The actual Empire: Total War thread

[Soapyfrog]

Yeah I agree, DLC of this nature should be priced as trivially as possible, especially when I could, with a little work, add equivalent units to the game myself, for free. 25 cents a unit sounds fine.

[Benhur]

Wait, I thought the 14 units were going to be free...

[Sepiche]

Wait, I thought the 14 units were going to be free...
There are 14 free units in the patch and 14 separate units you can get as DLC.

[Kalle]

Yeah I agree, DLC of this nature should be priced as trivially as possible, especially when I could, with a little work, add equivalent units to the game myself, for free. 25 cents a unit sounds fine.

You don't say. (http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=250655)

[Cubit]

The AI should now no longer repeatedly sign a diplomatic agreement and then break it the next turn. Treaties are more valuable and adhered to.

Can anyone attest if this really has been fixed?

[Thrag]

I've played one post-patch battle so far. One of my massive Austrian armies taking Terran from the Persians, who had large numbers of poor quality troops. Since it was a lopsided battle it wasn't a great test of the new AI. However, the dumb AI behavior of wasting units to garrison buildings that are far from the action is still present.

They don't seem to have fixed light infantry in any way, and may have even broke them in a new way. They still often face the wrong after moves (facing left or right instead of front). Skirmish mode is still broken from the last patch, units in skirmish mode will just stand still in the face of the enemy and even refuse manual orders to move. I don't know if this is new, but now light infantry seem to keep firing on targets long after they move out of range, and will continue to do so even after hitting stop and taking the out of fire at will mode. You have to move them to get them to stop.

I still have input problems when I have multiple keys pressed (like if I'm scrolling by pressing 'a' and hit pause, sometimes it pauses and unpauses as if I hit pause twice).

Round shot is now "super ball" shot. It will often do crazy bounces. I saw round shot bounce up hundreds of feet in the air at strange angles.

Load times somehow seem to have increased, or I just forgot how bad they were in the months I've waited for them to fix this game that they released in a completely unacceptable state.

So, so far after one long battle I sadly don't see a lot of improvement. Bugs that seem obvious to me like the light infantry stuff haven't been addressed in any way. I've always admired CA's reach with the Total war series and have long waited for them to live up to their potential, unfortunately it seems their reach continues to exceed their talent.

[Sarkus]

I've played one post-patch battle so far. One of my massive Austrian armies taking Terran from the Persians, who had large numbers of poor quality troops. Since it was a lopsided battle it wasn't a great test of the new AI. However, the dumb AI behavior of wasting units to garrison buildings that are far from the action is still present.

They don't seem to have fixed light infantry in any way, and may have even broke them in a new way. They still often face the wrong after moves (facing left or right instead of front). Skirmish mode is still broken from the last patch, units in skirmish mode will just stand still in the face of the enemy and even refuse manual orders to move. I don't know if this is new, but now light infantry seem to keep firing on targets long after they move out of range, and will continue to do so even after hitting stop and taking the out of fire at will mode. You have to move them to get them to stop.

I still have input problems when I have multiple keys pressed (like if I'm scrolling by pressing 'a' and hit pause, sometimes it pauses and unpauses as if I hit pause twice).

Round shot is now "super ball" shot. It will often do crazy bounces. I saw round shot bounce up hundreds of feet in the air at strange angles.

Load times somehow seem to have increased, or I just forgot how bad they were in the months I've waited for them to fix this game that they released in a completely unacceptable state.

So, so far after one long battle I sadly don't see a lot of improvement. Bugs that seem obvious to me like the light infantry stuff haven't been addressed in any way. I've always admired CA's reach with the Total war series and have long waited for them to live up to their potential, unfortunately it seems their reach continues to exceed their talent.

Are you just loading up a campaign game or actually starting over with the new patches? While it may not make any sense, comments I've seen on the TWCenter boards suggested that with previous patches you needed to start over to see the changes. Loading up a campaign that you started back when the game came out several patches ago may not be giving people the right idea.

[Mark Asher]

There are 14 free units in the patch and 14 separate units you can get as DLC.

Remember the days when DLC for PC games was free?

So my question is, has charging for DLC improved the quality of PC games? What is the benefit to us users?

[Sarkus]

Remember the days when DLC for PC games was free?

So my question is, has charging for DLC improved the quality of PC games? What is the benefit to us users?

Depends on how its done and what is offered. Would you rather have waited six months for Bethesda to release a $30 expansion for Fallout 3 or was getting three parts for $10 each every month or two as DLC worth it? To me that worked out fine.

Crap like extra units for $3.50 doesn't really bother me, to be honest as long as it doesn't significantly change the game. If people feel the need to buy something that I don't then it's not really a big deal to me. I'm only bothered when I'm asked to pay more for something that should have been part of the original game.

[Naeblis]

Remember the days when DLC for PC games was free?

So my question is, has charging for DLC improved the quality of PC games? What is the benefit to us users?

Lol?
I don't think any company is raising the bar of quality in their games just for releasing DLC. In fact, i don't think any company is thinking in that line, nor they are trying to decieve users with DLC. It's a paid product, they make it, users buy it. The objetive is clear: win more money.

Asking "what is the benefit to us users" is almost like deceiving yourself in thinking that the benefit to users was one possible reason to the creation of DLC in first place.

DLC It's just like expansions, but with less content and also a cheaper price. Usually it's more expensive for the user than the old expansion, the ration price/content is better in the old days than now. Of course, that's why the changed from the expansion model to the dlc model in first place, they can make more money selling individually each item (new weapons, new maps, etc).

[Aeon221]

Remember the days when DLC for PC games was free?

So my question is, has charging for DLC improved the quality of PC games? What is the benefit to us users?

For the most part, DLC is great. The Fallout DLC? Two out of three are pretty good. Rockband DLC? Fantastic implementation of the concept! Mysteries of Westgate for NWN2? If it had come out a little sooner, it would have been neat. The Entrenchment "expansion" for Sins of a Solar Empire? Another great value for money proposition.

A pack of units that are clearly missing from the game? Less than pleased about that one, Mark!

[Therlun]

The AI should now no longer repeatedly sign a diplomatic agreement and then break it the next turn. Treaties are more valuable and adhered to.

I see things don't change at all with CA. Unfulfilled promises to improve the AI with the next game/patch.

At some time in the pre release hype I actually had some hope they would change something, anything, with the braindead computer opponents.
Good thing I've become a hateful gamer and didn't bother with Empire then.

[Talorc]

I don't know if this is new, but now light infantry seem to keep firing on targets long after they move out of range, and will continue to do so even after hitting stop and taking the out of fire at will mode. You have to move them to get them to stop.

That one is not new - my light infantry fighting in the Americas had that happen frequently. (the green ones - Rangers I think)

They also exhibited the annoying facing sideways bug a lot as well. that one sucks because they dont fire upon incoming enemy properly.

[Naeblis]

I see things don't change at all with CA. Unfulfilled promises to improve the AI with the next game/patch.

At some time in the pre release hype I actually had some hope they would change something, anything, with the braindead computer opponents.
Good thing I've become a hateful gamer and didn't bother with Empire then.

The fan's reception of the patch and the "ai improvements" in the official forum is also not exactly positive. Most comments are "this is exactly the same, the AI still makes the same mistakes", "AI is FUBAR, i don't think they can actually fix it", "i don't believe it can be fixed this time with mods like in past games", etc.
Of course, they are they typical rabid fan/internet angry man. But they know what they are talking about, when you play hundreds of hours in the same game is when you can differentiate between AI feature, AI bug, lack of AI and a lucky fluke in the AI. Also, when you play hundreds of hours you master the game's mechanics (it is not like when you are a noob and have difficulty not fighting the enemies, but just trying to control your own economy), and need a really intelligent opponent to enjoy the game.

[Tim James]

That sucks, I thought CA hiring Lusted on as an AI tester would really help.

[Sarkus]

That sucks, I thought CA hiring Lusted on as an AI tester would really help.

Yeah, I'm confused about how this all came about as well. One suspects that Lusted would have some interesting stories to tell if he was free to.

[Tim James]

I've been asking for him to write something about the experience for a while, but I guess he likes his job.

He's only a tester so he's merely part of one feedback loop in the grand scheme of the business of making a profit off this game. But jeez, breaking treaties after one turn ought to be pretty simple to find and fix.

[Thrag]

I had another problem that I had not encountered before. A unit of foot artillery got into a state where it would simply not move. It was in the process of limbering and was 90% done, but for some reason it just froze. No matter what buttons I pressed it would not do anything.

On a positive note, the insane load time I experienced when I played right after patching seems to no longer be an issue. Load times no longer seem longer than before.

Unfortunately, the game is still pretty crashtastic. I had two crashes in battles yesterday.

[Eduardo X]

I had another problem that I had not encountered before. A unit of foot artillery got into a state where it would simply not move. It was in the process of limbering and was 90% done, but for some reason it just froze. No matter what buttons I pressed it would not do anything.

I had that bug when it was first released, but it was supposed to be fixed in the first patch.

[salwon]

That was different, that was where they'd limber and then immediately unlimber when they saw an enemy. This sounds like they just freeze altogether.

[Peter Frazier]

I purchased this recently, has anyone had a bug in the 'Road to Independence' campaign where you have to capture Louisburg? It tells me to build a 5th rater and apparently I'm meant to invade with it but I'm only allowed to move it a tiny bit up the coast. I think some trigger failed to shoot with movement permissions.

[Calistas]

Finally finished my AAR

http://afteractionreporter.com/2009/07/14/dar-al-islam-a-barbary-states-empire-total-war-aar-%E2%80%93-part-5/

It only took so long because of bloody crashes and seizures. Gah. Called it a day in 1794 with a quite impressive wee empire I reckon!

[whispa]

Finally finished my AAR

http://afteractionreporter.com/2009/07/14/dar-al-islam-a-barbary-states-empire-total-war-aar-%E2%80%93-part-5/

It only took so long because of bloody crashes and seizures. Gah. Called it a day in 1794 with a quite impressive wee empire I reckon!


Nice write up, fun to read! Nice job tackling the Caribbean and France.

[Calistas]

Thanks. Made for an interesting challenge, especially facing late-period troops with my musket-wielding desert nomads!

[datter]

I ditched ETW when I migrated from XP to Win7 (a worthwhile endeavor, both the ditching and the move to Win7) and despite previously high levels of "meh" with regards to ETW, I find myself thinking about playing it again. For some reason it took me SIX attempts to get it installed the first time. Steam kept causing issues and the entire thing was a giant clusterfuck. By the time I got it working I was so annoyed with the thing I hardly wanted to play, and when I did try it out I was less than enthralled.

Have there been any developments that make it worth risking the install again? Patches, mods, etc? Surely that co-op multiplayer angle that was promised is out now, or soon?

[schurem]

you wait a week or so until this thread resurfaces with 1.4 patch release
1.3 is imo pretty playable, but its bound to improve by quite a bit or so i've understood

[Stridergg]

Hehe, I had similar urge, so I restarted a campaign a week ago to see if battle AI has improved. The game hung up on me during my second battle, which never happened to me back when it was released.

Maybe I'll try it again after 1.4 patch. Or maybe not.

[Sarkus]

I only have room in my gaming queue for one game that is going to need 9 patches to be right. Hearts of Iron 3 just came out.

:-)

[datter]

By that criteria I have to remove everything from my hard drive except ArmA2. Crap.

[Skipper]

Having also just reloaded Win 7 and also having recently considering reloading this I'm glad for the advice on the patch. How close are we to it?

I think for now I'm just going to reload Rome:TW to get my TW fix.

[Fancy Salami]

I'm playing this right now and I'm glad to hear there's a patch coming out. During my two games (one as the dutch and one as the India faction which name escapes me) I have discovered at least two things that annoy me:

1. The AI need to value and protect it's home port! As the dutch this frustrated me to no end as my trade-based economy got crippled by usually tiny 1 or 2 ship fleets blockading my tradepartners home ports. And this while their own full stack fleets were off to god knows where doing god knows what. The solution was to declare war on half the world and send my own fleets to their ports and protect them... And it's just as damaging to the AI's economy if it works anything like the players.

2. Mortars are useless! And they shouldn't be! I had three batteries of mortars bombarding the same position for 3/4 of the battle timer, and the result was just a few deaths. And this was stationary targets! Surely you would think that the mortar crews would be able to eventually home in on their target... (I'm talking about the stationary 750 range mortar though, for some reason the 350 range mobile one seem to have better accuracy). And distance to the target don't seem to play a part either.

And sieges are still glorious messes, but I don't expect that to be as easy to fix as the two things above.

[datter]

Just came across this on the entirely-too-heavily-moderated twcenter.net forums...

18th August:

Hello everyone, today's update is about the upcoming 1.4 update.

The focus for the update has been AI, both campaign and battle along with improvements to sieges and the naval rebalancing. A lot of work has been put into the campaign and diplomacy AI, focusing on how it wages war, makes alliances and peace as well as use of naval invasions. Battle side improvements have been made to most areas of the AI with the focus on the siege AI which has had major changes made to it. Sieges have also had a lot of work done on them with a lot of bugs fixed, improvements made to pathfinding and how guns and troops on walls work.

Below is a list of some of the fixes that will be in 1.4:

- Fix for auto unlimbering causing the attack order to terminate prematurely resulting in an inability to stop the unit from firing.
- Fix for troops on fort walls not using fort gun range when judging when to fire on enemy troops.
- Fix for fort guns using wrong targeting formula.
- Fixes to fort pathfinding and use of ropes.
- Multiplayer soft lock fixes.
- Fix crash in quotes table.
- Cumulative updates to improve AI invasion behaviour.
- Bug fixes and improvements to AI counter offers.
- Improvements to AI diplomatic valuation of military access and alliances.
- Fix for wind sounds not working in naval battles
- Fixed ship wakes not always working.
- Fixed potential crash disembarking agents from navies.
- Fixed armies not being booted out of regions when losing military access gained by joining an ally in war.
- Improved AI diplomacy valuation of technologies.
- Fixed reinforcements from unreachable positions.
- Balance of power fix for attack of opportunity.
- Fixed bug that was causing issues with embarking an army containing multiple characters.
- Minor tweak to stop some ship sails endlessly play furling sound.
- Fixed path blocked bug (pathing into ZoC).
- Diplomacy counter-offer improvements.
- Fix for fast forward not working as intended on some PCs. Will always speed up if camera is still, if camera moves fast forward will be as fast as possible on each PC.

[datter]

Found this too, which is admittedly a couple of weeks old.

4 August:

Dear All,

The reaction on the forums to the recent announcement of Napoleon has suggested there is a level of misunderstanding about a few points. I'd like to shed light on a few of these, directly, if I may.

Why are you releasing another TW game without fixing Empire?

We have not given up on supporting Empire. The major AI upgrade patch is still very much being worked on and is coming shortly. It will be with you a good while before Napoleon's release. Napoleons development is ongoing, just as our support of Emprie is ongoing.
We recognise Empire had problems on release and we've dealt with the vast majority of stability and performance issues people are having. We now need to balance and address gameplay issues. The AI particularly. We have listened to everything you have said and are looking to address as much as possible. Empire has not been forgotten and a major gameplay upgrade is coming, and coming soon.

Why did you lie about releasing an MP campaign? Where is it?

The MP Campaign for Empire has always been a beta product. However, despite it simply being a test of the technology we still want it to be fun and enjoyable, something that's worth your time and our effort. So we've been working on it since release, building it to a state where its stable enough to beta test by you all and is indeed a great deal of fun to play. The MP Campaign Beta has not been forgotten, work is ongoing and it will be released before Napoleon allowing us time to absorb your comments and feedback (Which is ultimately the point of a public beta). To stress: Empire's MPC Beta is still under development and will be coming shortly it has not been dropped or forgotten and will be available soon.

Why do you never give dates for anything? I want to know when I can get my hands on these things!

Wer've learned about giving dates to the community. The understandable anger we've faced when we've given specific dates and not met them is not worth the little comfort given by us mentioning a specific date (Which you must still wait for). All development has a level of risk attached to it, that is the chance that it will not make a specific day for delivery. We've stopped communicating exact dates as a result of feedback from you. The Empire patch and the MPC beta will be released a significant while before Napoleon, which is scheduled for a first quarter 2010 release.

Why are you releasing Napoleon seperately when all it's content should have been in Empire?

The simple answer to this is that Napoloeons content shouldn't and couldnt have been in Empire. Napoleon is a game in it's own right. It spans three full campaigns, not missions or theatres, three sperate campaigns each with their own maps, factions, missions, opponents, story and unique features. In short: It is big.

Napoleon focuses on a man and his destiny and how this is tied to the rise of a nation, a man who defined an era. Empire was a very seperate theme, defining the interplay of actions between nations over a turbulent period of history.

These are two very different games.

We couldn't, nor would we, have added Napoleon into Empire. It's a huge piece of work worthy of its own title.

Admit it, you're going to give up on Empire and try to sell us another game aren't you?

Not at all. After the major AI upgrade patch that is coming we're going to announce another major piece of DLC for Empire, adding more content to its universe and expanding the game even further. Empire is a title into which we put a lot of time and effort, and to which you all gave a great deal of patience post release. We won't walk away from that. So there is more coming.

You do not need Napoleon to enjoy Empire or play Empire, they are two seperate games. Naturally we'd like people to go for both, but we recognise that choice is yours. Whether you chose one, none or both we want to make your experience reflect our time and energy and be as enjoyable as possible.

Does the community reaction to CA's announcements make any difference?

Yes, and always yes. The point of a public beta to the Multi Player Campaign is to get your feedback, the reason for this post is because we're reading and listening to what you say. There's a lot of reaction to what we've announced with Napoleon and some of it is based on misunderstanding. That's because we're at an early stage of development, we only announced on Wednesday last week and there are a lot of different facts and theories floating around. If you have questions post them here or bug a website or magazine to ask us and we'll answer. Please understand some of what is written is speculation and unless its a specific quote from us it may simply be informed opinion.

Finally, sometimes the community reaction is uplifting and othertimes it is demotivating. We recognise that there's a lot of desire out there to see us do better, given some peoples Empire's release experience. We hope that given the sheer amount of attention we've paid to Empire since it's release and the extras we're looking to provide that we will prove by our action that we're not just here to sell games. We love TW, thats why we make it, and we want you to enjoy it too, as that is ultimately it's purpose. Criticism is always welcome, if its positive and constructive we're far more likely to take ti on board and listen.

As always any further questions please post them here and look out for further Napoleon coverage as it comes.

Kind regards,
Kieran

[Tim James]

Yay, looking forward to this AI overhaul so I can go buy the game.

[mrmolecule88]

I'm looking forward to the AI overhaul so I can play it again. sheesh.

[Lorini]

I'm glad they felt the heat. Who knows maybe one day they'll have enough money not to need to sucker everyone into buying their games at release.

[Naeblis]

Bah, in that FAQ there isn't any reference to Paradox! :P

[datter]

I've been playing it a bit lately with a mod called "Darthmod". I haven't messed with the campaign much, but the battles are nicely huge (lots of units/smoke/flanking/etc) and all that. I suck at strat so I may be missing the finer points of appreciating how lousy ETW is. Maybe that's a good thing.

[peterb]

I've been on a bit of a Total War kick lately, and the discussion early in this thread about Shogun: Total War, which I've never played, got me thinking -- iis Shogun available for purchase on any download service anywhere? I know it's not on Steam, but I'm hoping i can impulse-buy my way to happiness tonight.

[Cubit]

I've been on a bit of a Total War kick lately, and the discussion early in this thread about Shogun: Total War, which I've never played, got me thinking -- iis Shogun available for purchase on any download service anywhere? I know it's not on Steam, but I'm hoping i can impulse-buy my way to happiness tonight.

None of the big download sites like Steam, Impulse, D2D, or Gamersgate have this game, but you can get it as a download from Gamestop:

http://www.gamestop.com/Catalog/ProductDetails.aspx?product_id=66903

I'm not sure how it will run on a newer system though.

[peterb]

ntcompatible.com suggests that Shogun is not so much with the working on modern hardware/software combos. Oh well.

[mrmolecule88]

ntcompatible.com suggests that Shogun is not so much with the working on modern hardware/software combos. Oh well.

Is that with a downloaded version? I lost my copy and bought a new disc off of ebay a few years ago, and I haven't any problems with it on my thoroughly modern computer.

[Naeblis]

I could run Shogun Gold Edition in Windows XP 32bits without problem. Well, almost, there was some problem with the prerendered videos.

[frogbeastegg]

There's no legally downloadable version of Shogun.

STW's main hate is modern nvidea cards, and I use the term modern loosely as it's been an issue for some years now. More specifically it hates their drivers. The game won't detect the cursor accurately on the battlemaps; it registers the click as taking place some semi-random distance from the cursor icon. It's impossible to play with that. The game also experiences visual and audio glitches, lock ups and CTDs.

If you don't have a nvidea card you might have a chance ... if the game doesn't hate your OS, or other parts of your hardware. It doesn't seem fond of vista or 64 bit OSs, and can be troublesome with multicore CPUs. Out of all the people I know on totalwar.org who still want to play STW, very few of us actually can.

Medieval: TW has similar problems as it's on the same engine.

[Cubit]

There's no legally downloadable version of Shogun.

Look up.

[frogbeastegg]

If there's a version on there then it can't be legal. CA have not authorised any downloadable versions.

EDIT: and looking at the site it reports compatibility tests, rather than hosting downloads of compatible games.

[Cubit]

If there's a version on there then it can't be legal. CA have not authorised any downloadable versions.

EDIT: and looking at the site it reports compatibility tests, rather than hosting downloads of compatible games.

I'd say if Gamestop was selling this (http://www.gamestop.com/Catalog/ProductDetails.aspx?product_id=66903) illegally, Sega would be on it pretty quick. Whether it works or not on current system is another story, but it is available as a legal download.

[frogbeastegg]

I'd say if Gamestop was selling this (http://www.gamestop.com/Catalog/ProductDetails.aspx?product_id=66903) illegally, Sega would be on it pretty quick. Whether it works or not on current system is another story, but it is available as a legal download.
That gets an actual, honest lol! I mean it. We've asked several times if there's a legally downloadable version and our contacts always say no. I guess they didn't send around a company memo when the deal was made.

If I were in the US I'd buy that version and try it out in the faint hope it works. I do miss old shoggy. I doubt it will though.

[Lorini]

I may have missed it, but you are from CA?

[Wandering_Along]

Its also available in Europe from here:

http://www.gamesplanet.com/UK/produit.html?product_id=511&category_id=17

Not my favourite download site but I've used it a few times with no problems.

[Talorc]

frogbeastegg is one of the mods at totalwar.org, and author of the excellent "The Total MTW Unit Guide" which I still have printed and spiral bound in my bookshelf :-)

[Blackadar]

I'm looking forward to the AI overhaul so I can play it again. sheesh.

I'm looking forward to the AI overhaul so I can finally get some enjoyment out of a game I purchased some months ago.

[frogbeastegg]

Talorc is quite correct. I'm staff on the org fansite and I've written a few internet for the older games in the series.

[mrmolecule88]

I'm looking forward to the AI overhaul so I can finally get some enjoyment out of a game I purchased some months ago.

That too. :)

[Alistair]

I've alway struggled with some basic interface things in the Total Wars. For example, when I come to deploy in a land battle, can I really not select some units and right click and drag to show the position and formation I want? I have to put those units in a group, open the formations tab, choose, say, a line, and then I can put them in a line. That seems so obviously painful that I must be missing something. Can anyone enlighten me?

[schurem]

you should be able to drag-place troops without being in formation. just be shure its well within your placement box. also, ships are wonky.

[datter]

Apparently patch 1.4 is to be be released tomorrow (Sept.22) if anyone is still interested in this game. There is also something called the Warpath Campaign (http://www.totalwar.com/empire/campaigns/index.php?t=EnglishUK) coming in October though I will avoid giving CA any more of my money.

[Lorini]

Apparently patch 1.4 is to be be released tomorrow (Sept.22) if anyone is still interested in this game. There is also something called the Warpath Campaign (http://www.totalwar.com/empire/campaigns/index.php?t=EnglishUK) coming in October though I will avoid giving CA any more of my money.

They ought to give that away for free as penance for the shit they released originally.

[zengonzo]

Give us the fucking campaign co-op.

[mrmolecule88]

Give us the fucking campaign co-op.

Wow, I dropped this for a while, hoping I'd be pleasantly surprised. Have they still not mentioned this at all?

[datter]

I believe it's been conveniently misplaced.

[Cubit]

I could care less about the co-op feature, but I find it supremely annoying that they talked about it so much before release and as of yet have not followed through. Just another reason why I won't be buying any more CA games in the future.

[datter]

Exactly the same here, though I did care. In fact the buy decision was made based on that... so CA got one sale out of that promise, but lost a futures worth from me.

[Naeblis]

I already suspected that the coop campaign was not going to appear anytime soon. Even before the retail release of the game, they were speaking about the coop as something well in the future, that eventually would come out, slowly (first in beta shape).

[schurem]

i dont really get all the deep negativity. guess nerds' gotta rage. i for one will happily support CA with another 7 bucks. i like what they make.

[Sarkus]

Co-op is being promised for the Napoleon expansion and they've suggested that it will be out for Empire before that. But yeah, it's pretty crappy the way this has all been handled by CA, even if it's more Sega's fault then theirs (which has always been my assumption).

[Naeblis]

i dont really get all the deep negativity. guess nerds' gotta rage. i for one will happily support CA with another 7 bucks. i like what they make.

Well, not everyone like what they make.

[Blackadar]

i dont really get all the deep negativity. guess nerds' gotta rage. i for one will happily support CA with another 7 bucks. i like what they make.

Riiiight.

Because we should all be happy to have a game that was fundamentally AI brain-dead at launch, had bugs introduced through patches that doesn't allow a fair number of users to even launch the game anymore (and not issued a promised hotfix) and was admittedly (via a GameInformer interview) rushed out the door without promised features. Furthermore, we should be grateful that they've spent more time working on their next product and DCL rather than fixing their product.

I guess some nerds can't tell shit from shinola.

[zengonzo]

I didn't really have a problem until I learned about Napoleon Total War.

That's pretty damn ballsy.

[Deadbuffalo]

i dont really get all the deep negativity. guess nerds' gotta rage. i for one will happily support CA with another 7 bucks. i like what they make.

How was Stormrise?

For whatever reason, Empire and CA piss me off a lot more than Paradox and their buggy releases. Maybe because Paradox is smaller and doesn't sell as many copies. Maybe because after dealing with Medieval 2's buggy release I should have known better. Maybe because unlike Paradox, I don't anticipate CA fixing Empire's release bugs.

[rezaf]

For whatever reason, Empire and CA piss me off a lot more than Paradox and their buggy releases.

For me one of my main gripes with Empire is how every reviewer out there seemed to love it. That or they all got paid off.
When I picked it up it had a Metacritic score that exceeded 90.

Now don't get me wrong, I think even in it's early states ETW wasn't a bad game, but at release, it was definately nothing better than 7x material, and I don't know if it's fundamentally better now.
I lost interest in it pretty quickly, and being a Steam game and all (though I did buy a DVD boxed retail copy), I can't resell it, which sucks.
_____
rezaf

[Hanzii]

For me one of my main gripes with Empire is how every reviewer out there seemed to love it. That or they all got paid off.
When I picked it up it had a Metacritic score that exceeded 90.

Read Tom's review (http://www.crispygamer.com/gamereviews/2009-03-17/empire-total-war-pc.aspx) (Fry It!, which is at the most a 7 on the 7-9 scale) and then Troy's Dissenting Opinion (http://www.crispygamer.com/columns/2009-03-20/dissenting-opinion-empire-total-war.aspx) and then tell me with a straight face how Troy is probably bought.

Perhaps if you read most critics arguments why they liked Empire instead of shooting straight to the score, which didn't match the one inside your head, you'd understand.

Disagreeing with people or even accusing them of totally missing the point is fine, but the "I bet they're corrupt!"-angle is fucking tiresome.
(Yes, I gave Empire a 5 out of 6 and I might have scored it slightly lower if I'd had more time with it... but I wouldn't have flunked it and I still like it flaws and all)

[rezaf]

Hanzii, you shouldn't take what I wrote too literally, I'm willing to believe most reviewers out there weren't paid a sum of money from CA for favorable reviews. However, SOMETHING must have caused the universally positive acclaim.

I've long gotten used to avoid blindly trusting review scores and I tend to read reviews in-depth. However, if a reviewer is willing to hand out a 9/10 or better in the bottom line, he is basically unconditionally recommending the game and shouldn't have written "oh, the game sucks by the way" somewhere in the review smallprint.
Tom's review is obviously not one of the problematic ones, as he clearly points out some of the game's flaws and his "Fry is" can't really be translated into a 10/10.

And I'm aware of criticism applied to aggregator sites such as Metacritic. However, I find they generally offer a solid general idea of the quality of most games. I would never use a MC score to judge a 72% game vs. a 77% game, but I like to use it to judge a 85% vs. a 25% game, if you get the idea...
_____
rezaf

[Eduardo X]

It takes a lot of playing E:TW to get the point where you realize the game is bullshit. And even when you do realize it, the game is still enjoyable.

[Benhur]

I have a few issues with the game, but I have played this game more than any other since it came out in March. There's something about the game that I just love and I keep going back to it. Maybe it's the period of history, maybe it's the sight of my Prussians lining up against a bunch of Gurkhas in Sri Lanka... I don't know. I can't disagree with any AI faults and I think CA has a lot of guts releasing another full game, but I will get the Warpath DLC in October since I still like this game and will be playing it for many months to come. Maybe I need my head examined.

[Blackadar]

It takes a lot of playing E:TW to get the point where you realize the game is bullshit. And even when you do realize it, the game is still enjoyable.

I entirely agree with the first part of your statement. It's hard to see the AI flaws in the typical window many reviewers play the game before writing the review (often no more than 5 hours). Therefore, the fundamental problems with the AI are easily missed. For example, if you started as France, you wouldn't catch the issue that the AI wouldn't attempt any seaborne invasions. Heck, you might not catch it as England for a while. So I understand why even good reviewers missed some major issues. It's similar to the outstanding reviews that Black & White got because the first 3 hours were pretty awesome. After that...not so much.

As for the 2nd part, once I uncovered these issues, the game wasn't enjoyable for me. Knowing the AI wouldn't attack even by land ruins the game for me. Watching the AI let their cavalry get destroyed by my guns because they kept moving back and forth across the battlefield wasn't much fun. Watching the AI stand outside my fort, making no attempt to enter while I shot them down wasn't fun. Hitting "end turn" and waiting 3-5 minutes for the AI to move wasn't fun. Hitting "end turn" 50 times because I had conquered the entire world yet the game didn't stop wasn't fun. Hitting the bug in 1.3 that wouldn't let me start the game up wasn't fun. Waiting for a promised hotfix wasn't fun.

Hopefully the new patch will fix these issues. Some of them may have been fixed in the last one (I wouldn't know since I can't start the game). But there's no way in hell these things should have been overlooked prior to release. There's no way in hell that a bug introduced in a patch that doesn't let players play the game should have been allowed to drag out this long after a hotfix was promised. There's no way in hell they should be releasing DLC over fixing stuff that was outright broken. So now there's no way in hell that I'm paying full price for a CA game anymore.

If anyone hasn't seen it, Game Informer had an interview some months back with the CA team on Empire. They asked some pretty scathing questions and CA's responses are worth reading. Essentially, the answers boiled down to "we didn't do enough play testing to uncover that issue and/or we knew we rushed it out the door".

[zengonzo]

That co-op campaign could forgive a lot for me - a buddy and I have long wanted such an opportunity.

But I'm still put off from buying any further iterations of the series.

[Stridergg]

So now there's no way in hell that I'm paying full price for a CA game anymore.


+1.

Even though I haven't been affected by some of the issues listed by Blackadar, seeing what kind of products CA has been releasing in the last few years as well as seeing what kind of "support" they are providing and how much they stick to their word - there is no way I am paying full price.

I just don't want to support this kind of business model.

[datter]

I just don't want to support this kind of business model.

ArmA2.

[Eduardo X]

ArmA2.

I got chumped with that game too. Again, I'd say it is an enjoyable game that is also total bullshit.
I am not trying to say that anyone else would find the games enjoyable. Basically, I like to kill little dudes with canons. E:TW provides plenty of opportunity for that. It's a shame it doesn't do it better.

[Kalle]

Basically, I like to kill little dudes with canons.

See, this is what the Americas campaign for M2TW is for. Not only do you have cannons and guns while your enemies don't, they massively outnumber you and all try to charge you so you get the full benefit of watching their ranks disintegrate.

[Stridergg]

ArmA2.

Haha, dude, Arma 2 doesn't work properly on your computer, we got it from the 3 different threads where you already mentioned it. :) It works perfectly ok on my computer, it allows me to play countless missions with my friends (I am not playing campaign, never wanted to), the AI is great, I am not getting CTD's, patches are coming out monthly and they fix a lot and don't break stuff.

So I guess you don't get a "+1" from me the way Blackadar got it for ETW. :)

[Alistair]

The 1.4 patch seems to be being applied now via Steam.

[salwon]

I am not trying to say that anyone else would find the games enjoyable. Basically, I like to kill little dudes with canons. E:TW provides plenty of opportunity for that. It's a shame it doesn't do it better.

Right here. ('http://www.madminutegames.com/')

[Eduardo X]

Right here. ('http://www.madminutegames.com/')

I actually have that installed, but have no idea how to play and am lazy about RTFM. I'll have to try it again.

[Alan Dunkin]

The 1.4 patch seems to be being applied now via Steam.

Yup me too.

Patch notes:

New Content


Two (2) new historical battles: Battle of Rossbach and Battle of Fontenoy. Both available in single player and multi player

Missile cavalry can now fire and reload whilst on the move


Balance Changes

Overhaul of naval balancing

Dragoons are available from higher building levels and now have fire by rank

Light Dragoons have gained longer range guns to allow them to skirmish better

Reworked cavalry costs to better reflect their value on the battlefield

Increase in cost to Windbusche Jaegers and Ferguson Rifles

Some improvements to projectile balancing

Balance improvements made to Road to Independence Episode 3


Fixes

Fix for auto unlimbering causing the attack order to terminate prematurely resulting in an inability to stop the unit from firing

Fix for troops on fort walls not using fort gun range when judging when to fire on enemy troops

Fix for fort guns using wrong targeting formula

Fixes to fort pathfinding and use of ropes

Multiplayer soft lock fixes

Fix crash in quotes table

Improved AI diplomacy

Cumulative updates to improve AI invasion behaviour

Added tooltips for alliance button in diplomacy

Bug fixes and improvements to AI counter offers

Improvements to AI diplomatic valuation of military access and alliances

Fix for wind sounds not working in naval battles

Fixed ship wakes not always working

Fixed disembarking subsets of armies and agents from navies

Fixed potential crash disembarking agents from navies

Fixed armies not being booted out of regions when losing military access gained by joining an ally in war

Improved AI diplomacy valuation of technologies

Fix for bug where general's unit for an upper class rebellion was coming from the region owning faction rather than the faction rebelling

Fixed reinforcements from unreachable positions

Fixed bug preventing disembarking

Balance of power fix for attack of opportunity

Fixed bug that was causing issues with embarking an army containing multiple characters

Minor tweak to stop some ship sails endlessly play furling sound

Fixed path blocked bug

Diplomacy counter-offer improvements

Fix for fast forward not working as intended on some PCs. Will always speed up if camera is if camera moves fast forward will be as fast as possible on each PC



--- Alan

[datter]

Haha, dude, Arma 2 doesn't work properly on your computer, we got it from the 3 different threads where you already mentioned it.

Good, I'm glad it's getting through to people because I'm far from the only one putting up with BIS and their nonsense... largely the same nonsense that was shoveled out as Armed Assault a few years back mind you.

The secret for you my friend, is to look up past your own little experience and see the larger group of people having issues with your golden-boy. BIS has shot themselves in the foot in a lot of ways, with a lot of people... just like CA did here with ETW.

So I guess you don't get a "+1" from me the way Blackadar got it for ETW. :)

That breaks my heart. Really.

[Naeblis]

Hey, i had more problems with E:TW than with Arma 2 :P

[schurem]

so ah datter, how's the weather out in nova scotia? sucks huh? got any good games to bide your time with? or only clunkers like E:TW and ArmA2?

[datter]

If the ArmA2 fans here want to argue, please report to the ArmA2 thread. I will be along at my convenience.

[Blackadar]

Fixed potential crash disembarking agents from navies

I wonder if they've fixed the crash when disembarking armies from navies? That really screwed up my first game when my 2nd biggest army couldn't get off the ship without crashing the game. I finally had to consider them "lost at sea" to continue.

[Thrag]

Those patch notes make me sad.

I'm sad to see no mention of a fix for the bug that was introduced in 1.1 where skirmish mode for light infantry became "completely freeze if any enemy is near" mode.

No mention of the whatever memory leak causes the game to take more and more memory until it crashes. I still have to restart the game every 2-3 battles or risk crashing in battle or just after.

Nothing about how lots of nvidia users have crashes or can't even start the game if the option for volumetric effects is turned on.

No fix for units that are grouped together not following move orders correctly (if you right click drag a unit into a particular position, they will ignore the carefully selected position and move as if you single clicked on the spot).

I knew it would be too much to hope for a fix to stop artillery from targeting that one cavalry unit that is coming around the flank that requires not only shooting through my own infantry units flanking the cannon, but through the other cannons in their very own unit. Just as I didn't even bother wishing for artillery to actually stop firing when you tell them to (you have to love how mortars just have to fire at least one more volley a couple of minutes after you tell them to stop).

Good thing they spent all that time re-balancing the simplistic naval combat that didn't really need any re-balancing. It could have used a lot of things, marginally realistic ship handling, shoals and other coastal features, weather, etc. though none of those would make my priority list before any of the bugs they are seemingly unaware of.

It's a real shame that after so many months and four major patches that it seems they are still a little ways off from what should have been an early release candidate build.

[Cubit]

Was that limbering bug ever fixed?

[Thrag]

Was that limbering bug ever fixed?

That one they did fix. I don't seem to have a problem with my guns unexpectedly unlimbering since the last patch.

[Cubit]

That one they did fix. I don't seem to have a problem with my guns unexpectedly unlimbering since the last patch.

Ah, good.

[datter]

One of the last times I played ETW I put DarthMod in to see if it would embetter things in some way. I can't recall if it did or not, and I think the mod is still in place. Is it advisable to delete those mod files, then fire up Steam and let it update to 1.4 or can I just leave the mod thingy as is?

[Alistair]

Just had my first crash. Volumetric effects you say? I'll try those. Restart to avoid memory leaks? Right-oh. What do I do about the fact my guys can't leave Amsterdam... becuase they don't know how doors work?

[Thrag]

I got to play some post patch. So far all I can tell is that skirmish mode is indeed still broken, one my light infantry did turn around before it totally froze up so maybe that's some sort of improvement, they turn their backs before standing still awaiting the charging enemy. I don't see evidence of an improved battle AI, unless pointlessly rushing into my battle lines is supposed to be an improvement.

Now I also get intermittent stuttering and flickering on the campaign map. Empire: Total Disappointment continues to deliver its total disappointment.

edit: On a brighter note, I just played through several battles without things slowing down and crashing. That's an improvement.

[UncleSmoothie]

It must be that we're a bunch of nitpicking grognards, right? Because this game sold like hotcakes and had universally glowing reviews, yet I have found it to be a frustrating mess once the initial glow wore off after a couple of days.

[Dan_Theman]

Well, in moderate defense of those who reviewed it a little more favorably than the rest of us currently view it:

If it worked on their PC without crashing, how right would it be to mark it down for stability issues? Also, it could take several full games to notice all the weaknesses the AI showed, let alone uncover the bugs within the game - I don't picture reviewers as beta testers who try to find where the game is broken and I don't imagine them zooming in to make sure every unit is facing the right direction, rather they're trying to see how fun it is (or not) and then they attempt to impart that information to you and me in a way that it becomes useful information to both your purchasing decision and as someone interested in the evolution and history of the gaming industry.

For whatever it's worth, while I appreciate that role the reviewers have, I have come to realize that having someone try to attack the game design from the get go and being able to read their findings likely would have saved me not only my $60 but also the sense of frustration of knowing that I missed out on the USS Constitution just because I hadn't preordered like many others.

Besides these points, my guess is many of those favorable reviews would likely be reprised at this point if the reviewers were given the opportunity, and even if they weren't then a rather distasteful opinion of CA's development process may have been formed in the wake of how this game has been received by many customers.

[Jag]

Got the game yesterday and played my first skirmish with 1.4. The enemy General's Cavalry suicide charged my line ahead of his troops.

Edit: In the campaign, I had an enemy unit freeze and was not attackable. I had to quit the scenario and received a defeat even though my bar was mostly green.

[Blackadar]

Well, in moderate defense of those who reviewed it a little more favorably than the rest of us currently view it:

If it worked on their PC without crashing, how right would it be to mark it down for stability issues? Also, it could take several full games to notice all the weaknesses the AI showed, let alone uncover the bugs within the game - I don't picture reviewers as beta testers who try to find where the game is broken and I don't imagine them zooming in to make sure every unit is facing the right direction, rather they're trying to see how fun it is (or not) and then they attempt to impart that information to you and me in a way that it becomes useful information to both your purchasing decision and as someone interested in the evolution and history of the gaming industry.

For whatever it's worth, while I appreciate that role the reviewers have, I have come to realize that having someone try to attack the game design from the get go and being able to read their findings likely would have saved me not only my $60 but also the sense of frustration of knowing that I missed out on the USS Constitution just because I hadn't preordered like many others.

Besides these points, my guess is many of those favorable reviews would likely be reprised at this point if the reviewers were given the opportunity, and even if they weren't then a rather distasteful opinion of CA's development process may have been formed in the wake of how this game has been received by many customers.

No doubt, I don't blame reviewers for this one. CA did a great job of polishing the product enough to get early good reviews. They just did (and continue to do) a shitty job of finishing the product. Much like many MMOs do with their excellent and engaging beginner zones (WAR, Conan) where the game turns into a giant piece of shit later on.

But CA has pissed me off enough on this one that I'll do my damnedest to warn others from purchasing any of their games. During this debacle, they've turned me from a fan to someone who actively wants them to fail. I could have forgiven the mistakes had they been patched. I could have even forgiven the major delays in the patches if I thought they were putting major effort into fixing them. If they made some token gesture of goodwill, I'd still be inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt. But watching them launch DLC packages and announcing a new TW game that's coming out in about 6 months, all the while not being able to play because of a patch bug they introduced has really pissed me off. You just don't fuck around customers like that.

[Therlun]

If anyone hasn't seen it, Game Informer had an interview some months back with the CA team on Empire. They asked some pretty scathing questions [...]

Is it odd that after a minute of searching for a link to that interview I was baffled by the revelation that Game Informer actually is a print magazine?
Supposedly even the one with the highest circulation...

[Enidigm]

The problem pretty clearly is that CA is no longer in control of their production.

"We need to release Empire next month" It's not quite ready, but... ok"
"We need an expansion pack for Empire, our sales are down" "well, you know. Um. Ok."
"The expansion is taking too long! We need some DLC that can give us more income. Make some units and a quickie campaign. You still want a job, right? ".... ok"

[Thrag]

Well, in moderate defense of those who reviewed it a little more favorably than the rest of us currently view it:

If it worked on their PC without crashing, how right would it be to mark it down for stability issues? Also, it could take several full games to notice all the weaknesses the AI showed, let alone uncover the bugs within the game - I don't picture reviewers as beta testers who try to find where the game is broken and I don't imagine them zooming in to make sure every unit is facing the right direction, rather they're trying to see how fun it is (or not) and then they attempt to impart that information to you and me in a way that it becomes useful information to both your purchasing decision and as someone interested in the evolution and history of the gaming industry.

It is true that aside from obvious crash bugs (that seem to affect nvidia users more than others) a lot of the issues are not initially obvious. For example, all the problems with light infantry are not apparent if you play a campaign game, since you don't get light infantry until many tens of hours into a campaign. Early in a campaign the starting forces and their initial positions can make it seem like the campaign AI is doing something intelligent. However a lot of the battle flaws could have easily been noticed by experimenting with different units in non-campaign battles, and the any extended campaign should have made the weakness of the AI apparent to someone paying careful attention instead of just merrily watching the explosions. I would expect reviewers to do things like set up lots of battles to see not only if all the units work correctly, but if the balance is effective. I'm not asking them to do it as extensively as a beta tester should, but I do expect depth in reviews not just a write up of the first impressions of a few hours play (of course, this is why I don't really read game reviews anymore, they are often just summaries of a game's feature list followed by glossy first impressions with little depth).

I'll give reviewers a pass on the units in skirmish mode just stand still bug since I believe it was introduced a patch, but the thing about them facing the wrong way is not a zoom in cosmetic thing. You give an order to line your infantry up somewhere and they all face to the side meaning they will not fire or defend themselves in any way from an enemy at their front. That's just plain broken. Other major bugs in the initial release like artillery immediately unlimbering and firing at will when given an order to limber would be hard to miss unless you never tried to move an artillery piece, and I wouldn't be surprised if some reviewers in fact never did limber artillery since with a battle AI that likes to set up its artillery regardless of any hillsides or buildings right in front of them blocking their fire and then rush its infantry and cavalry piecemeal into your lines, moving an artillery piece is hardly ever necessary to win a battle.

[Blackadar]

It is true that aside from obvious crash bugs (that seem to affect nvidia users more than others) a lot of the issues are not initially obvious. For example, all the problems with light infantry are not apparent if you play a campaign game, since you don't get light infantry until many tens of hours into a campaign. Early in a campaign the starting forces and their initial positions can make it seem like the campaign AI is doing something intelligent. However a lot of the battle flaws could have easily been noticed by experimenting with different units in non-campaign battles, and the any extended campaign should have made the weakness of the AI apparent to someone paying careful attention instead of just merrily watching the explosions. I would expect reviewers to do things like set up lots of battles to see not only if all the units work correctly, but if the balance is effective. I'm not asking them to do it as extensively as a beta tester should, but I do expect depth in reviews not just a write up of the first impressions of a few hours play (of course, this is why I don't really read game reviews anymore, they are often just summaries of a game's feature list followed by glossy first impressions with little depth).

I'll give reviewers a pass on the units in skirmish mode just stand still bug since I believe it was introduced a patch, but the thing about them facing the wrong way is not a zoom in cosmetic thing. You give an order to line your infantry up somewhere and they all face to the side meaning they will not fire or defend themselves in any way from an enemy at their front. That's just plain broken. Other major bugs in the initial release like artillery immediately unlimbering and firing at will when given an order to limber would be hard to miss unless you never tried to move an artillery piece, and I wouldn't be surprised if some reviewers in fact never did limber artillery since with a battle AI that likes to set up its artillery regardless of any hillsides or buildings right in front of them blocking their fire and then rush its infantry and cavalry piecemeal into your lines, moving an artillery piece is hardly ever necessary to win a battle.

Sorry, but you expect too much from reviewers. They're not going to set up battles and review the balance as a matter of course. They play the main game the way most players would play it and write their impressions. That's a review, which is different from analysis, which is what you want. Now if a reviewer does uncover something they think it major, they'll test it a couple of times to confirm it. But if something like that doesn't happen in the normal course of play, they're not going to uncover it because there's simply not enough time.

When you write reviews, you're under pressure from the time you get the game until the time you publish the review. Editors are on your back because they want to get theirs out early so more people see it (if you didn't get a review copy prior to the release date). Publishers & developers are eager to see the scores. You don't generally have 40 or 80 hours to spend with a game. For a MMO or big RPG, you might get a few days to play it. For a 1st person shooter or a strategy game, you might get a weekend. For the latest PopCap game, you might get an afternoon. That time frame includes the time to write the review, check it, print the screenshots and get it together to send to the editors.

It may not be perfect, but that's the way it is.

[Thrag]

It may not be perfect, but that's the way it is.

I know, and that's why I put little stock in reviews. It seems a minority of reviewers try to do more than scratch the surface of a game. They don't do things like try to see if all the types of units actually work as they are supposed to, or examine a game to see if it is horribly unbalanced. It is totally understandable why many reviews saw something shiny and pronounced it gold on that basis alone without looking past the thin glistering veneer, but it's still lamentable.

[Alistair]

I was just wiped out... losing Amsterdam... to the Marathi??

[zengonzo]

Damn, that's a long march.

[mrmolecule88]

Cooking their curry in their pots takes on a whole new meaning!

Eh? eh?

[Alistair]

I had abandoned my capital (my single holding in Europe) for a smash raid on Brussels, which I lost, but not disastrously (apparently there's a thing called cannister shot...) when out of the blue a boatload of Indians turn up and walk into my city. Which I'd held through about 10 attacks from France and Prussia. Jeez. And it seems to be sudden death - lose Amsterdam and the Dutch are no more. Does that apply to CPU factions as well?

[Thrag]

On the total war forums there was a thread about how some people are once again seeing the enemy AI foolishly rush into melee, the thread was closed with this note from the moderator:

My opinion would be if it is a bug then everyone would be saying the same thing ie that the AI never shoots ever it just always charges straight into the player and engages in hand to hand combat. As people are saying different things and in fact the majority view is that it is tactics and not a bug at all then it isn't a bug it's a new AI routine designed to more accurately mimic the fighting style of the period.

I really hope the moderator is just a fan and not in any way involved with the actual software development, but if they are it would explain their seeming inability to even acknowledge certain bugs.

[Stridergg]

The secret for you my friend, is to look up past your own little experience and see the larger group of people having issues with your golden-boy. BIS has shot themselves in the foot in a lot of ways, with a lot of people... just like CA did here with ETW.


Awesome, now I know your secret.

The thing is I don't care about experiences of other people and my own little experiences are the most important thing in the world. If the game (or whatever) works for me and I enjoy it, I couldn't care less about other people's problems with it. I recommend you do the same, you'll get more enjoyment out of your life.

That's a secret for you and IMO it's a better one.

[Thrag]

I just had a new and interesting thing happen in a battle. I had a unit of jagers in light infantry mode with a cavalry unit a distance behind it. I had my light infantry run up and fire a volley and then retreat while I ordered my cavalry to then run down the enemy. My lancers charged straight ahead! Which was odd since the enemy was running off to the right. Instead of chasing the enemy, they slaughtered 30 of my own light infantry. Now, taking a little friendly fire because I ordered fire on a close target is fine, but my own cavalry charging and slaughtering my own unit, that's ridiculous.

I wish hadn't exited the game in disgust, the recording would have been an excellent example of everything wrong with the game. On the battlefield there was a significant rise and an entire city between me and the enemy, yet they lined up their guns as if there was nothing in the way and proceeded to pound at the hillside. Not even stopping as its own units walked in front of the guns. The enemy moved in a completely disorganized fashion into my lines. First with it's general and elephant cavalry forward without any support walking into a line of jagers, hesitating for a while, and only charging after I have set spikes into the ground which the enemy immediately destroyed itself against. It garrisoned buildings in the town for no apparent reason, wasting units that should have been used for a massed attack at my line. Bit by bit came the musketeers and dervishes that didn't pointlessly garrison buildings, encountering my lines without any coordination and one by one being repulsed. I probably wouldn't have taken more than a dozen casualties if I hadn't quit, and the battle wasn't that uneven. The Mughal army was a full stack, eight 18 pound artillery units, a general and additional war elephant, and similar numbers of musketeers and dervishes making up the rest of the army. I had 2 mortars, 2 howitzers, four Prussian jagers, a general, two lancers, and the rest line infantry. Sadly the enemy AI even with all that artillery couldn't do anything remotely useful. It took a friendly AI bug to do significant casualties.

[Lorini]

Why do you keep playing it if you hate it so much?

[Thrag]

Why do you keep playing it if you hate it so much?

Well, I'm playing it now because a patch came out that was supposed to finally fix many of the problems I had with the game. I figured that would be fairly obvious given that the only reason this thread is getting posts again is because yet another patch has come out. I was hoping to finally get the game that was advertised and that I paid good money for.

I do have a love/hate relationship with the game. Like most games in the series it is close to being great. It is great at moments, if only they weren't overshadowed by it's many flaws. There are occasional battles that play out great and for a moment it is the game I have always dreamed of, but for each one of those there are three brain dead AI battles and five crashes to desktop.

I initially purchased and played it because I had respect for the development house and I enjoyed their previous titles despite their flaws. I've been waiting a decade for CA to live up to the potential they showed back with Shogun: Total War, now I just want someone else to try and make a game of this nature since CA has proved they are simply not up to the task or producing a stable game or anything resembling a competent AI. They have ruined their reputation with me with their terrible handling of Empire.

[salwon]

On the total war forums there was a thread about how some people are once again seeing the enemy AI foolishly rush into melee, the thread was closed with this note from the moderator:



I really hope the moderator is just a fan and not in any way involved with the actual software development, but if they are it would explain their seeming inability to even acknowledge certain bugs.

Dude, you just can't handle the awesome AI!

[zengonzo]

The AI very accurately simulates completely incompetent commanders. It's as realistic as you can get.

[Stridergg]

I initially purchased and played it because I had respect for the development house and I enjoyed their previous titles despite their flaws. I've been waiting a decade for CA to live up to the potential they showed back with Shogun: Total War, now I just want someone else to try and make a game of this nature since CA has proved they are simply not up to the task or producing a stable game or anything resembling a competent AI. They have ruined their reputation with me with their terrible handling of Empire.

I am guessing (and I have no idea whether it is really the case) the ETW team (its structure, the actual people, the business model, etc.) is much different from the Shogun team. It's probably to the point where it's a completely different company now, it just happens to own the Total War IP.

Thrag, thank you for your posts btw, I was curious about the patch and didn't have time to test it out for myself.

Blackadar, did this patch fix that "can't start the game" bug you used to have?

[Blackadar]

Blackadar, did this patch fix that "can't start the game" bug you used to have?

I haven't tried it yet. It was supposed to be fixed months ago via a hotfix, but that never came out. There wasn't a mention of the fix in the patch notes.

EDIT: According to the forums, it doesn't appear that this was fixed. But perhaps I'm not having the exact same problems, so it remains to be seen.

[datter]

The thing is I don't care about experiences of other people and my own little experiences are the most important thing in the world. If the game (or whatever) works for me and I enjoy it, I couldn't care less about other people's problems with it. I recommend you do the same, you'll get more enjoyment out of your life.

That's a secret for you and IMO it's a better one.

Being a self-centered jackass is a pretty lousy secret.

[Stridergg]

Being a self-centered jackass is a pretty lousy secret.

No, it's called having your own opinion based on your own experience.

[datter]

No, it's called having your own opinion based on your own experience.

ok, good luck with that.

[Dan_Theman]

Blackadar -

I've heard from many people that your particular situation is not fixed, yet a few have finally found some success.

While that wasn't my crash situation, I was able to play a 4-on-4 large army land battle and made it through the entire struggle without a crash - something I usually wasn't able to do in the past. I did lower the graphics settings and adjusted the sound a bit (I found some issues with a different game where if I selected "Windows default" for the speaker setup it actually caused some problems as opposed to just selecting 5.1 discrete), as I just wanted to see if I could make it through the whole battle. There were still some brain-dead AI decisions being made, but it played a little tougher than before.

I'll raise the graphics settings back to where they should be to play another battle tonight, and perhaps open up a campaign to see if it will still grind to a halt (which it always did after a time).

[Enidigm]

I've been tooling around in the first couple of years of a Russian campaign, and tried to continue it after the patch. I move up an army into Ingria and took St. Petersburg without a fight by asking the defenders to surrender. But surrounding the city were several small stacks of 2 or 3 units piecemeal. The next turn i decided to reduce these possible threats one at a time, before they had the time to coalesce, and attacked 2 units of pikemen with 4 Line Infantry, 3 Cavalry, and a cannon.

At first the cannon lined up and fired uselessly for several rounds at a pike unit behind a barricade, without causing a casualty or even getting near, so i decided to move the line infantry up.

To my horror my Swedish opponent cast the global spell "cannot select my units" because suddenly the pike unit didn't exist as a eligible target. My line infantry could not shoot at it or melee with them; yet, the individual soldiers were still capable of being killed. So i lost greater casualties than he, despite not having a single gun in his force, because i had to walk my units into the general area of the pikemen and hope they swung a sword or two on their own. Then, at the end, an invisible unit of broken pikes at the edge of the map, which i could neither see, shoot at, or select, caused me to lose the battle - and abandon St. Petersburg in disarray, apparently, as well. Fun.

[Blackadar]

I've been tooling around in the first couple of years of a Russian campaign, and tried to continue it after the patch. I move up an army into Ingria and took St. Petersburg without a fight by asking the defenders to surrender. But surrounding the city were several small stacks of 2 or 3 units piecemeal. The next turn i decided to reduce these possible threats one at a time, before they had the time to coalesce, and attacked 2 units of pikemen with 4 Line Infantry, 3 Cavalry, and a cannon.

At first the cannon lined up and fired uselessly for several rounds at a pike unit behind a barricade, without causing a casualty or even getting near, so i decided to move the line infantry up.

To my horror my Swedish opponent cast the global spell "cannot select my units" because suddenly the pike unit didn't exist as a eligible target. My line infantry could not shoot at it or melee with them; yet, the individual soldiers were still capable of being killed. So i lost greater casualties than he, despite not having a single gun in his force, because i had to walk my units into the general area of the pikemen and hope they swung a sword or two on their own. Then, at the end, an invisible unit of broken pikes at the edge of the map, which i could neither see, shoot at, or select, caused me to lose the battle - and abandon St. Petersburg in disarray, apparently, as well. Fun.

Jeezus. That's just fucking unacceptable.

[Enidigm]

At least it looks good :). Also, kill HDR lighting, it looks stupid most of the time making wooden barricades glow white hot like the sun.

[Tim James]

I understand that software development is hard and bugs must be tackled, but every now and then something makes me scratch my head. How does your code gets so bad that in-game units can't be selected anymore?

[Stridergg]

I understand that software development is hard and bugs must be tackled, but every now and then something makes me scratch my head. How does your code gets so bad that in-game units can't be selected anymore?

Especially since they don't rush out the patches. Their idea of a hotfix seems to be "we'll get to it in a couple of months". How do you screw up this bad when you take so much time to develop a patch?

I don't think I even want to fire it up and check it our for myself. I am just not excited about playing this game anymore.

[Larinson]

Loaded it up, all set to have some fun with the new and improved E:TW. 3 turns in, my East Indiamen were unable to leave port for no apparent reason. Turned it off. Maybe after the next patch it will be fixed. Though I guess there won't be another patch, they'll just release Napoleon: Total War and start trying to fix that when it's released too early.

I want to love the games, I really do, but the problems with them just make it impossible.

[Blackadar]

Loaded it up, all set to have some fun with the new and improved E:TW. 3 turns in, my East Indiamen were unable to leave port for no apparent reason. Turned it off. Maybe after the next patch it will be fixed. Though I guess there won't be another patch, they'll just release Napoleon: Total War and start trying to fix that when it's released too early.

I want to love the games, I really do, but the problems with them just make it impossible.

I think if Empire has all of these issues remaining and they don't fix it, they'll find that Napoleon will be the most pirated game of the year.

[Naeblis]

The worst of everything is that i have a strong "this was the last big patch" vibe with this update. They worked for months in this, they betatested it for weeks, annouced the changes in the official forums and they were discussed, etc. From here onwards, it's Napoleon time.

[Tim James]

I only played the demo but this new patch has made me reflect a bit more on my gaming tastes. I've said before that if I had to choose between the two, I usually prefer a high-variance experience (bugs and brilliance) rather than a bland, polished game (though they are nice sometimes). It may be that the Total War games can't surprise me as much anymore and I'm less willing to forgive the bugs, which might explain why I haven't purchased it yet if ever. Perhaps over the lifetime of a game design concept, the developers need to scale back and learn to polish what they already have.

Another aspect to judging this is my faith in a developer to eventually get it right even if it takes 20 patches like Bohemia. (Had to throw that in for the endless Arma2 chatter!) On the other hand you have hardcore fans of Relic games that know even if the game is relatively balanced and stable, there will always be some glaring problem.

[Lux]

I think if Empire has all of these issues remaining and they don't fix it, they'll find that Napoleon will be the most pirated game of the year.

I feel like a dick for saying this, but I think Napoleon has to be a commercial disaster for CA to realize they have to finish their products. Of course if it is, then they'll just fold up the empire franchise and move on to their next product.

I'm actually not seeing the appeal of the Napoleon product. It's a very similar epoch without the depth of the grand campaign and as far as I can tell pretty much all of the same game mechanics. We can assume it to be at least as buggy as Empire will be at the point of its release. So... if they end up fixing the glaring problems with Empire on its release why not just play Empire, which we already own? If it's all still so broken it hurts to play why buy another broken product? If Napoleon magically fixes everything but Empire is left bug ridden... well then F them. I just can't think of a circumstance where I would play Napoleon.

[Enidigm]

The meta-problem, unfortunately, seems to be talent. They need new people, and they need a larger staff if they want to keep growing as a company. All the claims about the superior AI, and then later, the reality of the situation, shows that they aspire to better than they are able. Not all problems can be solved by having your staff just "work harder".

[datter]

The meta-problem, unfortunately, seems to be talent. They need new people, and they need a larger staff if they want to keep growing as a company. All the claims about the superior AI, and then later, the reality of the situation, shows that they aspire to better than they are able. Not all problems can be solved by having your staff just "work harder".

I said "ouch" when reading that, but I was nodding my head too.

[Dan_Theman]

Interesting way to look at it, Tim. I was recently filling out Stardock's survey and one of the questions was a forced choice type inquiring about what would get me to purchase more games. I was caught between three of the choices:

a) lower cost
b) better support
c) better quality at release

I went with the better quality at release and realized that the motivation for doing so was in some part connected to my Empire: TW experience.

I expect for games to have quirks & glitches, and for occastional compatibility issues. That's just the nature of dealing with a gaming machine that has a ridiculous number of different configurations where the parts are made by hundreds if not thousands of different companies. And to be fair, there are games out there more unstable, more defective than E:TW ever was. Do we all remember a certain game with a glitch that would format your hard drive?

However, this game has a company behind it (Creative Assembly) that is experienced enough that they should know what they're doing and I would imagine they have the funding to make sure it gets done right. Sure, Sega might have been pressuring them to get the game out under a tight schedule. Having a bad release would be expected in such a situation.

But the game was released more than 6 months ago and putting aside any AI issues, a sizeable number of people apparently still can't even get the game to load so they too can share in those singularly stupid moments. Others, like myself, haven't been able to play the campaign because the game would "surrender" by crashing to the desktop or freezing up. Perhaps that's the more intelligent AI, afterall? And for people like Blackadar, maybe the game learned the old addage from Wargames - "The only way to win is not to play." Now THAT'S a smart AI.

I agree with Lux when it comes to Napolean - there's really no push for me to get that either, and I imagine it's much the same elsewhere on this continent. Perhaps it will sell better in Europe given the setting, but I somehow doubt it when I think about the extremely poor word of mouth that Empire has cultivated. Perhaps that will turn out to be the fatal blow to the Total War series but I wouldn't be so sure: the cost to produce Napolean, built on the same engine and borrowing quite liberally from their existing product, might be low enough that even a lack of typical commercial success could still result in a decent profit for everyone involved.

I do think they've learned from this - you'd have to be as brain dead as some of the AI generals not to. I just wonder how many will still be around for the next major release. TheSelfishGene may indeed be correct.

[Jag]

I think if Empire has all of these issues remaining and they don't fix it, they'll find that Napoleon will be the most pirated game of the year.

Don't you realize that this need for patch upon patch to make the game playable is the ultimate form of piracy protection?

[Naeblis]

The meta-problem, unfortunately, seems to be talent. They need new people, and they need a larger staff if they want to keep growing as a company. All the claims about the superior AI, and then later, the reality of the situation, shows that they aspire to better than they are able. Not all problems can be solved by having your staff just "work harder".

There is a directionless feeling in the Total War saga. It began as a game focused on tactical battles, with a Risk style map, with the diplomacy AI of a DM game of Quake. But with time, it grew and grew, to a more Civ-like style, every time more encompassing, and now they don't know what game are they doing.
Is a tactical game? a strategy game?
a historical one? a "fun over history" game?
A simulation of a real historic theater? a game where one side wins when kills all the other ones?

In fact, i would say fans also don't know it. Some want more battles and aggressive AI and a challenge, and others complain how irrealistic is the AI making treaties and declaring war to everyone.

[Lorini]

The beauty of TW is that it encompasses all of that, the strategy, the tactics, the history, the simulation. The horror is that they got so close and couldn't finish the deal.

[datter]

Have any CA guys ever posted here? I'd love to hear the other side of all this.

[zengonzo]

In fact, i would say fans also don't know it. Some want more battles and aggressive AI and a challenge, and others complain how irrealistic is the AI making treaties and declaring war to everyone.

Ideally, as with Tropico and other more open strategy games, the starting parameters would allow all players to guide their experience more towards whatever they are seeking in the game.

It doesn't have to be a weakness. (As it might be in this case.)

[Thrag]

To give some positive balance, the game is less crash prone. It does not appear to always be building to an inevitable crash. I did have one lock up the other night while playing a very large battle in a long play session. So not perfect, but definitely better.

When it comes to the AI, it still has major flaws like how it only seems to consider range and not intervening terrain when setting up artillery, and it does seem to occasionally still rush into melee without reason, it certainly doesn't seem any worse. I've only fought some campaign battles from a saved campaign, none of which provided a great chance for the AI to demonstrate any improvement. None of them involved the combination of a well balanced and equivalent enemy force on a relatively open field, a situation which the AI could occasionally do a competent job of.

I have heard that men manning fortress walls man the guns and shoot properly now, but I haven't had a chance to experience that myself so I can't say. I haven't tried a naval battle yet either so I don't know what effect the changes on naval battles have had.

The weird campaign map flickering I had the first time I played post patch doesn't always seem to happen. It's been fortunately uncommon since my first game. I also had tiny blurry text on some loading screens that appears to have gone away, I don't know if they did a hotfix or if tweaking my video settings fixed it, even though I ended up with the same settings as before.

Diplomacy is more active now, I can't say yet if it is sensible, but other nations are more willing to swap things. So it looks like the patch may have made improvements there.

I've seen a lot of people reporting naval invasions, but I haven't had a chance to notice that either since I spent most of my time post patch playing a few turns of a late Prussian campaign where I had effective mastery of the sea and I've already conquered Europe and I'm fighting a unified Mogul India, while invading the Americas starting with the Caribbean. The only naval invasions are being carried out by me. If I didn't have to play until the last turn for the game to end I'd likely stop since I'm dominating.

[Alistair]

The fort guns are better yes. Not perfect, but definintely being used better in my experience. The default troop layout will have them opening up on the enemy at the front and sides of the fort.

[Tim James]

Are there any games that do AI reasonably well at this level on this kind of scale? Maybe the TacAI of the Combat Mission games? Maybe it's telling (or just ironic) that they had a lot of similar problems when they went to their modern release.

I'm not talking about being as good as a human opponent but at least not making serious gaffes.

[Naeblis]

Are there any games that do AI reasonably well at this level on this kind of scale? Maybe the TacAI of the Combat Mission games? Maybe it's telling (or just ironic) that they had a lot of similar problems when they went to their modern release.

I'm not talking about being as good as a human opponent but at least not making serious gaffes.

In defense of CA, Empire TW is a big, big game. Much bigger than Combat Mission, Tropico 3, Civ 4, or the oldest TWs. It's almost three games in one: strategy game (with campaign and sandbox mode), land battle game (with sieges), and sea battle game. With both single and multiplayer in the last two.

[Tim James]

Yeah that's what I was getting at. Not to excuse them but trying to remember where I've seen good real-time tactical AI on this kind of scale. The strategic AI comparison would be something like Civ 4 I suppose?

Back to the business angle, it must be a hard sell to a publisher to take the time to polish every aspect of the game. I'm just trying to brainstorm a scenario where we actually see a working, excellent version of this type of game. Iterating doesn't seem to be going perfectly for CA.

[mrmolecule88]

Is anyone put off by new menu background? Bit of a shameless plug for the new Warpath campaign, isn't it? Although I do like the new music. Much more in keeping with the times, gives things a bit of an Aubrey/Maturin feel.

[Alistair]

... and it still crashes :(

[Thrag]

Are there any games that do AI reasonably well at this level on this kind of scale? Maybe the TacAI of the Combat Mission games? Maybe it's telling (or just ironic) that they had a lot of similar problems when they went to their modern release.

I'm not talking about being as good as a human opponent but at least not making serious gaffes.

When it comes to the battle engine, Sid Meier's Gettysburg comes to mind. The AI in that game was more than competent, it was seriously challenging.

[Jag]

I had my first siege of a Fort last night. I outnumbered the defender and was moving to a hill to place my artillery. The gates open and his Cav comes out. I figured he was going to use it to scout and harass my guns. Then his entire army comes out and gets destroyed. Are they not supposed to stay behind the walls?

[Stridergg]

I had my first siege of a Fort last night. I outnumbered the defender and was moving to a hill to place my artillery. The gates open and his Cav comes out. I figured he was going to use it to scout and harass my guns. Then his entire army comes out and gets destroyed. Are they not supposed to stay behind the walls?

They read "offense is the best defense" somewhere and interpreted it wrong. :)

[schurem]

I got utterly destroyed in a campaign game last night. Either i suck, or the game's ai does know how to play the game.

I was playing as the UP (holland). I had destroyed a fair number of pirate ships in thefirst couple turns and decided i should expand a little. So i wardecced Spain and took Bruxelles from them. Taking it wasn't too hard. But then the French decided to stand up for their Spanish allies and plunked a major army right at the gates of Amsterdam from the north sea. So yea a naval invasion, and a strategically very sound one too. I could not get enough men back to Amsterdam in time, lost it and that's all she wrote.

[CalvinGT]

When it comes to the battle engine, Sid Meier's Gettysburg comes to mind. The AI in that game was more than competent, it was seriously challenging.

The best real-time tactical combat game I have ever played, to this day. I still play it every once in a while and love it. An updated version of the game or one incorporating a strategy layer a la the TW games might be my dream game!

[zengonzo]

They read "offense is the best defense" somewhere and interpreted it wrong. :)

Considering how easy the forts are to scale, I guess they just decided to avoid delaying the inevitable.

[Blackadar]

Well, there's good news. The game actually loaded for me last night. That's progress. Changing the splash screen to advertise their new DLC is downright shitty. What's bad is that I really would like to play the Native American tribes because I think their units are far more interesting to play. There's a lot more speed and movement with those units than with the European armies.

Anyway, encouraged that I could actually get the game to load, I started a new campaign as the Prussians on the 2nd hardest difficult level. I made a trade agreement with the Poles, made sure other enemies were engaged and immediately went and attacked the Ottomans because their territory is ripe for the picking. I had a superior force, so I expected that the Turks would hunker down in some defensive terrain or in the city itself or play a hit-and-run game.

So the map comes up and it's the exact same map I've seen maybe 15-20 times now. I get my forces positioned and start. The Turks, who had no guns and no cavalry, decided to march right into the open field. Right in range of my guns. *groan* So after hitting them for a bit and watching them march back in forth, I decided I'd press the attack. I feinted with my cavalry and watched the Turks split their force outnumbered force. *groan* Needless to say, it wasn't much of a contest. The isolated Ottoman units were beset by my units and turned their backs to my cavalry units, who rode right up their asses.

Simply put, the AI was brain dead. But I didn't expect them to mount much of a defense with their limited units, so I figured I'd give it another go.

I healed my stack-o-doom and promptly engaged another Turk force, this one a bit tougher than the last. I still had the advantage, but they could do some damage to me if they really wanted to. So the campaign map comes up and...

*CRASH*

$%$!&$*!@#!

[Jag]

Considering how easy the forts are to scale, I guess they just decided to avoid delaying the inevitable.

I was actually looking forward to a siege, but I have to figure it is more stupid AI. I agree that Gettysburg was much more challenging.

[salwon]

The best real-time tactical combat game I have ever played, to this day. I still play it every once in a while and love it. An updated version of the game or one incorporating a strategy layer a la the TW games might be my dream game!

It started out with a strategic layer, but Sid Meier eventually decided that combining strategy and tactics was a fool's errand.

The Combat Mission AI seems smart at first, until you realize that all it's doing is going gung-ho for the flags. Then it gets much easier to game. For Shock Force, they went with a completely scripted AI, which people have done some good things with. Of course, the TacAI isn't that smart, which sort of ruins it.

[Dan_Theman]

Well, I just fired up another skirmish at my usual graphics settings and all seemed well. I was mildly impressed that the AI used its cavalry to manuever out of sight and flank my army in an effort to knock out my general. Unfortunately for them I usually keep a sizeable reserve in part to defend against moves like that, and I annihilated the two units they sent without losing a single man form the general's bodyguard. Still no crashes for me, but I've got a long ways to go until I start feeling optimistic.

I'll give the campaign a go over the weekend. I'm at least glad to hear that the AI naval invasions are working properly. Those were supposedly fixed in the last patch, but it still sounded a little sketchy from what I read in the past.

[espressojim]

I think if Empire has all of these issues remaining and they don't fix it, they'll find that Napoleon will be the most pirated game of the year.

Why would anyone waste bandwidth on crap? If they were giving this game away for free on steam I probably wouldn't download it.

[Jason Lutes]

Changing the splash screen to advertise their new DLC is downright shitty.
Yeah, that struck me is pretty sleazy too. Smart, though, since I too have a hankering to whup some European ass as the Native Americans.

[zengonzo]

Were modders not already accommodating that?

[Blackadar]

Were modders not already accommodating that?

Dunno. Were they? I haven't been able to play for a few months now.

[datter]

Yeah, that struck me is pretty sleazy too. Smart, though, since I too have a hankering to whup some European ass as the Native Americans.

Neverwinter Nights used to hawk upcoming expansions on the start screen sort of like this. I don't think it's sleazy exactly, not normally anyway. In this instance, given the state of things with ETW it's a bit silly though.

[zengonzo]

Dunno. Were they? I haven't been able to play for a few months now.


http://www.strategyinformer.com/pc/empiretotalwar/mod/31148.html


You're in luck! You won't have Spirit Walk Kung Fu Attack, of course, but it should scratch the itch.

[Blackadar]

http://www.strategyinformer.com/pc/empiretotalwar/mod/31148.html


You're in luck! You won't have Spirit Walk Kung Fu Attack, of course, but it should scratch the itch.

Good find. I'll have to see if they updated this one for 1.4...or 1.5...or whenever the game is actually stable enough to play. :)

[Stridergg]

The Turks, who had no guns and no cavalry, decided to march right into the open field. Right in range of my guns. *groan* So after hitting them for a bit and watching them march back in forth, I decided I'd press the attack. I feinted with my cavalry and watched the Turks split their force outnumbered force. *groan* Needless to say, it wasn't much of a contest. The isolated Ottoman units were beset by my units and turned their backs to my cavalry units, who rode right up their asses.

This is my main gripe with ETW from the very begining (luckily I didn't have that many CTD's). The AI is so incredibly stupid when it is outnumbered in battles. It's not even stupid, it does random stupid things with absolutely no logic behind them, like walking back and forth in front of my artillery. The problem is that if you play smart on the strategic level, in most of your battles you are supposed to have an advantage ("don't get into a battle, if you are not sure you are going to win it blah blah") and this means that most of your battles are going to be incredibly stupid shows of random acts.

Of course you could handicap yourself and fight only when you are outnumbered but what kind of strategy game this is then?

[Blackadar]

This is my main gripe with ETW from the very begining (luckily I didn't have that many CTD's). The AI is so incredibly stupid when it is outnumbered in battles. It's not even stupid, it does random stupid things with absolutely no logic behind them, like walking back and forth in front of my artillery. The problem is that if you play smart on the strategic level, in most of your battles you are supposed to have an advantage ("don't get into a battle, if you are not sure you are going to win it blah blah") and this means that most of your battles are going to be incredibly stupid shows of random acts.

Of course you could handicap yourself and fight only when you are outnumbered but what kind of strategy game this is then?

Yup, the AI is retarded. They don't understand how to react to a feint, or even how to set up a defensible position. If the TW AI can't attack, it can't offer up a significant challenge. It's so pathetically easy to flank it's not even funny.

Seriously, defending a town with carbines when the other side has cavalry and a couple of cannons, are you going to walk out in the open?!? Or are you going to find a wall to hunker down behind. Or even better, are you going to make the opposing armies funnel into the town, entirely neutralizing their cavalry and cannons?

Now when it was in previous games, where you couldn't get that many units into a fortified structure, the AI offered up a better challenge because it would just attack you at the wall. Now if it does that, my cannons will make short work of a cluster of troops like that. Also, they had some battles that took place with a narrow bridge in between the armies, so it could put up an effective defense there, too. But not anymore

Frankly, the AI in this isn't much better than Gary Grigsby's Objective: Kursk (the original), where a flaw in his programming made defeated enemy AI units retreat forward. He left it in the game to make it more challenging. :)

[Sarkus]

Blackadar, I don't get why you haven't just given up on this game like most of us have. I haven't put significant time into it since a few weeks after it was released because after every patch comes out I go check out a few forums and see that nothing has changed. Endlessly beating your head against this isn't going to change that CA has delivered an unfixable pile of crap and I say that because there are things wrong with this game that go beyond AI or bugs. There are serious design flaws IMHO, things they changed that made the previous TW games unique. And I don't see them completely reworking things the way a developer like Paradox sometimes does. Maybe some modders will fix it down the road, but why bother with it until then?

Then again, I guess if this was a period that you really enjoyed it would be hard to give up on it.

[Naeblis]

So i have begun a new campaign, with the British chaps, and i already seeing a bug. More exactly, a bug that existed in 1.0 and i thought it was fixed in one of the first patches! :< ( i could swear i read it was fixed in a release note from a past patch)
I am speaking about the "some sounds that dissapear from the land battle" bug. Usually they are enviromental sounds, like wind, rain, footsteps, etc.

[datter]

I we all call the CA offices, tell them they suck then go back to playing the board game version of Risk. I'll make the first phone call, you guys get the game board.

[mrmolecule88]

I think I can sympathize with Blackadar. I fired up a new Sweden campaign last night (lost all my old saves due to a bad hard drive. oh well.) and well...it was kind of fun. For all of our complaining, there is a fun game in there somewhere. It's just hideously deformed.

[Blackadar]

Blackadar, I don't get why you haven't just given up on this game like most of us have. I haven't put significant time into it since a few weeks after it was released because after every patch comes out I go check out a few forums and see that nothing has changed. Endlessly beating your head against this isn't going to change that CA has delivered an unfixable pile of crap and I say that because there are things wrong with this game that go beyond AI or bugs. There are serious design flaws IMHO, things they changed that made the previous TW games unique. And I don't see them completely reworking things the way a developer like Paradox sometimes does. Maybe some modders will fix it down the road, but why bother with it until then?

Then again, I guess if this was a period that you really enjoyed it would be hard to give up on it.

Because I haven't had even the opportunity to try it since 1.2 due to the introduced bug. I wanted to see if something had changed...it hasn't.

[Naeblis]

Perhaps we complain so much because in other areas Empire TW the improvements are excellent. For instance, i love what they did in the strategic part of the game.

The art of the landscape, the sheer scope of it, the trade zones, all the interface, controls, tooltips, icons used for feedback, organitazion of the information in panels, the idea of buildings outside the side and into the province, the need of specialize in building sites, you can't jsut build everyting, the new research tree is great, not too small, not too big, and how it plays in the theme of that age (the more you research it, the clamor for reforms increases) , the reduction of agents to only three and how they are generated, the new method to reinforce armies, etc etc.

The problem is "only" that all these elements: economy, religions, armies, interface, trade, etc by themselves are nothing, it's only when all are together when they make a game. And once you have a game... the game is played against the AI. And the AI isn't enough smart for the game. Sometime it can be dangerous, yeah, but it is almost by chance, once you have enough experience you can see clearly how it doesn't use any kind of planning in their actions, it just acts turn by turn, without connection to past actions, and without connections to the future plans. It seems to always live "in the present". That, and also it doesn't seems to judge enemy forces very well (why the hell tries to siege my port with 3 ships, he doesn't see that i have near a navy of 9 ships??).

[Naeblis]

Ok, forget every sentence of faint praise i have written about the game. Also forget the criticism to the AI.

This stupid piece of shit is crashing my campaign. I press "end turn", the AI moves, and when it is going to begin a new turn for me, the game crashes to Windows. Again and again (i just tried 4 times). The previous 47 years of the campaign were more or less stable, mind you.

This, for a game released in March and according to Steam it already have 10 patches is UNACCEPTABLE.
edit: hah hah, using a previous save i got the game working again... until a few turns later, when again i had a crash. When i played the american campaign i didn't have so many problems...

[schurem]

I reckon they only tested that one to conclusion.

[Thrag]

I reckon they only tested that one to conclusion.

Come to think of it, you are probably correct. Since to finish a full campaign you have to play the full 200 turns even if you manage to conquer the entire world before the final turn, I would not be surprised if testers did not actually finish any campaigns. To play a full campaign, especially without auto resolving battles, probably takes hundreds of hours.

[salwon]

The problem with the new campaign map is that a lot of the improvements are pretty awesome on the surface, but completely break down in game. Having buildings all over the place is great - instead of attacking a city, go raid the farms and increase your own food supply! But it doesn't work like this. There's no reason to fight over the scattered villages. The AI will annoy you with small stacks in them, which are easily dispatched, and once you get your own stack together you might as well just go for the main city. It seems like with most of the improvements, they would be pretty sweet if someone actually made a game with them.

[zengonzo]

Sorry, 'new campaign map'? Is this regarding the patch or the expansion? Or .. ?

[Blackadar]

Sorry, 'new campaign map'? Is this regarding the patch or the expansion? Or .. ?

I don't think he's referring to either, but the supposed "improvements" to the campaign map in E:TW versus past games in the series. For example, the ability to have towns in E:TW is neat, but there's really no reason for them because they don't serve any real tactical nor strategic purpose. Frankly, they'd have been much better off if they made you take towns to keep supply lines intact. But as implemented, they're just there to upgrade to unlock certain special units or to generate additional funds.

[zengonzo]

Ach, ja.

Yeah, they're not really significant enough to ever compel any action. Raiding might also have been more useful if sieges were actually difficult and costly, instead of just slightly different terrain.

[salwon]

Yeah, that's what I meant. Raiding is completely useless for a player, and is only annoying when the AI does it.

[zengonzo]

The arbitrariness of sieging really put a huge damper on strategic possibilities and variety. What a catastrophic decision.

[Enidigm]

It would be nice if towns could be captured and traded for, just like in RL during that era. The borders of European states tended to shift by small amounts after wars without any dramatic changes (aside from, say, Poland or Austria).

[mrmolecule88]

Can I just ask something? Why is the new campaign about the American Indians? I thought that was what the M:TW2 expansion was all about. Doesn't it make more sense to add in African tribes?

[zengonzo]

Except that there is really no map for Africa and they'd have to do more than just dress up some units and add magic powers.

[Enidigm]

True African colonization didn't start until after Industrialization, though.

It finally occurred to me what is missing in Empire; there just doesn't seem a way to win decisively as happened in real life, because the game mechanics just don't allow that kind of dramatic sort of pitched battle. The whole Total War combat mechanic was based originally on medieval combat anyway, something that doesn't carry over terribly well into the pre-Industrial era. But when you read about Eugene's victory over the Turks at Belgrade with 40,000 vs. 150,000, i realize that nothing in the game will ever allow this sort of battle to take place. Rivers are still clumsy Amazonian expanses of impassible terrain, and no creeks or streams intermittently fordable, no boggy patches, no dramatic sweeps of road and hill and dale and village and fog or anything that gave one commander the advantage over another. There just seems no way i'm going to beat my opponent, given the same kinds of units, in a dramatic, historically famous fashion, but instead a boring slogfest of melee and numbers. There is also no way to retreat and lesson your losses; every pitched battle is a total battle of annihilation from which there is no survival and no second chances. Break your enemy and they lose >90% of their deployed forces.

[Preachy Preach]

It's a good point, TSG. I'm trying to think of a battle from the period that actually ended up with more than 20% casualties on the losing side (in the specfic sense of physical damage as opposed to wholesale surrenders) - armies would disintegrate in the retreat, but that was more people drifting back home than massive human suffering.

(Of course, just marching an army back and forth in those days would cause a massive diminuition in strength - it wasn't untypical, IIRC, even if no battles or even sieges took place in a campaign, for an army at the end of the season to be a fraction of the size it was at the start - 1812 is only an extreme outlier of the diminution caused by sickness, desertion, starvation, etc.)

[Alan Dunkin]

New patch today came out with the Warpath Campaign release:

Fixed a bug which which occasionally allowed factions who were not allied to be invited to join a war

Improved campaign map performance

Republics will no longer dispute a claim to a throne via a war of succession

Fixed a crash when pathfinding for embarking/disembarking

Fixed situation where balance-of-power bar on battle screen was not considering the correct set of reinforcements

Made the decision of which third-party factions can be involved in a campaign battle slightly fairer

Interceptions are no longer suppressed when blockading a port

Fixed rare crash after naval battles

Fixed rare crash caused by successful revolutionary armies containing units that were not permitted for the resulting government type

Fixed crash in AI logic structures

Reduced AI army clustering

Improved AI invasion troop movement

Various light infantry behaviour fixes

Naval and Land unit balancing

General AI improvements

The game is up for sale this week (half off, at $25), and the units that came in the special edition are now available as a DLC ($2.49), which is not the same as the Elite Units DLC.

--- Alan

[Naeblis]

Fixed a crash when pathfinding for embarking/disembarking
Fixed crash in AI logic structures

Who knows, maybe one of these things were to blame of my problem in the campaign. Not that i am going to try it right now, already uninstalled it. :/ Maybe in December, when we will be out of the big release season.

[zengonzo]

Fixed a crash when pathfinding for embarking/disembarking

Feel like we've seen this in every patch release ..

[datter]

No sale

[Jag]

Is there a fix for the AI cavalry charging my fixed lines every.single.time.

[Sepiche]

Is there a fix for the AI cavalry charging my fixed lines every.single.time.
I haven't seen that in a few patches. The AI almost always tries to flank with cavalry.

[Lux]

I haven't seen that in a few patches. The AI almost always tries to flank with cavalry.

The last few patches they always try to flank. They do, however, charge right in even if you rotate your line to compensate, often before the main body shows up.

[Talorc]

I've noticed them charging in, and just form square and massacre them because they come in unsupported by any other troops...

[Jason Lutes]

Can I just ask something? Why is the new campaign about the American Indians? I thought that was what the M:TW2 expansion was all about. Doesn't it make more sense to add in African tribes?
Even if it made logical sense, it doesn't make marketing sense -- and clearly that's where Creative Assembly's priorities lie. The romance of the American Indian has always been huge in Europe, so they're guaranteed good sales by making that the focus of this new campaign.

I actually bought the Warpath expansion via Steam last night, despite the glaring problems with E:TW, because I'd love to kick some ass as the Huron. However, it hasn't shown up in my games tab, so I can't download it. Sigh.

[Jason Lutes]

Oops, I figured out the problem. There's no separate download, it just updates the game. It looks like it downloaded and updated without me noticing.

[Dan_Theman]

Fixed a crash when pathfinding for embarking/disembarking
Fixed crash in AI logic structures

Who knows, maybe one of these things were to blame of my problem in the campaign. Not that i am going to try it right now, already uninstalled it. :/ Maybe in December, when we will be out of the big release season.
Well, I was able to get past my most recent crash in the campaign after having downloaded the newest patch, so at least there's an improvement in stability for this gamer. I wasn't able to play too long due to time constraints, but I'm planning on giving it another go this evening. I've read reports indicating that several people still can't get the game to start up, but others who have had more success in-game.

The experiences of those that can't even start up (which doesn't seem to be your issue) often seem to be tied to recently released display drivers, but that might just be a common theme among internet sleuths that is being shared. I've noticed some who claim success after rolling back to very old (circa 2007 - 2008) drivers. I think the most recent one I've seen specifically mentioned was something in the 188 series for Nvidia. That's similar to what I need to do for KOTOR, keeping a spare ancient driver that plays nice with the game to avoid incessant crashing on the initial starship.

Anyway, once I have some time to go through the campaign all over again, I'll post here to let you know if it still crashes on me (the PC this game is on uses 4 GB RAM, an old Intel 6850/Core 2 Duo 3.0GHz, and an 8800GTX in case that helps for your own diagnostics).

[Lorini]

Creative Director Mike Simpson of Creative Assembly now has a blog (http://blogs.sega.com/totalwar/2009/10/01/blogging-for-quality-by-mike-simpson/#more-145). Here is the first post:

"Well, I’ve finally given in and decided to start blogging. It’s something I’ve tried to resist over the years. I’ve also not posted directly on the forums, and it’s mainly because it takes so much time. Many of the issues discussed on the forums are deep and complex, and the arguments well put and compelling. Writing considered and persuasive responses that really deal with the issue is time consuming, and that is time I can’t spend working on the games.

So it’s a choice - fix stuff, or talk about fixing stuff. Seems like a no-brainer, but things have changed. I can now add more quality to the games by talking to the community than I can by fixing issues.

Quite simply, the quality of what we produce depends directly on how much we get to spend on developing them. How much we spend depends directly on how many people buy the games. The user feedback on sites like IGN directly impacts sales, and that impacts how positively our publisher views the future of Total War, which determines how much we get to spend on the games.

Normally it’s a virtuous circle, and that’s allowed us to be very ambitious with what we try to deliver. We were not entirely happy with the state of Empire: Total War when it went out, and are only now getting to a point where we are broadly speaking happy with the game. Our own threshold for how we’d like the game to be is much higher than the commercial threshold required by our publisher. We are, like our community, hardcore fans of our own products, and any imperfections drive us nuts.

With Empire: Total War, the virtuous circle turned a little vicious. The community used user ratings and user comments on sites like IGN and Metacritic to highlight weaknesses in the game, to try to encourage us to fix existing issues before working on anything new.

I’m not saying that we didn’t deserve to have a fair number of verbal bricks thrown our way.

However overdoing the criticism (For example I think a 67% user score on Metacritic is unfair), has the opposite effect to what is intended. Gamers (and reviewers. retailers, marketeers and publishing execs) will be put off Total War. That could mean fewer sales and less money to spend on adding quality to the games.

And so I find myself blogging. The aim is twofold. Firstly, I want to explain why we do the things we do, and also a little more detail about what we’re spending our time (and your money) on. That should give the community a much better starting point for discussing issues. Secondly, I want to prove we listen to the community by directly addressing the big issues. I’ll be as honest as I can be without getting sued or fired.

Anyway, I started this by saying I’d rather be fixing the game than talking about it. That’s true, but talking about it is a pretty good second best. I’ll start with the 1.5 patch and AI on the next update, and then go on to talk about Napoleon - what it is, why it’s the size it is, how that affects the price.

Mike Simpson"

So since they shipped a bad product, we (the players) were at fault for criticizing it? I don't get that. On the other hand, this blog could be a subtle message to Sega for not letting CA finish the game. Had the game shipped in a better state, there wouldn't be the heavy criticism, and the game wouldn't have gotten a 67% user rating. I think too though, that the 67% was a reaction to the glowing reviews of reviewers who didn't appear to play the game the same way the game's audience would play it, something CA doesn't directly control (we hope:)

ETW and all the other TW games are a different type of game. ETW is going to be played by players who don't just boot up a game for a few minutes and then move on. ETW is going to be thoroughly explored by (my guess) a majority of the players who play it, and since it's historical is going to be subject to a lot of scrutiny, particularly of the AI.

Apparently 1.5 is better, according to the forums on totalwar.org. I'm going to be booting it up again to see for myself later today.

[Jakub]

I can kind of see his point of view, but it's a very weak argument. Especially since his post just adds to the evidence that a campaign of criticism by disgruntled consumers is having an effect.

[djotefsoup]

I think I understand what he's saying about back end and patch support being determined by sales figures and publisher support and those in turn being determined by critical/metacritical reception.

I think I might have a better idea of why things didn't work out so well in that regard.

I used to be the biggest TW nut around and I had absolutely no problem skipping ETW entirely. I was prepared for MTW2/Kingdoms to be imperfect on release, but I wasn't expecting them to be as bad as they were by the time ETW was announced, let alone in the state they were in by the time ETW was released. That's nothing to do with metacritic or reviews - which were largely positive - but that CA had given me an education in Long Term Problems That Don't Really Become Apparent Until You've Played A Game Or Three.

I would so love for them to ever put out something as good as MTW/VI again. Lessen the scope, ditch this nonsense about the strategic map, and just make it a version of Risk where the payoff is in bringing together as many unit markers in the same place as you possibly can and having a Really Big Fight.

ed - the only thing that could get me to buy another CA game is if they announce that there are going to be two provinces and two sides in the first version and they'll add more when they get those working. But in reality the next game is going to be, you know, SOLAR SYSTEM:TOTAL WAR.

[Tim James]

Publishers might have the money but if the developers are seeing their reputation and franchise devastated by criticism because the game was released too soon, then they need to push back at SEGA instead of crying about it.

It's a lot easier to talk things through in a conference room than convince anonymous Internet posters to curb their hate to allow more money for post-release support. There have to be some people left that still understand the concept of a goose that lays golden eggs for the publisher, and CA needs to either remind them about that, scale back their games, or fold.

[Naeblis]

What a freaking huge bullshit. "If we make a bad game don't stop buying our games and don't give it low scores, because then our future games will be even worse, as we will have less money".

Oh look, sorry, but that is how it work in the industry since... ever. You make a good game, people will buy it. You make a bad game, people will complain and will stop buying your games (or at least i hope it works that way, some times bad games have huge success... but that's another story). You don't have special privileges, now you are going to suck it up.

Yes, now you are going to have a harder time selling your next game, perhaps next time you will think twice before releasing an unfinished game.
And no, money is not the main driving factor of the quality in a game. Proof? Your own Empire Total War!
You had a very good budget (i suppose) for Empire TW, higher than the average strategy game. And even then you couldn't make a good game. So hey! at least that means it's possible to make a good TW even if you have less money in your future games, as it's clear there isn't a direct correlation.

[zengonzo]

I’ll start with the 1.5 patch and AI on the next update, and then go on to talk about Napoleon



Should've fucking stopped at 'next update' ...

[Deadbuffalo]

Well, the blog post was a good motivation for me to rate the game on metacritic.

The community isn't overdoing the criticism. They're responding to the lack of accurate criticism in the gaming media. It's complete bullshit that this guy thinks he can blog away the people who are frustrated with the game on the argument that bad user reviews makes it harder for them to fix the game. You know what else would get rid of the people complaining? Fixing the problems!

I can now add more quality to the games by talking to the community than I can by fixing issues.

I think that quote really sums up how absurd this is.

[Blackadar]

What a freaking huge bullshit. "If we make a bad game don't stop buying our games and don't give it low scores, because then our future games will be even worse, as we will have less money".

Oh look, sorry, but that is how it work in the industry since... ever. You make a good game, people will buy it. You make a bad game, people will complain and will stop buying your games (or at least i hope it works that way, some times bad games have huge success... but that's another story). You don't have special privileges, now you are going to suck it up.

Yes, now you are going to have a harder time selling your next game, perhaps next time you will think twice before releasing an unfinished game.
And no, money is not the main driving factor of the quality in a game. Proof? Your own Empire Total War!
You had a very good budget (i suppose) for Empire TW, higher than the average strategy game. And even then you couldn't make a good game. So hey! at least that means it's possible to make a good TW even if you have less money in your future games, as it's clear there isn't a direct correlation.

I agree 100%. His blog is a bunch of whiny, self-serving bullshit.

Frankly, the way you break the "vicious circle" of "fewer sales and less money" is to:

1. Fix the fucking game
2. Make amends to the community if you have to (how much goodwill did the Witcher folks generate with their freebie?)
3. Move on to the next game.

In that order. What CA is doing is:

1. Moving on to the next game.
2. Maybe fixing the current fucking game.
3. Blame the gamers for being pissed off.

Gee, I get the feeling this strategy isn't going to work all that well.

[Blackadar]

Well, the blog post was a good motivation for me to rate the game on metacritic.


Me too..and it wasn't favorable.

[Lorini]

We'll see. For historical gamers, Napolean is like heroin:) If there's even a hint that the game is good, they'll flock to it in droves. Let's hope this time however the review sites do a far better job in reviewing the game.

[Adam Altmann]

Should've fucking stopped at 'next update' ...

Yeah. Good luck selling me on your next game after your crazy dream-logic explains that it's going to be shit because you'll have less money to make it because people complained about your last game because it was shit. Do you even read what you write, Mr. Mike Simpson?

[salwon]

The last few patches they always try to flank. They do, however, charge right in even if you rotate your line to compensate, often before the main body shows up.


Also, they'll stand there getting shot up by squares instead of going somewhere else.

[intruder]

It's the same thinking than the argument that "Indie games" should get away with more shit than AAA games and that we ought to buy them to support the devs.
A shit game is shit regardless how many people spent how many months / years creating it.

I'm not buying a game so that the devs can make the next one. I buy it because it offers me possible enjoyment.
I owe those devs nothing.

I had a different view some years ago but these days it's a race of who screws whom better with things like DRM, DLC, 2nd hand market etc.

[Naeblis]

Also, a 67% in Metacritic is not "unfair". For lots of months, the game crashed, and your own AI didn't know how to play the game. With that type of flaws, a 67% is very fair... or even too high still.

And next time, perhaps their budget should be more even between the AI and coding departments and the art department. Because the big budget in Empire TW was 90% to the latter, i would say.

[Cubit]

Ugh. That blog post is pretty bad.

[Tim James]

It's the same thinking than the argument that "Indie games" should get away with more shit than AAA games and that we ought to buy them to support the devs.No, I mentioned a while back that "supporting the devs" still makes sense when they are young and in high-variance mode. I have money and am willing to throw it at GSC Gameworld to see if they can capture lightning in the bottle again for another STALKER game simply because that strategy usually beats bland AAA crap for me in terms of producing great game experiences once in a while.

On the other hand, CA is now established and ought to focus on consolidating what they've already done, polishing the formula and getting it right. There is a natural level of patience that humans seem to have with product development and good faith; CA is now in the part of the life cycle where they do not have this, and need to recognize it and shift strategies quickly before they die.

[Lorini]

Btw, if you already own the CE edition of ETW, you can't get the two new units that are included in the SF download for $3 because Steam says you already have the SF download. If you don't want to wait for them to work this out, you can buy them as a gift and use your own email as the address. You can then get the units.

[schurem]

Or you just can go "frak this shit" and not buy them.

I had a lot of goodwill, but their latest caper (http://shoguntotalwar.yuku.com/topic/63705/t/Empire-Total-War-vote-and-WIN.html) pushed me over the edge. These guys are assholes, and no matter how awesome their vision is, and no matter how awesome their games are when they work and come together, this shit just won't stand.

[Lorini]

Or you just can go "frak this shit" and not buy them.

I had a lot of goodwill, but their latest caper (http://shoguntotalwar.yuku.com/topic/63705/t/Empire-Total-War-vote-and-WIN.html) pushed me over the edge. These guys are assholes, and no matter how awesome their vision is, and no matter how awesome their games are when they work and come together, this shit just won't stand.

I'm sorry, but all game companies do this. I have issues with CA, but that wouldn't be one of them.

[mixuk]

I don't understand the furor, or the point of not buying their games. Do we really want to make them go bankrupt?

How about just giving feedback?

I really doubt they are making that much money to begin with.

[Cubit]

I don't understand the furor, or the point of not buying their games. Do we really want to make them go bankrupt?

How about just giving feedback?

I really doubt they are making that much money to begin with.

The impression that I get is that they've gotten feedback on the same issues stretching back over a couple game releases now. CA either doesn't have the talent or the will to do their AI right. People have every right to be upset with them.

[mixuk]

I hate to say this, but it's just a game. Not a philosophy, or a religion, that you have to have a strong opinion of.

Just trying to bring some perspective into this.

[Blackadar]

I don't understand the furor, or the point of not buying their games. Do we really want to make them go bankrupt?

How about just giving feedback?

I really doubt they are making that much money to begin with.

After Empire, I wouldn't shed a tear if they folded up shop. Why should I care one iota about supporting them if they're going to continue to release lousy products and then try to blame consumers for calling them lousy?

[Adam Altmann]

I don't understand the furor, or the point of not buying their games. Do we really want to make them go bankrupt?

How about just giving feedback?

I really doubt they are making that much money to begin with.

What's to understand about not buying their games? It's not like I'm contractually, ethically, or otherwise obligated to buy them. You want me to keep buying your games? Make games worth purchasing.

Are you asking me to buy games I don't want to buy so I can give feedback? People have been complaining about the lackluster AI for several games in a row. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Additionally, Mr. Mike Simpson just told us he doesn't appreciate the negative feedback. How about I just give feedback by spending my $50 on a Paradox game I'll rarely play. At least I like Johan.

I can't say I want CA to go bankrupt. I've loved many of their games. I just want them to do better, and to quit being dicks in the meantime. I'm really put off by the Napoleon announcement, their jackass whiney passive aggressive PR, and this douchey blog post by Simpson.

[schurem]

After Empire, I wouldn't shed a tear if they folded up shop. Why should I care one iota about supporting them if they're going to continue to release lousy products and then try to blame consumers for calling them lousy?

and then to put some icing on the cake, try to bribe them into voting for them to get a prize in a contest lol. these guys have lost it.

I hate to say this, but it's just a game. Not a philosophy, or a religion, that you have to have a strong opinion of.

Just trying to bring some perspective into this.

While you certainly have a point here, there's two points i'd like to make in reply to you. For one, a written argument, especially quickly, impulsively written like those on forums often are comes across far more forcefully than a spoken one. So while many of us seems ready to nuke CA offices into a radioactive parking lot and then piss on the headstones over the empty fraves of the CA staff, most likely we're just slightly miffed over a game that's not quite what we'd expected it to be.

That said. To me games, their development, the way they are marketed and discussed is quite more relevant than something like religion. How could someone could ever get worked up about metaphysics? lol. Games are my hobby, and one i deeply care for. this care sometimes expresses itself in vehement forum warrioring to defend a game that gets slagged off (hey datter, wanna go for a round of ArmA2?).

I have been defending CA for quite some time. I love total war games. Love the idea that drives them, and what CA was trying to do. But they've been behaving shitty, and i feel my goodwill has been betrayed. So fuck you CA, fuck you very much.

[Dan_Theman]

Not trying to pile on, just provide another perspective:

Imagine a company advertised a product that you wanted at a price you were willing to pay for. You provide the money, and yet the product is broken out of the box and the company is unable to fix it and unable to refund your cash.

I think that's reason for being upset. Going out-of-your-mind crazy? Not so much, but I don't read that level of emotion into anybody's posts here. The inability to refund is understandable in this age of piracy and scams, but that highlights the importance of being able to fix the product.

Within the context of PC games, we all know compatibility issues happen. However, these are taken care of by patches almost as routinely as they've sprung up in the past. However, the inability of CA to provide adequate patching for a large number of people is a very good reason to pause before sending any more money in their direction. Whether that's solely their fault or the end result of market forces beyond their control really doesn't matter - it is now a part of the company's track record and is more than reasonable to consider when contemplating your next purchase.

Perhaps a better question to ask which may answer your own is the inverse: why would you not be upset in that situation and why would you buy more products from them, knowing all that has passed? If it's because their games are fun and work on your PC, then great - that's the way it's supposed to work. If they did that for more people, this wouldn't be an issue for them in the first place.

[mixuk]

What's to understand about not buying their games? It's not like I'm contractually, ethically, or otherwise obligated to buy them. You want me to keep buying your games? Make games worth purchasing.

Of course. I merely meant these people who say that they'll never buy a CA game again. Seems like an overreaction.

I can't say I want CA to go bankrupt. I've loved many of their games. I just want them to do better, and to quit being dicks in the meantime. I'm really put off by the Napoleon announcement, their jackass whiney passive aggressive PR, and this douchey blog post by Simpson.

Agreed. And hopefully they learn their lesson before they run out of customers, because despite all its problems, I think ETW is a pretty good game.

But I think the main problem is, that they don't really have competition.

[Naeblis]

I hate to say this, but it's just a game. Not a philosophy, or a religion, that you have to have a strong opinion of.

Just trying to bring some perspective into this.

Of course it's just a game. But that blog post was a low point. "Don't you dare stop buying our games, or else..."

[djotefsoup]

I don't know if I came across as "I'll never buy their games again" but certainly I think we no longer share many mutual goals. If they had gone down another trouser leg of time from MTW/VI where they had made their games more bleak (rather than more silly), put more units on the screen at once (rather than making the same number prettier), put more focus on the tactical map (rather than strategic map) and targetted the expansion packs at core gameplay tweaks (rather than oodles of new new new maps/units/sides) then we would still be best pals! But they don't seem interested in any of that anymore. So MTW2 was the last one I could bring myself to buy, and that was mainly because they got a brisbane based team to do a lot of it.

[Blackadar]

Of course. I merely meant these people who say that they'll never buy a CA game again. Seems like an overreaction.


Why is this an overreaction? It seems perfectly normal to me that someone who feels they were burnt wouldn't want to fork over their hard-earned money to the same company that burnt them.

Ya know, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."

[Larinson]

A fooled man can't get fooled again.

[Grifman]

I think the strategic map is what "broke" the later games. While it definitely added a number of strategy options, the AI just isn't up to it. I wish they had stayed - at least a while longer - with the older map, and focused more on the tactical AI. Then once that was solid, then look at changes at the strategic map. Right now the game is too complex for the AI they have. I mean, for both Rome and MTW2, they admitted that the diplomatic AI was totally uncoupled from the military AI which is why the AI would declare war in absurd situations, and then just as quickly beg for peace. If something as basic as that is missing AI-wise, that says to me they really need to spend a lot more time in this area.

[mixuk]

Blackadar,

I could see where you are coming from if you would be talking about car companies. But I'm having a hard time understanding how you can be "burned" by a $50 computer game.

I guess we have to agree to disagree.

[Cubit]

Blackadar,

I could see where you are coming from if you would be talking about car companies. But I'm having a hard time understanding how you can be "burned" by a $50 computer game.

I guess we have to agree to disagree.

Price isn't necessarily the issue. If you buy a $500 shitty washing machine or a $50 game that doesn't work, you still feel "burned". $50 is a lot of money to some people.

[Lorini]

Price isn't necessarily the issue. If you buy a $500 shitty washing machine or a $50 game that doesn't work, you feel "burned".

I agree that your feeling may be the same, but still, this needs to be put into perspective. There's someone on the totalwar.org forums that says he'll never buy anything CA makes again because he has to pay $3 to get the extra two units he feels he should have gotten for free. Now that's losing perspective, imo.

[Cubit]

I agree that your feeling may be the same, but still, this needs to be put into perspective. There's someone on the totalwar.org forums that says he'll never buy anything CA makes again because he has to pay $3 to get the extra two units he feels he should have gotten for free. Now that's losing perspective, imo.

Agreed, but mixuk is responding to people posting here, and no one has been crying about that. He is talking about $50, not $3.

[salwon]

Why is this an overreaction? It seems perfectly normal to me that someone who feels they were burnt wouldn't want to fork over their hard-earned money to the same company that burnt them.

Ya know, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."

To be fair, I think we've all been burned by Paradox many times over, and yet we keep coming back for more. But Paradox at least has the decency not to announce an expansion six months after their broken game is released. Also, Johan seems way cooler than this Simpson character.

[Adam Altmann]

Blackadar,

I could see where you are coming from if you would be talking about car companies. But I'm having a hard time understanding how you can be "burned" by a $50 computer game.

I guess we have to agree to disagree.

You feel burned in the way that you could have spent your $50 on a different game and enjoyed it a lot more. Or burned in the way that the $50 you spent for Shogun: Total War was infinitely more satisfying than the $50 you spent on Empire: Total War. That's probably what bums me out the most. The downhill slide.

[jg93]

A fooled man can't get fooled again.

Well, Americans did vote Bush jr into office. Twice :P

[mixuk]

I just wish we could approach developers in the same way as authors or bands. Sometimes they create bad work, and we shrug and move on. Maybe we'll buy what they do next if they get rave reviews.

Also, this is one of the reasons why the game industry is a bit troublesome. It is focused on hits, and you are only as good as your last game. I wish we could move away from that attitude.

Of course, this is off-topic, and related to a bigger discussion that could be had elsewhere. Sorry about that.

[zengonzo]

I just wish we could approach developers in the same way as authors or bands. Sometimes they create bad work, and we shrug and move on. Maybe we'll buy what they do next if they get rave reviews.

I think we do, though. For some folks this has been a steady decline of bad work.

For myself, it's been all pretty forgivable right up until exactly this instance.

In either case I bet most folks would come back around if they heard from other fans that CA had managed to turn it around again. Some would be too skeptical, but I think it is roughly as you describe.

[schurem]

games are not books nor music nor movies

they are not books, as they are not (usually) the product of one or two minds but of large (corporate) teams.

they are not music, because a game is not just 750 megabytes, or 50 minutes of content. they are gigabytes of textures, code, music, text, inspiration, frustration and so on.

they are not movies, because you can not churn one out in a year or two while using completely new assets every time. either a game reuses a LOT of assets or it takes forever to gestate.

they are art though, and part of our culture. just of a new kind, and new ways will have to be found to properly deal with the differences in quality between them and those who make them.

[Alan Dunkin]

Or you just can go "frak this shit" and not buy them.

I had a lot of goodwill, but their latest caper (http://shoguntotalwar.yuku.com/topic/63705/t/Empire-Total-War-vote-and-WIN.html) pushed me over the edge. These guys are assholes, and no matter how awesome their vision is, and no matter how awesome their games are when they work and come together, this shit just won't stand.

Yes, shame on CA for wanting to promote their games. What are they thinking???

--- Alan

[schurem]

this isnt normal promotion, its buying votes. in light of that blog they posted the other day, and the general story of empires' release, yes shame on them

[Calistas]

The game I was writing up for me site started crashing 3 years out from the end of the campaign. Very annoying.

[Dan_Theman]

Mine crashed with the new patch, albeit later in the campaign this time. I think it's about time to permanently shelve it.

I will say I'm one of those people who will come back if CA gets things turned around. However, I will not buy any more of their games on or around release date. Rather, I'll wait for the rest of the willing public to do the QA for me.

[Alistair]

I'm a PC!

[Unicorn McGriddle]

Exciting new bug: blurry text. So much for getting into Warpath right away.

Also, I hear tell of shit in the latest patch/DLC combo that breaks the main campaign.

[Calistas]

Exciting new bug: blurry text. So much for getting into Warpath right away.

I've had that one. Fix it by alt+tabbing out of the game and then back into it. Should resolve the problem.

[Unicorn McGriddle]

I've had that one. Fix it by alt+tabbing out of the game and then back into it. Should resolve the problem.

Nope.

[Calistas]

Nope.

Damn! It's a bloody annoying bug too.