Publisher: Sega Developer: Creative Assembly Year of Release: 2009 Platforms: PC Truth be told, I am a little bit on the slow side as a gamer. I like FPS games and racing, but sit me down with a long term RTS or a good old game of Civ and I will be happy and content until the cows come home or the map is painted my colouring depending on which comes first. Creative Assembly's Total War series holds a pretty special place in my heart, not just for the exquisite blend of real time tactics and turn based strategy but for the great stories it tell as you paint the map your colour. Empire is split into two parts. The first is the high level strategy map, not unlike a crazy game of risk. This time, your battlefield is three theatres of war – Europe, India and North America. You have to create your armies and navies and lead them to conquer the various territories while also masterminding the economic, technological and political side of everything aiming to achieve your objectives. In the Grand Campaign this can vary between capturing a certain number of  states or simply holding onto specific ones – for example the British have to hold on to Gibraltar as well as tramping through the Indian Subcontinent. These objectives help to mould the action and make it a little easier for the newer players to jump in and know what to do as opposed to more open games which can be quite hard for newbies to jump into. As well as this, there are also smaller missions that confer benefits – going back to the Brits, if they capture several territories such as Georgia and parts of Canada then the Thirteen Colonies will join the empire, boosting your number of territories and inching you closer to victory. These territories hold both cities and the smaller towns which all specialise in certain building trees such as factories or colleges. As well as your armies and navies, you also have agents to help out with your cunning plans. First up is the gentleman who represent all the men of learning. Their primary role is advancing your research by sitting in your colleges and drinking tea but alternatively you can kit them out and focus them on calling your enemy characters curs before engaging them in a duel. So if you want to have Isaac Newton become Europe’s greatest dualist, you can! In a similar killing role, assassin’s return as the Rake. He can sneak behind enemy lines, killing agents and generals, sabotaging buildings or can protect your own characters from attack. The final agent is the priest who can spy on opponents while converting the local population to your religion. These men of the cloth are very useful in the New World, where the locals aren’t too happy about being ruled. These three groups are vital to success as they help to soften the enemy up before your armies rush in. They are not created like other units but instead are generated from certain buildings. This system adds some tension to using them as well as making them a valuable commodity. Of course at any point your opposition may simply declare war and then your generals come into play. Generals gain traits and experience from battle to battle based entirely on their actions - a general who fights using primarily infantry will gain traits that make their line infantry much more effective. Obviously, this can make you wonder about risking your higher level generals in dangerous battles as if you loose one who has a high command rating it can be a major blow for any campaign. Luckily you don’t have to have units attached to a general at all times like in previous Total War games (in Medieval units under a captain could change sides very easily). Its also easier to muster an army under a new general as they can recruit from the field rather than having to go back to a city to pick up new troops. Overall, it is a lot easier and much smoother experience to wage war. The second part is the real time tactics battles which have had a massive change due to the introduction of massed firearms. Rather than being based around charging in and flanking, you now end up lining up against each other and battling with volleys of gunfire. There is also a greater reliance on cannon fire to break large units - with the right technology and canister shot, three field guns can force back a much larger infantry force. Although the big blocks of infantry are the focus, there are also small skirmish units to pick off enemies at longer range and cavalry units. The cavalry are brought down from their position of dominance in previous Total War games to a supporting role of committing flank attacks on weaker units or running down routing. This considerable change means players used to Roman or Medieval warfare need to go through the battle tutorial to wean them off the old style. The battle engine is good but the AI can occasionally have some major issues with generals running off into the firing line or units forming squares while under attack from cannon fire. A new game style introduced in Empire is playable naval battles. This feature makes a lot of sense for the time period due to its important but unfortunately it does dissolve slightly when it is actually played. It can just turn into ships just going round and round in circles. It feels nowhere near as polished as the main land battles but it can throw up some of the most dramatic moments such as when a ship gets hit by enough rounds that it explodes, throwing sails and planks of wood all around. The two battle modes can be played up to 4 on 4 in multiplayer mode with a good selection of maps ranging from totally flat tournament mode to the historical battles also playable in single player. The multiplayer works well and also has an automatch mode using steamworks which includes a ranking system and achievements. Post release, Creative Assembly also added in a co op campaign mode, allowing two players to take part in the Grand Campaign which will take double the amount of time a normal singleplayer campaign will take. As mentioned before, the game includes some historical battles which includes an American campaign from the start of the colonies to the American War of Independence. It actually as a good introduction for newer players although it has no where near the same level of freedom as the normal grand campaign. Empire looks rather good, with the smoke of battle hanging over the field and being able to render a huge number of enemy troops. There is a little variety between different soldiers in a unit so it doesn’t just look like an attack of an army of clones but most of the time you won’t notice it. I actually quite like the campaign map – rather than the static maps of the previous game the game map is literally alive with trees swaying in the breeze. It really helps you to get lost in ye olde world. The sound is also really good, from the period music of the campaign to the crack of battle as artillery whizzes past. Obviously someone spent a lot of time with swords and such like. However, there are some major performance problems on some PC’s mainly to do with the load times and some in battle hiccups. At release it also had several major bugs but most of these are fixed. It is also important to point out that the game also takes up approximately 15GB and requires Steam. Empire received 5 DLC packs after release. One of these was a very good idea which was all of the pre-order DLC in one pack which gets rid of my personal bug bears with the current trend publishers are fixating on. The other DLC packs add an additional 41 units, with some to various side which are mainly named regiments with their improved stats. These add an edge in multiplayer but also help to improve the story that singleplayer tells – its more exciting to say how the 33rd Foot re-enacted their American campaign than to just say your line infantry defended New York. The most substantial pack is the Warpath Campaign, which puts you in charge of an Native American tribe as the Europeans encroach. It does feel as professional as the main game, as there is a lack of voice acting for the new sides, along with a much smaller tech tree and reduced unit count when compared to the British or French. It does however pose more of a challenge as you can’t rely on overseas trade to support yourself so it all comes down to just holding out as long as you can against the Europeans while taking as much land for yourself. The DLC for Empire I think is really only for the main fans of the series or this game in particular. Empire Total War is the largest Total War to date and although it almost buckles under the strain, it is still the best of the series. I do think Napoleon Total War is slightly better for newer players but it does miss out the larger scale. Most of the bugs have been ironed out so I think Empire is worth playing to see the Creative Assembly team at their finest.

Publisher: Sega
Developer: Creative Assembly
Year of Release: 2009
Platforms: PC

Truth be told, I am a little bit on the slow side as a gamer. I like FPS games and racing, but sit me down with a long term RTS or a good old game of Civ and I will be happy and content until the cows come home or the map is painted my colouring depending on which comes first. Creative Assembly’s Total War series holds a pretty special place in my heart, not just for the exquisite blend of real time tactics and turn based strategy but for the great stories it tell as you paint the map your colour.

Empire is split into two parts. The first is the high level strategy map, not unlike a crazy game of risk. This time, your battlefield is three theatres of war – Europe, India and North America. You have to create your armies and navies and lead them to conquer the various territories while also masterminding the economic, technological and political side of everything aiming to achieve your objectives. In the Grand Campaign this can vary between capturing a certain number of  states or simply holding onto specific ones – for example the British have to hold on to Gibraltar as well as tramping through the Indian Subcontinent. These objectives help to mould the action and make it a little easier for the newer players to jump in and know what to do as opposed to more open games which can be quite hard for newbies to jump into. As well as this, there are also smaller missions that confer benefits – going back to the Brits, if they capture several territories such as Georgia and parts of Canada then the Thirteen Colonies will join the empire, boosting your number of territories and inching you closer to victory. These territories hold both cities and the smaller towns which all specialise in certain building trees such as factories or colleges.

As well as your armies and navies, you also have agents to help out with your cunning plans. First up is the gentleman who represent all the men of learning. Their primary role is advancing your research by sitting in your colleges and drinking tea but alternatively you can kit them out and focus them on calling your enemy characters curs before engaging them in a duel. So if you want to have Isaac Newton become Europe’s greatest dualist, you can! In a similar killing role, assassin’s return as the Rake. He can sneak behind enemy lines, killing agents and generals, sabotaging buildings or can protect your own characters from attack. The final agent is the priest who can spy on opponents while converting the local population to your religion. These men of the cloth are very useful in the New World, where the locals aren’t too happy about being ruled. These three groups are vital to success as they help to soften the enemy up before your armies rush in. They are not created like other units but instead are generated from certain buildings. This system adds some tension to using them as well as making them a valuable commodity.

Of course at any point your opposition may simply declare war and then your generals come into play. Generals gain traits and experience from battle to battle based entirely on their actions – a general who fights using primarily infantry will gain traits that make their line infantry much more effective. Obviously, this can make you wonder about risking your higher level generals in dangerous battles as if you loose one who has a high command rating it can be a major blow for any campaign. Luckily you don’t have to have units attached to a general at all times like in previous Total War games (in Medieval units under a captain could change sides very easily). Its also easier to muster an army under a new general as they can recruit from the field rather than having to go back to a city to pick up new troops. Overall, it is a lot easier and much smoother experience to wage war.

The second part is the real time tactics battles which have had a massive change due to the introduction of massed firearms. Rather than being based around charging in and flanking, you now end up lining up against each other and battling with volleys of gunfire. There is also a greater reliance on cannon fire to break large units – with the right technology and canister shot, three field guns can force back a much larger infantry force. Although the big blocks of infantry are the focus, there are also small skirmish units to pick off enemies at longer range and cavalry units. The cavalry are brought down from their position of dominance in previous Total War games to a supporting role of committing flank attacks on weaker units or running down routing. This considerable change means players used to Roman or Medieval warfare need to go through the battle tutorial to wean them off the old style. The battle engine is good but the AI can occasionally have some major issues with generals running off into the firing line or units forming squares while under attack from cannon fire.

A new game style introduced in Empire is playable naval battles. This feature makes a lot of sense for the time period due to its important but unfortunately it does dissolve slightly when it is actually played. It can just turn into ships just going round and round in circles. It feels nowhere near as polished as the main land battles but it can throw up some of the most dramatic moments such as when a ship gets hit by enough rounds that it explodes, throwing sails and planks of wood all around.

The two battle modes can be played up to 4 on 4 in multiplayer mode with a good selection of maps ranging from totally flat tournament mode to the historical battles also playable in single player. The multiplayer works well and also has an automatch mode using steamworks which includes a ranking system and achievements. Post release, Creative Assembly also added in a co op campaign mode, allowing two players to take part in the Grand Campaign which will take double the amount of time a normal singleplayer campaign will take. As mentioned before, the game includes some historical battles which includes an American campaign from the start of the colonies to the American War of Independence. It actually as a good introduction for newer players although it has no where near the same level of freedom as the normal grand campaign.

Empire looks rather good, with the smoke of battle hanging over the field and being able to render a huge number of enemy troops. There is a little variety between different soldiers in a unit so it doesn’t just look like an attack of an army of clones but most of the time you won’t notice it. I actually quite like the campaign map – rather than the static maps of the previous game the game map is literally alive with trees swaying in the breeze. It really helps you to get lost in ye olde world. The sound is also really good, from the period music of the campaign to the crack of battle as artillery whizzes past. Obviously someone spent a lot of time with swords and such like. However, there are some major performance problems on some PC’s mainly to do with the load times and some in battle hiccups. At release it also had several major bugs but most of these are fixed. It is also important to point out that the game also takes up approximately 15GB and requires Steam.

Empire received 5 DLC packs after release. One of these was a very good idea which was all of the pre-order DLC in one pack which gets rid of my personal bug bears with the current trend publishers are fixating on. The other DLC packs add an additional 41 units, with some to various side which are mainly named regiments with their improved stats. These add an edge in multiplayer but also help to improve the story that singleplayer tells – its more exciting to say how the 33rd Foot re-enacted their American campaign than to just say your line infantry defended New York. The most substantial pack is the Warpath Campaign, which puts you in charge of an Native American tribe as the Europeans encroach. It does feel as professional as the main game, as there is a lack of voice acting for the new sides, along with a much smaller tech tree and reduced unit count when compared to the British or French. It does however pose more of a challenge as you can’t rely on overseas trade to support yourself so it all comes down to just holding out as long as you can against the Europeans while taking as much land for yourself. The DLC for Empire I think is really only for the main fans of the series or this game in particular.

Empire Total War is the largest Total War to date and although it almost buckles under the strain, it is still the best of the series. I do think Napoleon Total War is slightly better for newer players but it does miss out the larger scale. Most of the bugs have been ironed out so I think Empire is worth playing to see the Creative Assembly team at their finest.