Total War: Rome 2 Announced

[Imperial Honour]

War hath cometh, and Carthage is burning, as the Roman military machine marches once more. So saddle up your horse, prepare your armour, and ready your gladius for Total War: Rome II is force marching to a strategic destination near you.



There is a second video interview as well, but I cannot embed it at the moment due to current forum restrictions forbidding more then one embedded video in a single post. So here is the link to the second video interview, click here.

Previews
CVG (07/02/2012)
Eurogamer.net (07/02/2012)
GamesRadar (07/02/2012)
IGN (07/02/2012)
PC Gamer (07/02/2012)
Rock, Paper, Shotgun (07/02/2012)
ShackNews (07/02/2012)
VideoGamer (07/02/2012)

Interviews
PC Gamer - Lead Designer (07/02/2012)
PC Gamer - Lead Battle Designer (07/02/2012)
Rock, Paper, Shotgun - Part #1 (of #2) (07/02/2012)

It will be interesting to see how all these touted improvements and new features actually work, assuming they do not get revised during development. The most intriguing and scary change for me is the change in scale, instead of commanding individual Cohorts it sounds like we will be moving up a level and commanding entire legions at a time. Also for something which is still in development, and god knows how far from entering an alpha or beta stage, those two in-game screenshots are absolutely beautiful, in my opinion.

Thoughts?

[Codex]

I am salivating as we speak. And I haven't even clicked any links yet.

[Misiok]

For those who want a quick roundabout.

Possible beach invasions and thus interaction between ships and land armies
Melee being even better than in Shogun 2. Units brawl, dodge and fight with their shields and swords.
Detailed cities, units, ingame engine cutscenes during (possibly) battles, together with scripted (possibly) events during main battles.
Live Action trailer looked similar to either Game of Thrones or Spartacus series, which can only be good, also

BIG FUCKING HUGE BATTLES OHMYGODSOAWESOME!!!!!11

Also, big eyegasm number one and number two.

[Pocktio]

I was checking my book of face when I saw an IGN status about this.

Nearly died of excitement, omhygodwantwantwant it can only be amazing.

[Gorb]

Those articles are bad at getting their historical data accurate, and I'm too lazy to check which one is correct (PCGamer and IGN cite different dates for the sacking/burning of Carthage). If this is a calendar mishap and I then look like a fool, so be it

But yes, hrmmmmmmmmm. The game that made me discover the Total War series, reborn. Hrmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

[Rook]

I've been waiting for this! TW is by far my favourite game franchise and i spent years on RTW. Please have massively massive battles. oh and truly diverse factions again. I love Shogun/Napoleon but damn it, I want smartly drilled legions being attacked by wode painted barbarians with their tackle swinging about wildly again.


waiting with great anticipation, Rook.

who is currently sporting a full mast.

edit: Beach invasions sound awesome, it all sounds so very total war.

[Kirjava]

All I have read is the thread title.

FUCKING YES MATE!!!

Now I will go and read things.

[Liljagare]

I refuse to get my hopes up, been seriously dissappointed with the last few..

Though, maybe, just maybe, they'll bring some magic back with this game to the series?

[Thorno]

I just made a mess.

[Kirjava]

No graphics, but the live-action trailer for the game is pretty nice...

[Visitor13]

I refuse to get my hopes up, been seriously dissappointed with the last few..

This.

Nice screenies as always, it remains to be seen if they're not a smokescreen for abysmal AI yet again.

[Waterbizkit]

I started with Shogun and left the franchise entirely until Shogun II. No Rome. No Medieval. No Napoleon or Empire. Only Shogun.

This though.... this I may get.

[Aesaar]

Awesome. I skipped Shogun II because I'm not especially interested in Japan. This is what I was really looking forward to.

[TheDividedGod]

I'm really not liking the comments about simplification and outright removal of management options and regions in the campaign screen. Total war was brilliant because it was civilization AND total annihilation in a single game. Other games have done the same since, to great effect and success (see the original Sword of the Stars). The balance was nearly perfect, and unfortunately, as the series has worn on, they've been focusing more and more on the real-time battles, especially the cinematic and graphical aspect, while reducing and simplifying the strategic management half of the game.

IMO, not good.

I like spending just as much time in both modes - literally, I'll spend 45 minutes in a massive 8000-man meatgrinder, and then another 45 minutes deciding the precise order and time required for building construction, and extrapolating my tax revenues to see if I can cover it, while carefully positioning my defensive armies. I LIKE that, and to my knowledge, no significant part of the Total War community has ever asked for simplification of the strategic layer OR the real-time layer. It seems arbitrary, and uneccessary. Over-focus on one side or the other will, if allowed to run unchecked, eventually unbalance the gameplay to the point where it will ruin the compelling dual-genre nature of the series.

We'll have to see.

[Kalimac]

Hhhhhhnnnnggg, the theme at the end of the theatrical trailer. All of my money.

[Ewokz]

Loved Shogun 2 and Rome, spent a stupid amount of time on both (probably about 4 times as long on Rome though ). So excited for this. Like the province type details, sounds interesting though I hope it isn't dumbing it down.

Don't really need to say anymore than this:

Ships and armies can now take part in the same battles when the situation demands it

This is interesting, sounds like supreme commander, hope it still feels like TW though:

Rome 2 will feature a tactical view that allows players to zoom the camera out to a top-down, kilometer-square overview where units are represented by simplified icons

Very very cool addition, I like how they are expanding on the mechanics of battle:

This part of the demo closely resembled equivalent encounters in other recent Total War games, but the sheer size of cities necessitates that battles be more complex than simply capturing and holding a single central location. In Rome 2, a successful siege will be a multi-part affair, with several dynamic objectives.

Reading the Pc gamer article it looks promising but I share TheDividedGod's thoughts about the civilization aspect potentially being dubbed down. That area of the game was the real reason I played for so long, eventually I would tire of the relentless battles and I'd just start auto-resolving all but the most important ones, leaving me enjoying solely the campaign map. Without the depth of that I'm not sure I would have played for so long.

[overmind2000]

I really have to get a new computer now *can't run any of the new TW games*

The merging of sea and land battles sounds fantastic, being able to do proper beachhead invasions is grand. Would be the icing on the cake to be able to combine a beach landing/sea and land battle with a siege! Also I hope they expand the number of units you can control - bigger and bigger battles is always a plus in these games

[Ewokz]

Overmind your in luck:

Ships and armies can now take part in the same battles when the situation demands it. As troop-carrying biremes crashed into the shore, Roman boats armed with catapults kept their distance and provided covering fire for the dismounting troops, who formed into ranks before charging up the beach towards the walls.

Roman archers taking cover behind wooden barricades to return fire on the Carthaginian defenders, siege towers moving into place, off-shore Roman artillery causing a breach in the city’s harbour walls.

Sounds so cool.

[overmind2000]

Aye - I'm just going to now have to avoid all mention of this game till its released. EA has taught me well never ever ever to believe pre-release info. Mostly because developers never say when pre-released info gets dropped from the final release which means if you read all the pre-release you can end up getting a vastly different game than you were "hinted at" early in development.

[Brenil]

Oh shit.

Awesome.

[Guilliman]

As much as I want to want this, based on empire total war it will probably be buggy, half broken in terms of stability and take months to actually work like they want it.

It's EA all over again. Not a penny unless it's completely polished and crash free as well as very kind on system resources (unlike ETW).

[Lautaro]

FUCK YES, my favorite game of all time is coming back!!

[Visitor13]

As much as I want to want this, based on empire total war it will probably be buggy, half broken in terms of stability and it will take months until they release a Trajan Total War, which will be more or less playable

Fixed

[Lautaro]

Goddammit, I want to see the video they are talking about!

[Kirjava]

I know Empire was a bit of a debacle, but Shogun 2 was actually pretty polished and a big improvement. If anyone understands being skeptical of pre-release hype it's me *points in the direction of the Assassins Creed 3 thread* but I say we at least wait for some gameplay vids before we start drawing any conclusions.

[Ewokz]

Yeah recently they did mention in an interview that they went to far to fast with Empire, resulting in tons of new content but very little polish overall. Its mostly been fixed in patches but they said they've changed how they design games from now on, focusing on adding only a few new elements with each new game. This one clearly has ship/land integration as well as a more streamlined campaign map.

Going by how they want to expand the steam workshop side of things in shogun, I'm really looking foard to how they will reach out to modders in this new game.

[DrRansom]

I remember the first Rome game, and the hours lost to that. This is quite possibly the best RTS news of the year, sorry Relic.

I really like the attempt to push up the size of the armies, give each army a specific feel, and as the Rock, Paper, Shotgun article said, make the player think in terms of legions and not individual units. That is a great sign for the series and I'm really looking forward to that.

One thing I do hope they change is that they get the 'casualties per battle' down right. I disliked how in previous total war games it was too easy to annihilate your opponents army; cascading routs + cavalry. If CA can fix that result, either by having a 'retreating' stance, instead of fighting or running, or some other mechanism, that will really add to the overall scale of the game.

Edit:
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012...e-2-interview/

Interview with the Rome Total War dev, explains the thinking behind less control of individual regions.

[Codex]

R:TW had such awesome music!

I only realised many years later (last year?) that the title screen music has a full song (i.e. with lyrics):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zj_kRsTUwJc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irXQid4peS0
Favourite tune- brings back the campaign map for me...

[Shuma]

Looks impressive, and i love the Total War series, but, i'm going to side with TheDividedGod here, i was really liking everything until he started talking about how we'll have less management, and more accessibility bullshit and all that crap. Reminds me of Supreme Commander 2, and that's awful.

Other than that, it looks pretty, it sounds awesome, so here's to hoping it doesn't suck shit.

[Codex]

I found the micromanagement in the total war series to be great at the beginning, but just becomes a drag as you approach the late game and beyond. The battles come much less frequently, and the late-game is less rewarding for me as a result. When one session can be taken up by two big battles in one turn, sometimes I will play only one battle a session. That's a far cry from the early game. In fact I find the middle game to be the most fun to play, and usually get bored by the end game.

[Ewokz]

The end can be a bit annoying when its just mopping up, in Shogun I found the AI to be half decent for most the experience though. It only became a drag if you were checking every city, and with the limited income it was a pretty pointless thing to do. The late game is mostly just a few cities of recruitment and then army movements. The beginning is usually far more city orientated, though it is faster paced due to less moving to do. It only gets annoying (for me) when you know you've won but you have like 5 cities to cap on random islands, or like 10 cities in one area.

[Gorb]

I remember the first Rome game, and the hours lost to that. This is quite possibly the best RTS news of the year, sorry Relic.

I'm going to be horrendous nitpick and ask why you consider the Total War series an RTS. I mean, there's no base-building in the scenario battles! Empire management (/4x strategy?) with elements of real-time tactical gameplay, sure. But not an RTS

[Sinogrim]

I'm pretty excited for this, however, I do have some concerns that they seem to be changing the campaign map a bit too much. I'm just hoping they're not dumbing it down...

Either way, the battles sound pretty amazing, I do however hope we still get the incredible selection of different troops from Rome 1, cause the last few Total War games were lacking in troop variety.

[Imperial Honour]

OP Note: Updated the first post with more previews and interviews, check out the new RPS interview if you haven't already.

The reservations of some people in this thread I can certainly understand, and even I am daunted by the size and scope of features and 'improvements' being touted. Creative Assembly have to deliver on what they are promising and execute it to perfection if they want people to view any potentially huge upheavals as positives to the advancement of the franchise's gameplay as a whole. Total War: Rome II will have especially high expectations among a lot of the community due to pre-release hype being generated and the burden it carries from being the sequel to and re-imagining of the hugely popular Rome: Total War. We shall see if Creative Assembly have truly learnt from the mistakes made during the development of the Warscape Engine and Empire: Total War when Total War: Rome II is released. Creative Assembly have admitted they were overly ambitious trying to develop both the Warscape Engine and a Total War game of the proposed scope of Empire: Total War, after working on Napoleon: Total War and Total War: Shogun 2 they now believe they have the smaller scale down well enough to once again attempt something more ambitious and larger in scope.

It shall be an interesting path to release, and beyond, that is for sure. Though rather then arguing that the new touted provincial system is a step backwards couldn't it be seen as a natural progression forwards from the systems explored in Empire and Napoleon: Total War? Though a bit less explored so in my opinion in Total War: Shogun 2, ergo its exclusion from that question. The difference being that in Empire and Napoleon the individual towns in a province weren't their own conquerable regions and settlements, there are a few ways to interpret that interview answer. Obviously if you did not like the way Empire or Napoleon: Total War handled things then that is fair enough, but it possibly is not quite as backwards as one may think when you consider Empire and Napoleon, and Jupiter only knows how it interconnects with all the other touted gameplay systems like characters (provincial governors anyone?) and dilemmas.

[Niftyeye]

Oh.My.God.

[Kirjava]

@Codex and Ewokz: I think the experience of the endgame differs in varying Total War games. In the much-maligned Empire (which, now patched and modded, comes into its own), you can have achieved victory conditions for empire size and have done enough to 'win', but there's enough space on the map to ensure that other powers have the strength to challenge you. In my current game as England, I'm dominant in North America (though that's not to say I own it all), and I have a few key bases in the Mediterranean. Austria, meanwhile, has grown strong, so strong that our battle over Rome and central Italy (I'm the Protector of the newly-emerged Kingdom of Naples, which popped up after the fall of Spain) is proving bloody and intractable. Whole armies are being poured into this meatgrinder, and even though I've blockaded their ports I can't seem to get much traction. I've lost several key battles and won others, but the war goes on.

Meanwhile, in either of the Shogun games, once your conquest reaches the halfway point of Japan, who else is as strong as you? No individual power, which is why there's that bullshit necessity of having them all gang up on you. The bigger the game, the more interesting the endgame, I've found.

Also, I feel like my initial words did not do my actual reaction justice, and I can reach into my bag of Spartacus: Blood and Sand lines to find something more suitable:

BY JUPITER'S COCK!

[Kirjava]

Doppelpost.
Part 2 of the RPS interview. Salient points: 1) They're really working super hard on the AI- they're aware it hasn't always been good and the new system sounds interesting. 2) It's not 'Supreme Commander BC'. 3) No flaming pigs.

[Nurizeko]

This, but overall Total war games seem to satisfy so as long as you don't get your hopes up/buy into announcement hype we should be okay.

[TheDividedGod]

This is exactly what I was afraid of. From the eurogamer preview:

"Rome 2 is about making your decisions more interesting, not just making more of them," says Russell, who doesn't believe there's much fun to be had in individually administering all your regions or precisely tweaking all your armies. As a Roman ruler, he explains, your mind should be on where your Tenth Legion is and if they can move to support the Eight Legion, not building another unit of 40 archers or altering a tax rate in eastern Gaul. To this end, there's a new Province system for quickly administering regions under your control, so that the game doesn't turn into an endless parade of paperwork."

What the lead designer doesn't seem to realize is that the core of the franchise is predicated on exactly that type of gameplay, and gamers have been enjoying administrating regions and tweaking their armies and getting into the minutae of empire management for more than ten years. Stating outright that he "doesn't think there's much fun to be had" in that kind of gameplay only emphasizes how far removed he is from both the dual-genre core aspect that made the series compelling, and the gamer base who made the games successful. Quite frankly, there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of gamers out there who DO think empire management is fun thank-you-very-much, or at least, just as fun as wrecking shop with a massive army, and we really liked the way your franchise used to do it. Too bad, I suppose.

...not to mention the fact that, actually, roman rulers spent the vast, overwhelming majority of their time altering tax rates in Gaul and training levies and municipal/state level shit just like those things. Very few ever actually ordered legions around. The quoted statement just makes the guy sound really ignorant.


Just sayin.

(edit) what the fuck is with the pictures in the RPS article link? Come on guys, a little tiny bit of professionalism wouldn't hurt. If you don't have any other images besides the two every other review site has, then just use those and write the article. Jeez.

[overmind2000]

If they take out the ability to custom build your army - that takes out a massive chunk of the game itself! Honestly I'm hoping that this province management system is rather like what we have in a lot of other games of this kind - that in that its optional to put the "governor" in charge or you can do it yourself.

I'd actually welcome that change as it does allow simplification of the core game for faster play through if the player wants. However I'd greatly be apprehensive if it were a forced system. Taking out the players ability to custom build armies or to only be able to build fully finished forces just sounds like the are undermining their own game.

[Mr Carrot]

TDG I pissed myself at the screenshot pisstaking by RPS - it's basically saying "Sega you fucking idiots, don't clear a studio to do a press video and a whole slew of videos without releasing sufficient visual materials to pad the subsequent reportage".

[TheDividedGod]

Yeah, I suppose. It's true that the city siege shots seem to be the only two screenshots released thus far, which is pretty limited as far as press release material goes.

[sang]

Looking back at other total wars games I am going to expect this in March 2013

[Ewokz]

Really hope this dumbing down system is optional, such as allowing it all to be set into provinces obut allowing the player to fine tweak all the little things. I can't imagine that they've gone the simplified method without some normal TW alternative, just thinking they have makes me sad

[guardsman lover]

Now I will look forward to this DLC:

Animal Attack Pack.

Now featuring...
WARDOGS - Losses are replenishable, give your men a break and let the dogs eat arrows and sniff swords.
INCENDIARY PIGS - Confers +10 Happiness in the towns they are present in because of a daily supply of bacon.
CATAPHRACT ZEBRAS - being covered in heavy armor, you can't tell the difference from the regular cataphracts
SCYTHED CHARIOTS DRAWN BY ELEPHANTS BECAUSE YOU, THAT'S WHY
LION CAVALRY - Warcry scares enemies, has 2 attacks in addition to the rider.

[Nurizeko]

I just noticed the guy in the live action trailer reminds me of Theon Greyjoy.

The game has just been announced lads so less cryin' like puny leetl babi girls.

Give CA a chance to dissapoint you first, they've been good to us with Total War games so far.


Plus I already got my Shogun 2 so I couldn't care less if I never see another TW game.

Shogun was the only ones that seemed to get a 'simple' rock-paper-scissors system down well enabling some solidly tactical play.

[DrRansom]

Before we got too worked up about the new province system, I have a different interpretation of the guy's comments. It seems to me the new terrain system addresses two issues:

1) Having a high number of independent settlements / cities is quite ahistorical for the Rome period. With the countryside being a collection of small towns and manors and a few large cities, it doesn't make sense for the player to manage dozens to hundreds of historical places.
2) Empire total war introduced the player to a province system, with a central city and then smaller 'improvements' located scattered about the countryside. This system had the downside of making wars all or nothing affairs, as you had to grab this entire province by bum rushing the city. Once you grabbed the city, even if you didn't control anything else in the district, that area was yours.

It seems to me that Rome total war is attempting to run the same sized province system as Empire total war, but make each province an amalgamation of smaller 'sub-provinces.' These 'sub-provinces' won't necessarily have a city, they could just represent countryside. Thus, in a war, the players can trade 'sub-provinces,' allowing for more fluid front lines, and each 'sub-province' won't necessarily become an independent production city (once again, an ahistorical outcome).

Personally, I think that the system, if I have it right, will make sense for the Rome 2, particularly because it allows for more draws in wartime, as the countries can exchange terrain without exchanging massive production capabilities.

About the army builder. The dev. suggests that the size of the armies will be dramatically growing for Rome 2. He says 10k + units per side and mentioned that some ship units come in multiple ships per unit card. If that is the case, then it is a distinct possibility that there will be multiple blocks per unit card in the army. If an army comprises only 20 units, and has 10k soldiers, than each unit card consists of 500 soldiers. That size, to me at least, seems impossible to adequately manage. I expect that the 'unit cards' will follow the naval combat and consist of multiple blocks of soldiers per unit card. In that case, buying a unit of 40 archers is no longer possible, you'll be buying units of 400 archers. So we may have to reconsider what it'll me to control units in Rome 2.

[Ewokz]

Well they've always had a way of limiting the amount of soldiers in the options, I thought it was just an extension of that.

They aren't going to force new players to buy beter pc's for the increased unit sizes so I don't think its really going to make much difference.
Perhaps the new units will just be larger to match the increased scale of both the maps and cities?

[Coey]

I'd like some information on diplomacy, for instance having client kingdoms/tribes, as Rome being able to install Herod-like characters as your puppets. Maybe playing as the "Barbarian" factions your leader has a influence or standing rating where if it's high enough you get an event to unite all the tribes and try and push back or destroy Rome, also not just having an Iberian or Gaul or Germanic faction but lots of smaller independent tribes would be nice, but I don't think the new province system will support that.

[Celution]

All I can say about this: FUCK YEAH!!!

But seriously, I still consider Rome: Total War the best of all the series, just because I love the Roman era. Medieval 2 was really good too, because battles had more depth and stuff, but still, Rome II! Definitely going on my To-Buy list.