Empire: Total War is developed by Creative Assembly and is a Total War game set in the 18th century. Players assume control of a major power as they seek to conquer the world. Players can engage in land and naval real time battles with authentic weapons from the era. The campaign map is turn based and concerns itself with the high level strategy of purchasing units, upgrading cities, and moving armies on the grand map. Players can engage in naval battles across the world with land battles limited in North America, Europe, and India.
This game had a lot of hype and promise. No other Total War game before this would feature musket warfare, naval battles, or separate theaters of war. Surprisingly these features work. Musket battles are fun to command even if it is clunky. Naval battles are incredibly buggy even to this day. Naval battles are also not as engaging as land battles which causes the player to auto resolve them as they had to be in Total War games of the past. The theaters of war are fun as land battles in new settings are always cool. It is always fun to move armies across campaigns and have a story with them. This game allows you to do that by naming regiments.
However, the game still suffers from problems that plagued earlier Total War games. On launch, this game was effectively broken for many people. Even with the patches, much of the compaints such as brain dead battle and campaign AI remained. This game is not a challenge unless you play as Prussia with the highest difficulty. As the United Kingdom, the AI did not attempt any amphibious landings even when London had no army. This AI does not build stacks of armies to attack or defend.
One of the biggest promises Creative Assembly never kept was a multiplayer campaign. It was released in beta and promised after launch, but it was never released. It is also difficult to enter into the beta currently. It is also broken as the game mode prevents people from allowing them to end their turn.
Empire: Total War is still fun but anyone looking for a well developed Total War game should look at previous Total War titles such as Medieval 2.
Grade: B.
This game had a lot of hype and promise. No other Total War game before this would feature musket warfare, naval battles, or separate theaters of war. Surprisingly these features work. Musket battles are fun to command even if it is clunky. Naval battles are incredibly buggy even to this day. Naval battles are also not as engaging as land battles which causes the player to auto resolve them as they had to be in Total War games of the past. The theaters of war are fun as land battles in new settings are always cool. It is always fun to move armies across campaigns and have a story with them. This game allows you to do that by naming regiments.
However, the game still suffers from problems that plagued earlier Total War games. On launch, this game was effectively broken for many people. Even with the patches, much of the compaints such as brain dead battle and campaign AI remained. This game is not a challenge unless you play as Prussia with the highest difficulty. As the United Kingdom, the AI did not attempt any amphibious landings even when London had no army. This AI does not build stacks of armies to attack or defend.
One of the biggest promises Creative Assembly never kept was a multiplayer campaign. It was released in beta and promised after launch, but it was never released. It is also difficult to enter into the beta currently. It is also broken as the game mode prevents people from allowing them to end their turn.
Empire: Total War is still fun but anyone looking for a well developed Total War game should look at previous Total War titles such as Medieval 2.
Grade: B.