Empire: Total War

In general, I blame the consoles for a lot of the stagnation that can be found in gaming. If the resident evil franchise had developed on the PC, you could bet your arse that you'd be able to MOVE and SHOOT at the same time. I hate to generalise console owners as teenagers who can easily be placated with the latest whatever in the Halo/Gears of War series but the sad truth is: Whilst the majority of console owners are well out of their teens, the ones with all the disposable income are school kids and students who wouldn't know a good game if it sat on their head.

Having said all that, the most stagnant genre currently in existence is the RTS, a genre almost exclusive to the PC despite a few misguided attempts to bring it to consoles. Halo Wars anyone?

Anyway, if I was to pick a word to describe Empire: Total War it'd be just that. Stagnant.

I loved Shogun: Total War back in the day. It was a revolution in RTS games. No real time base building so you could focus on the tactics of war. High Ground and choke points actually meant something (unlike in, say, Total Annihilation, where such features served only to look pretty).

As the games went on, though, it became less about the strategy and more about diplomacy. I can kind of roll with that- I even completed Medieval. I would have completed Rome but I was a student myself at that point and didn't want to dedicate the couple of hundred hours the game seemed to be asking for in the pursuit of a "well done" screen with a Centurion wearing something fetching in red and white.

There's nothing wrong with diplomacy sims, though. Especially not ones where you have to fight as well. The problem comes when all subsequent games to is expand the battle map. Rome, Medieval 2 and Empire are all essentially Medieval: Total War with larger maps, better graphics and various bells and whistles added.

This wouldn't be too much of a problem were it not released in the same month as Dawn Of War 2, which has taken the RTS genre by its geriatric shoulders and shaken it until the bones have cracked and broken to the point where the pointless pensioner is now in the shape of a cheetah and would you believe it, there's life in the old girl yet. Girl Cheetah. That last sentence was far too long.

Anyhoo, I did quite enjoy Empire for the first hour or so that I played it. Yes, it was the same game I've played twice before but I kind of enjoyed it then as well.

Problems started arising when I entered the second hour of play. Suddenly I wasn't doing as well any more. I discovered that this was because, as well as upgrading my cities, I needed to be upgrading my towns, villages, settlements, farms, mines, fur markets etc. etc. etc. as well. After I had discovered this, the amount of time I had to take for each round increased massively.

I should point out in the games defense that you can automate all this upgrading farms stuff but I got this damn game so I could play it, not have the computer play it for me.

So that annoyed me.

The combat seems to have taken a beating as well.

I was trying to wipe Sweden off the map so I could divide up the spoils between my Russian empire and my mates in Denmark, who were having a bit of a rough time of it. This was all well and good for the first few battles - I got St Petersberg no trouble, Ker-Ching. But taking Stockholm... fuck me that took ages.

The battle itself was over in about five minutes because the only people defending it were peasants with flintlocks but getting my troops there - oooh that was another matter.

I don't know if there are troop transport ships I could have used - the tutorial didn't say - but I had to walk my guys all the way round the north end of Scandinavia. For those without a map, that's a very fucking long way. It took about ten turns.

Now, I know that this is all quite realistic and you shouldn't be able to destroy civilisations easily but the fact remains that by the time my first army had gotten to Stockholm, I'd built another two of equal size. Something's not right there.

So yes. The micromanagement gets annoying, the area of play is huge so the game becomes a massive time sink, the AI is sporadic, the diplomacy feels broken and the battles just don't feel fun any more.

Back when I used to play these games regularly, height gave you a massive advantage and you couldn't fire muskets in the rain, that sort of thing. I don't know if these features are still present, they may be, but I saw no evidence of them at all. The one nod to realistic battles was that my canon troops couldn't see very far when the weather was foggy, which was a very nice touch. Although I could have liked it if they could have just fired... somewhere over there and kind of hoped they hit something.

There are naval battles, as well, but I didn't really experience them. I started off as the Russians, who have far too much to be worrying about even without going to war on the oceans. I became impoverished, though, due to my destruction of Sweden and the fact that I hadn't upgraded anything so I started again as the British.

Aaaaaaaand I took one fucking look at the map with its ultra complicated trade routes, colonies off in America, my advisor telling me to invade India before the french did and prevent the Spanish forming an alliance with anyone and I couldn't hit the ESC key fast enough.

I like that there are games out there that are this complicated and this in depth because it weens the MMO crowd off their bullshit "Pay £10 a month to throw coloured light at AI sprites" games but for me... no. No, no, no. My life is far too complicated as it is without giving any thought to this kind of crap.

I really enjoy games that challenge me mentally - especially adventure & puzzle games but this sort of thing? Nah, I'm good. Thanks.