Engine?

[scoicarius]

I'd be very curious to learn who were the Lead Game Designers of the Total War games so far. Does anyone know where I can find this information?

Edit: This is what I could find in the Wikipedia articles:

Shogun: Total War
Director: Michael M. Simpson

Medieval: Total War
Director: Michael M. Simpson
Designer: Michael M. Simpson

Rome: Total War
Director: Michael M. Simpson
Designers: Robert T. Smith, Mike Brunton, Michael de Plater, Jamie Ferguson, Chris Gambold

Medieval 2: Total War
Director: Robert T. Smith
Designer: Robert T. Smith

Empire: Total War
Director: Michael M. Simpson
Designer: James Russel

Napoleon: Total War
Designer: Ian Roxburgh

Shogun 2: Total War
?

Shogun 2: Total War - Fall of the Samurai
?

Rome 2: Total War
Creative Director: Michael M. Simpson

Attila: Total War
Director: János Gáspár

[HigoChumbo]

Shogun: Total War
Director: Michael M. Simpson

[...]

Rome 2: Total War
Creative Director: Michael M. Simpson

Well, that already settled one of the arguments

[LordInvictus]

I am no expert but only can make conclusions based on playing the games.

The battles in Med2 compared to Rome 2 feel better to me. I get the impression of individual soldiers in units fighting together, cavalry impacts seemed better, and just overall found them more engaging.

In Empire I found the melee to feel a bit lacking. Still enjoyed the game since I like the era and enjoyed the battles since a lot revolved around ranged weapons.

The impression I get is for melee in the games after Med2 just feels lacking to me.

If it is the difference in the games' engines causing this then IMHO they need to change.

While I agree that infantry clashes are better in Medieval 2 (despite the fact that charges bugged out 75% of the time), cavalry charges were pitiful and Rome 2/Attila's are far better.

[The Despondent Mind]

While I agree that infantry clashes are better in Medieval 2 (despite the fact that charges bugged out 75% of the time), cavalry charges were pitiful and Rome 2/Attila's are far better.

I beg to differ, RTW2 charges are rather pathetic, it's like a bunch of rubbery figures hit other rubbery figures, and I have played mods both for Rtw2 and mtw2, in a lot of mtw2 mods, the cavalry charge feels like punch in the formation. Though yes they can bug but more so with infantry than with rtw2, however bugs seem to be a rather persistent issue with all tw games, and as far as I know all of them have game breaking bugs in the final version.

[LordInvictus]

I beg to differ, RTW2 charges are rather pathetic, it's like a bunch of rubbery figures hit other rubbery figures, and I have played mods both for Rtw2 and mtw2, in a lot of mtw2 mods, the cavalry charge feels like punch in the formation. Though yes they can bug but more so with infantry than with rtw2, however bugs seem to be a rather persistent issue with all tw games, and as far as I know all of them have game breaking bugs in the final version.

Did you watch the video? That cavalry charge stopped immediately after hitting the front line of those unarmored peasants wielding daggers. The only evidence of impact is the random men flying straight up into the air, which isn't that great to begin with. The horsemen themselves continue charging, but are stuck against the front line (yay unit collision!) so they end up sliding on the ground. The rather comical situation of peasants blobbing up against sliding horses while popping into the air or dying ensues. In Rome 2/Attila, heavy cavalry will penetrate or even flatten most infantry, much less peasants.

[The Despondent Mind]

Did you watch the video? That cavalry charge stopped immediately after hitting the front line of those unarmored peasants wielding daggers. The only evidence of impact is the random men flying straight up into the air, which isn't that great to begin with. The horsemen themselves continue charging, but are stuck against the front line (yay unit collision!) so they end up sliding on the ground. The rather comical situation of peasants blobbing up against sliding horses while popping into the air or dying ensues. In Rome 2/Attila, heavy cavalry will penetrate or even flatten most infantry, much less peasants.

I am watching cavalry charges in mtw2 for 9 years, one video with one charge, won't change my view of it. The thing is the engine of mtw2 can easily create really brutal charges, it's simple numbers really, both in rtw and mtw2 you can have a mod where cavalry can destroy heavy infantry in one charge yet it can utterly fail with peasants in another mod.

In RTW2 all of them feel off.

[Chris P. Bacon]

I gotta disagree Mind, I haven't played Rome 2 or Attila in a while and I love playing M2 mods (Divide and Conquer, SS, COW) but while both have awesome looking charges the more modern games just have so much better physics.

Watching people flying back instead of just dying in their normal animations when charged just looks so much better to me.

Go to 3:45 and 11:35

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxjq...ist=WL&index=5

This is still a cool charge and that was when Rome 2 was still only a month old and still riddled with bugs.

[scoicarius]

Feel really bad for the X-Com guys considering how terrible the game sold on consoles.

Hope their next game does well enough as a PC exclusive.

I'm glad it's a PC exclusive because it will probably have a better interface. The problem with games developed for both PC and consoles is that they usually have a lowest-common-denominator approach to interface design (which I greatly dislike), meaning the same simplified console-friendly interface for both versions, even though the PC version allows for a much more robust interface.

“When we have our meetings, when we talk about stuff, we only talk about PC,” said Solomon. “We talk about ‘What is the experience like on PC? What does the mouse feel like in this experience?’” The most obvious change resulting from those conversations is how the team is optimizing the interface to be mouse-and-keyboard friendly, moving UI elements and grouping them logically so that buttons we’re likely to press one after the other aren’t placed on opposite sides of the screen. “It will certainly be recognizable, but there isn't one UI widget that's the same,” said Solomon. We’ll also see more tactical information (such as detailed explanations of why your chance to hit is increased or decreased) displayed on the tactical interface, since Firaxis can now count on players sitting closer to their PC monitors and being able to read smaller text.

[nosuchname]

CA is beating a dead horse

[Arimahn]

Watching people flying back instead of just dying in their normal animations when charged just looks so much better to me.

Go to 3:45 and 11:35

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxjq...ist=WL&index=5

This is still a cool charge and that was when Rome 2 was still only a month old and still riddled with bugs.

I'd say it's mediocre at best. You can see how the riders simply come to a full stop except for the first two ranks. And that's under ideal conditions.
Plus the HP system introduced in Rome 2 doesn't help at all, since it takes like two or three seconds before soldiers start dying in some cases.

[Majorbookworm]

I'd say it's mediocre at best. You can see how the riders simply come to a full stop except for the first two ranks. And that's under ideal conditions.
Plus the HP system introduced in Rome 2 doesn't help at all, since it takes like two or three seconds before soldiers start dying in some cases.

That's what horses would do in a charge against a bunched up group like that. The front ranks smash into their target and slow down quickly, while those to the rear would pull up behind them and prepare to pull away to charge again. The heavy cavalry crashing all the way through anything but a braced pike formation that everyone here seems to want only happens in movies.

[Arimahn]

That's what horses would do in a charge against a bunched up group like that. The front ranks smash into their target and slow down quickly, while those to the rear would pull up behind them and prepare to pull away to charge again. The heavy cavalry crashing all the way through anything but a braced pike formation that everyone here seems to want only happens in movies.

Sure, but they wouldn't go from full charge to complete standstill in a second.

[Totalheadache]

Not touching another CA title till there's a new engine. Unless its very cheap. I'd suggest others do the same.

Fed up of paying them money to get framerate issues in sieges. (and if you dont know what am talking about you must either have a £3000 machine and be playing on 1080p or just in denial).

It's a shame but they seem to think poor cpu optimisation is ok in 2015...

p.s unless somehow they can work/improve the current but I just cant see it happening, same things have been recurring since they introduced the engine. And no amount of cinematic trailers nor their gameplays vids will convince me otherwise. (short of a decent demo).

[Cathal]

Not touching another CA title till there's a new engine. Unless its very cheap. I'd suggest others do the same.

Fed up of paying them money to get framerate issues in sieges. (and if you dont know what am talking about you must either have a £3000 machine and be playing on 1080p or just in denial).

It's a shame but they seem to think poor cpu optimisation is ok in 2015...

p.s unless somehow they can work/improve the current but I just cant see it happening, same things have been recurring since they introduced the engine. And no amount of cinematic trailers nor their gameplays vids will convince me otherwise. (short of a decent demo).

I agree. I'm done with day 1 purchases of CA titles. I am going to wait a few weeks to a month before making up my mind with this game. While it looks quite impressive so far, their most recent games have not been up to par (damn you Rome 2).

[Person012345]

The current thinking on the TW forums is that part of the reason they've said they're limiting battles to 20 units a side is for performance reasons because the engine is crap. I was skeptical, but I've watched the blackfire pass a few more times and you can see definite slowdown when they get all the units in shot (the blackfire pass demo has more than 20 per side) and I'm assumingt hey were using a fairly powerful machine to show it off. There may be some validity to the idea.

[Evan MF]

The current thinking on the TW forums is that part of the reason they've said they're limiting battles to 20 units a side is for performance reasons because the engine is crap. I was skeptical, but I've watched the blackfire pass a few more times and you can see definite slowdown when they get all the units in shot (the blackfire pass demo has more than 20 per side) and I'm assumingt hey were using a fairly powerful machine to show it off. There may be some validity to the idea.

I would only take the Dwarven Battle as proper gameplay footage, as it is allegedly not scripted and a live play through, with all the UI whistles and bells present. To me it was extremely underwhelming and had the same essence of Rome 2/Attila with a different lick of paint. I won't be buying it near release unless I can get it discount or cheap.

[Person012345]

I would only take the Dwarven Battle as proper gameplay footage, as it is allegedly not scripted and a live play through, with all the UI whistles and bells present. To me it was extremely underwhelming and had the same essence of Rome 2/Attila with a different lick of paint. I won't be buying it near release unless I can get it discount or cheap.

I agree, I actually said almost the exact same thing in the small rant I did in the thread about the price. Like I said, the blackfire pass demo had more than 20 units per side although there have been statements saying that the real game will only include 20 per side, so I'm not taking it as representative. But it was done in-engine and in-game, even if the battle was scripted and There is slowdown, you can see it chugging a little bit when they include large numbers of units in one shot. The numbers and epicness is pretty important for me in a warhammer game so if they scale it back below what they've achieved in previous total wars then that will be terrible and will likely cause an immediate refund from me (I bought it because I know I can get it refunded on request, I won't be playing it until reviews give me some ideas what it's like.

[Dekhatres]

Did you watch the video? That cavalry charge stopped immediately after hitting the front line of those unarmored peasants wielding daggers. The only evidence of impact is the random men flying straight up into the air, which isn't that great to begin with. The horsemen themselves continue charging, but are stuck against the front line (yay unit collision!) so they end up sliding on the ground. The rather comical situation of peasants blobbing up against sliding horses while popping into the air or dying ensues. In Rome 2/Attila, heavy cavalry will penetrate or even flatten most infantry, much less peasants.

cav got stoped because there was another TWO peasant unit behind coming in, it's because there was a lot of mass there and not bad collision, they easily stomped the 1st and 2nd but eventually stoped at 3rd and from what i could see they still killed a lot of the 3rd unit, iirc peasants units have 150 men so that's 450 men there, about 300-350 probably died in that single charge

you can get cav to charge in place/slide only when you charge a unit that is behind another unit, in this case the 1st unit of peasants wasnt the unit that cav was set to charge at, it was probably the 2nd or 3rd, in med2 a unit cant simply walk through another so this happens, if there's a lot of infantry cav just wont be able to get through and they will walk/charge in place trying to go where you told them to go, but this is hardly an example of bad colision, the only thing wrong with med2 charges are the men being thrown up nothing else

[LordInvictus]

cav got stoped because there was another TWO peasant unit behind coming in, it's because there was a lot of mass there and not bad collision, they easily stomped the 1st and 2nd but eventually stoped at 3rd and from what i could see they still killed a lot of the 3rd unit, iirc peasants units have 150 men so that's 450 men there, about 300-350 probably died in that single charge

At the initial point of impact, the knights only hit the first peasant unit so the other two are irrelevant until a few seconds later. In those few seconds, the cavalry should have broken through the first unit but they don't. The damage done is there but the visuals don't match it well.

[Dekhatres]

At the initial point of impact, the knights only hit the first peasant unit so the other two are irrelevant until a few seconds later. In those few seconds, the cavalry should have broken through the first unit but they don't. The damage done is there but the visuals don't match it well.

they did break the 1st unit but because the 2nd and 3rd one followed in so fast it could seem as if they didnt, the visuals actually match when cav charges 1 unit like in the rest of the examples in that video