there niech in the market, but that is no longer the case. Not, mind you, that I am particularly worried about them doing that now, I am just pointing out that not all of us consider the original Rome is not the gold standard of the total war series, and I worry sometimes that CA will cave to consumer pressure and come out with an inferior product.

Well you had 2D sprites and diplomacy was either "alliance" "war" "peace".

Ah, but it worked. Problems are to be expected when ambitious new things are tried, and I am sure you agree that CA should keep pushing the limits. But some of the problems in rome really could not be attributed to that. like the blocky, clunky battle UI? there was little reason to change it from the elegant refined version they had in Shogun and Medieval, but gilding the lilly is a default impulse for game designers to resist. But this is not an attack on CA, far from it.

Disagree if you must, but before Empire, there was no DLC. That's something I'd like to see go, but as I'm sure many will flock to remind me, there is no chance of that "these days". I still look to Kingdoms and die a little inside thinking of what once was.

You won't hear any disagreement here. I liked Empire, but I will never argue that it was perfect. The main problems with it though where not its' design (aside from the overwhelming unnecessary homogeny of the units) but rather the frustrating and aloof attitude that CA developed at this time toward expansions, mods, and releasing a game that was not really finished.

If you like Empire more than Rome, its because you prefer long-range warfare over the mechanics of close combat and you prefer more focus on battles and less on management. Cause that's exactly what Empire was - the exact opposite of Rome and M2.

No, I actually prefer the earlier periods, with steel and braun and all that good stuff, that is one of the reasons that I will go to bat for Medieval. The reasons I take issue with Rome and M2 are the reasons that, um, I already outlined.

[Turbosatan]

Rome looked lovely & they certainly made sure the strategic level had plenty of things to do in it (not really the point of the preceding two, but still worth noting). I just wish they'd somehow managed to put some sort of battlefield AI in. Any sort of battlefield AI.

It was horrible going from MTW to Rome simply because MTW tried to beat you (& if you were unlucky, incautious or slow, it would beat you). Not with RTS brute force, but by actual military tactics; it didn't like putting its horsies in the way of your spears, & hated showing you a flank. It occasionally gave you the illusion that you are battling a real person, because it tries to stay alive.

Years later, I've not come across anything near the quality of that engine for sheer battle smarts (in a mano-a-mano, toe-to-toe stylee).

I was gutted with Rome 'cos it mills around stupidly, rushes from one side of the battlefield to another, usually with large amounts of its force. If it doesn't come at you head-on it's because it's sent its horsies into your pointy things. It can't win missile battles & doesn't seem to know which troops go where. The units don't seem connected to each other at all, each fights like an individual rather as part of a whole (Empire (the point I stopped buying TW games) had an eerily similar AI feel on the battlefield, despite everyone having guns).

& please, no-one go "But they fixed it with mods!" No, no-one did. They slowed it down, they fiddled with formations, they changed the gameplay but in no way "fixed" the battle AI. What was most wrong with RTW was coded into the engine in the form of a battlefield opponent that wouldn't do something as drastic as try & defeat you, lest you got distracted from zooming in on the beautifully-rendered 3-D underpants of legionaries. What you could mod was the fluff, the bells & whistles that kept you from realising that as a gaming experience the thing was as hollow as a chocolate Easter egg.

All the games I've played since have been further attempts to refine this "let's do a pretty version of Europa Universalis. Oh, & maybe you get to fight some battles. Look how cool the battle's look!" -type of game, rather than the top-notch battle simulators that the first two titles managed to be.

[Lord Baal]

All the games I've played since have been further attempts to refine this "let's do a pretty version of Europa Universalis. Oh, & maybe you get to fight some battles. Look how cool the battle's look!" -type of game, rather than the top-notch battle simulators that the first two titles managed to be.

Quoted for the truth.

[Drtad]

I may be in a small minority on this, but I feel pretty compelled to express this:

The original Rome was pretty crap. Well not crap, but certainly one of the weakest (in my opinion tied with Medieval 2) among a stellar seres. I played Rome and Medieval 2 and enjoyed them but happily cast them aside when many of the problems and serious design flaws were solved, for newer and oddly less beloved but superior titles. Yes I think Empire is better than Rome, please don't kill me.

I tend to agree with all your points. As a historian focused on ancient times, seeing the blatant inaccuracies of Rome seriously upset me... The units I could deal with, but the map and starting positions were so ahistorical that it made vanilla practically unplayable for me. Same went for Medieval 2.. Though Medieval (my favorite of the series) was liberal about historical accuracy, Rome and Medieval 2 really stretched it beyond what I could take.

That was one of Empire's greatest innovations in my opinion- removing the faction limit, bringing emergent factions into the fold, and removing the "brigands" and "rebels" that were cringingly terrible for gameplay and historical accuracy. While Empire didn't exactly flesh out these minor factions or go to great lengths to make them accurate, the fact that there were a great number of factions controlling their historical territory on the map was aesthetically pleasing.

My whole point, I suppose, is that while the period is exiting and I am very much looking forward to this game, I hope Rome one is very far from the minds of the developers.

I agree. Since CA hired Lusted who created very nice mods for Rome and Med 2, I think they've put a little more stress on being as accurate as they can be without negatively affecting gameplay (in their eyes anyway) which is certainly going to be better than Rome.

Not sure why CA decided to give us a battle map editor for S2 really, since there is no particular Japanese battle I care enough about to replicate.

...err, just because you don't care to replicate any, doesn't mean other people wouldn't like to? *scratches head*

[zg0301zg]

Mainly you have to look at that, when the game was published, and what similar games you had at that current period.

Game was complex, gave you a lot ot possibilty to explore rather then just have an army, do this and do that...the game had a soul, ....yes if you look it today its not very much attractive....so I still belive R2TW will have even greater impact then R1TW in its time