# Empire: Total War



## golightly (Mar 4, 2009)

I quite like playing soldiers and this does look rather good.  Anyone got this yet?  What do you think are the pros and cons of this game?


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## Threshers_Flail (Mar 4, 2009)

Its out? 

I only got a shitty laptop, will check the demo now. Loved the previous installments, yet it has lost some of its magic from game to game.


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## kained&able (Mar 4, 2009)

apparently its proper epic. i want!


dave


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## Threshers_Flail (Mar 4, 2009)

Cross my fingers my home pc is up to it, will spend Easter break not revising. This game used to have such a grip on me, i remember first time i played RTW, didn't move from the PC for hours.

Can't believe I forgot about this game, naval warfare ftw!!!


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## golightly (Mar 4, 2009)

Threshers_Flail said:


> Its out?



Well it's on sale from Play.  Someone commented that it uses Steam to install which is something of a nightmare.


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## Jorum (Mar 4, 2009)

Am installing now from DVD - but yes it does dial up steam to unlock.
First installation failed as it unlocked but then said "steam servers too busy" (too busy for what ffs, all the data is on these two dvds)
However, is now installing...slowly.
15gb so far and I'm on disk 1.......


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## ruffneck23 (Mar 5, 2009)

my mate got his from play on tuesday but couldnt unlock it til last night


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## kained&able (Mar 5, 2009)

so how great is it?

I can't decide between this on pc or fallout3 on xbox as my next game.

Do the navel battles work? They are normally shit on this type of game.


dave


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## golightly (Mar 5, 2009)

Jorum said:


> Am installing now from DVD - but yes it does dial up steam to unlock.
> First installation failed as it unlocked but then said "steam servers too busy" (too busy for what ffs, all the data is on these two dvds)
> However, is now installing...slowly.
> 15gb so far and I'm on disk 1.......


 
Installed yet?  

Tbh, I'm prepared to put up with a day of fucking about with Steam if it runs well once installed.


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## Idaho (Mar 5, 2009)

I used to play Shogun and Mediaval TW a lot back in the day. Played online a fair bit too and was reasonably competitive.

Not played Rome, and probably won't get round to playing this one.


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## ruffneck23 (Mar 5, 2009)

my mates playing it but hasnt got as far as the naval battles in single player but says its gonna be a loooong slog.....


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## Kid_Eternity (Mar 5, 2009)

Looks great, although my laptop probably wont be able to run it well...


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## 100% masahiko (Mar 5, 2009)

If I buy this, I'd have no life.


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## Bakunin (Mar 5, 2009)

Speaking of sea battles, does anyone remember a good naval piratey type game called 'Sea Dogs'?

YA-HAAAAARRRGH, ME HEARTIES!

I'm still enjoying 'Stronghold 2 Deluxe' as well.


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## Idaho (Mar 5, 2009)

100% masahiko said:


> If I buy this, I'd have no life.



Don't be silly - of course you'd have a life. 






It'd just be a life where you forgo social contact, proper nutrition and personal hygene for a few months


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## hendo (Mar 6, 2009)

I bought it on the strength of this review from Eurogamer. I shall report back, but the reviewer virtually swoons with delight...


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## Silva (Mar 7, 2009)

I really wanted to give this a go (looks like Cossacks on 3D and steroids), but surely wouldn't work on the laptop. But then again, I thought Shogun was a bit out my league


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## The Groke (Mar 7, 2009)

Started to play it...

Finding it fun but daunting as it is not a genre I usually tackle.

Looking forward to the first patch to fix some of the glitches, but on the whole I am impressed!


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## golightly (Mar 7, 2009)

Part of the reason I'm interested in this game is because I don't often play RTSs and I fancy something different.  I've played  Imperial Glory in the past, which I think is similar.  

What kind of glitches are you getting?  Also, how well does it run on your machine?


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## agricola (Mar 7, 2009)

Got it via Steam today... its good, but by no means great when viewed against some of the total conversion mods of MTW2 or Rome.


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## The Groke (Mar 8, 2009)

golightly said:


> What kind of glitches are you getting?  Also, how well does it run on your machine?



Some control glitches in the battles mostly - sometimes units won't actually acknowledge your command and just stand there getting shot in the face.

It doesn't happen often though and it is usually recoverable.

Performance is - oddly - pretty good on the huge, detailed battles but a little stuttery on the campaign map?!

Perhaps some more optimisation needed here. I did just update to the latest drivers as well which, according to the TW boards, are untested and might be worse than the previous ones!

I am still tweaking the settings at the mo anyway.

My specs:

Core 2 Duo 8600 @ 3.2Ghz, 4Gb RAM, NVIDIA 8800GT 1Gb and Vista 64.


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## golightly (Mar 8, 2009)

Swarfega said:


> My specs:
> 
> Core 2 Duo 8600 @ 3.2Ghz, 4Gb RAM, NVIDIA 8800GT 1Gb and Vista 64.



Hmm.. My specs aren't up to yours, so I reckon I will need to run it with some of the graphics settings turned down a tad.  Anyway, payday next Friday, so I'll be ordering it then.


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## Cid (Mar 10, 2009)

kained&able said:


> so how great is it?
> 
> I can't decide between this on pc or fallout3 on xbox as my next game.
> 
> ...



Yes, they do... They're tough to get the hang of, but in a good way. The mechanics are detailed; you're having to take into account your position in relation to the wind, the maneuverability of your ships and theirs, the type of shot you're using and whether you want to board any, but at the same time the actual interface and commands are pretty simple because you can use grouped formations. 

They also look great, properly modelled from National Maritime Museum blueprints with decent physics built in. Ships can blow up and set fire to adjacent ones, masts collapse, hulls splinter etc.

e2a: imo the most disappointing aspect was the AI in siege conditions, it's just not very good at handling how it moves around the walls (or inside towns).


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## bmd (Mar 10, 2009)

agricola said:


> Got it via Steam today... its good, but by no means great when viewed against some of the total conversion mods of MTW2 or Rome.



Which ones would you recommend?


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## kained&able (Mar 10, 2009)

think i will order it once i have completed gta 4.


dave


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## Psychonaut (Mar 11, 2009)

Bob Marleys Dad said:


> Which ones would you recommend?



I played stainless steel 6.1 pretty extensively - its very nice, except the 'passive siege AI' bug persists from the original, although it might have been lessened. had a look at the darth mod too, same problem.


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## Nine Bob Note (Mar 11, 2009)

Is it worth £25 to someone who only plays the campaign maps on M:TW and leaves individual battles to chance?


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## The Groke (Mar 12, 2009)

Nine Bob Note said:


> Is it worth £25 to someone who only plays the campaign maps on M:TW and leaves individual battles to chance?



There is more meat on the campaign this time around, so yes - if you enjoyed playing it like that on the last one, this will suit you just fine.


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## Pingu (Mar 12, 2009)

Jorum said:


> Am installing now from DVD - but yes it does dial up steam to unlock.
> First installation failed as it unlocked but then said "steam servers too busy" (too busy for what ffs, all the data is on these two dvds)
> However, is now installing...slowly.
> 15gb so far and I'm on disk 1.......



the steam bit is REALLY pissing me off now..

so in an attempt to chill out i unwrap my copy of dawn of war II



lets just say its a fucking good job that anyone who is currently on my shit list isnt within punching distance


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## golightly (Mar 12, 2009)




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## Dandred (Mar 16, 2009)

Anyone know where I can find a demo of this? STEAM is telling me it's not available in my area......


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## Nine Bob Note (Mar 18, 2009)

Well, I bought it, and I've seen precious little other than "Connecting to Steam..." and "This game is currently unavailable"

Going back to the shop tomorrow.


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## Cid (Mar 19, 2009)

Nine Bob Note said:


> Well, I bought it, and I've seen precious little other than "Connecting to Steam..." and "This game is currently unavailable"
> 
> Going back to the shop tomorrow.



I got that, sorted itself out after I restarted steam properly (closing the steam window doesn't quit it). It's not a problem with the game afaik, it just requires patience.


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## Dandred (Mar 20, 2009)

I should add that the reason that Steam is telling me it's not available in my area is because I'm in South Korea. 

Anyone have any idea where I can get a copy of the demo from........


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## Kid_Eternity (Mar 23, 2009)

18 quid brand new here.


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## oicur0t (Mar 27, 2009)

I started playing yesterday, a fully patched version. Not encountered any problems yet, seems ok. Slow to start off, the campaign map is a lot different and there is less management so far, but this seems to be a simple story mode to ease you in gently. You can occupy buildings in the battlefied, and hide behind cover. This would work ok, but when you try to stick 120 men behind a log then can hide behind it in single file!


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## dilute micro (May 10, 2009)

I haven't got it yet but from the looks of the screenshots they've got the units fighting in files of 7 deep.    

WTF


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## oicur0t (May 11, 2009)

dilute micro said:


> I haven't got it yet but from the looks of the screenshots they've got the units fighting in files of 7 deep.
> 
> WTF



you can set them however you wish.


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## camouflage (May 11, 2009)

Idaho said:


> I used to play Shogun and Mediaval TW a lot back in the day. Played online a fair bit too and was reasonably competitive.
> 
> Not played Rome, and probably won't get round to playing this one.



Shogun for the win

I was tempted to get Empire: Total War, but it won't have the depth and richness as a strategy game of Europa Universalis: In Nomine. So why bother, probably down there with Civ4.


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## Jorum (May 27, 2009)

native americans + very hard/very hard = pain the fucking arse. I've been killing Huron and Cherokee for nearly 10 years now and still not really getting anywhere.
If I ever meet a 18th century tribal warrior I may have to slap him.
Oh - and the US has just popped into existance with shit loads of troops and conquered half my protectorate. 
Fuck the new world, next time I'm sodding off to India.


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## The Groke (Jul 5, 2009)

Well I finally started to get into this - was really enjoying it the other day until...bam! The latest hot-fix for the game via Steam killed it for me.

Now I can't play any battles without a CTD.

FFS.


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## treelover (Jul 6, 2009)

Yeah, I finally bought it, but thats happened to me too, what i have done is lower all the bells and whistles before loading up the savegame: AA, HDR, put the graphs to mostly medium, then the CTD's were for me much less, weirdly, I can then hike them all back up again though, amazing game imo...


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## The Groke (Jul 6, 2009)

Well, after pissing around with every setting under the sun to no avail, I just trashed all of the local files from Steam and re-downloaded the lot.

Works fine again now.


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## dilute micro (Jul 7, 2009)

I've been testing some naval tactics.   3rd rate vs 3rd rate. 

First thing is I get the enemy to trail me as we both head downwind.  Then I turn broadside right quick and hit them with a volley then head again downwind.  This way I can get a few shots on them before going into full battle.  It's kind of tricky though.  If you don't time it right and with the right distance they can put it on you.


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## hendo (Jul 27, 2009)

Jorum said:


> native americans + very hard/very hard = pain the fucking arse. I've been killing Huron and Cherokee for nearly 10 years now and still not really getting anywhere.
> If I ever meet a 18th century tribal warrior I may have to slap him.
> Oh - and the US has just popped into existance with shit loads of troops and conquered half my protectorate.
> Fuck the new world, next time I'm sodding off to India.



Can't believe our great great great grandparents tried to do both.


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## The Groke (Jul 27, 2009)

Still enjoying this, though still very much a n00b.

I realise it is the Total *War* series, but I do think diplomacy needs a bit of work, as does the AI's insistence on suddenly declaring war on you for merely sharing a border.

In the Road to Independence campaign, I was more than happy to leave the natives alone, but they got shirty as soon as I expanded to the limits of their territory, so I had to wipe them out of existence.



You should be able to:

a) grant captured lands back to those that owned them originally with the result of having a good future relationship with those people.
b) raze the fuck out of towns and cities you do capture in order to ensure no local resistance from then on.

Oh well.

As an aside, I also found that the latest 190 series NVIDIA drivers actually perform worse on TW than the 186 series, so I have rolled back...


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## dilute micro (Jul 29, 2009)

I think so too groke.  

Something else, one thing I see different than the other TW is that the battle assessment is way off.  I had 2 1/2 armies all routed by a unit of cavalry and one of regular soldiers.  

you can mop the floor with the native americans if you have artillery especially mortars.


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## treelover (Jul 29, 2009)

> In the Road to Independence campaign, I was more than happy to leave the natives alone, but they got shirty as soon as I expanded to the limits of their territory, so I had to wipe them out of existence.



Imperialist monster, know what you mean though...


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## treelover (Jul 29, 2009)

> Something else, one thing I see different than the other TW is that the battle assessment is way off. I had 2 1/2 armies all routed by a unit of cavalry and one of regular soldiers.




Is there a mod to change morale?, i think routing is happening to frequently and too early.


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## The Groke (Jul 29, 2009)

treelover said:


> Imperialist monster, know what you mean though...




I did feel a bite of liberal guilt each time another proud people vanished forever...

Canister shot goes through natives like a shotgun through jelly.



But yeah, it is a bit annoying that all it took was my border neighbouring theirs and they would declare war on me out of the blue.

 It didn't really make sense as it was a war they couldn't_ hope_ to win, given my power, technology, army and wealth at that stage - plus, I had done nothing else at all to aggravate them at any point. 

I had even presented a few state gifts to try and keep them happy.


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## treelover (Aug 3, 2009)

> t didn't really make sense as it was a war they couldn't hope to win, given my power, technology, army and wealth at that stage - plus, I had done nothing else at all to aggravate them at any point.




surely the story of imperialism?

btw, the east india pc demo is now available, more imperialist misadventures!


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## Pingu (Aug 5, 2009)

I get round that irritant by just squishing them at the first opportunity

i would make a bad neighbour


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