Napoleon TW - RTW Alexander

[edyzmedieval]

Self explanatory title.

But for those who don't understand, here's my impression - N:TW is trying to be a revamped RTW Alexander but marketed as a stand alone game. In case you haven't played RTW Alexander, you haven't missed much. The campaign is nice but the lack of unique units and special battlefield tactics make it somewhat boring after a couple of hours of conquering along. Okay, you might say the graphics and features are different, it won't be that boring blah blah blah. But...no. I'm not buying what CA is offering me.


Bottom line - I'm not impressed. It's just a variation with a different period, more units, more campaigns, but the concept is basically the same. The series needs a refresh, it needs to come back to its core values then add tried and tested features to make it something interesting that everyone will enjoy.

Any thoughts?

[Durallan]

I was really hoping they were going to expand the grand campaign map, maybe make europe a bit more detailed, add africa, maybe complete off the rest of the america's (not sure how long it took to go from east - west coast) extend the grand campaign a bit, have an option to have historical revolutions or not, appearance of boney etc, at least for the grand campaign. The story campaigns don't overly thrill me lots, I'd rather play in a big world but I'll probably play it if I bought it.

[antisocialmunky]

Alexander came out free after a actual expansion that added a little bit in the AI brain department.

[Nelson]

Bottom line - I'm not impressed. It's just a variation with a different period, more units, more campaigns, but the concept is basically the same.

Hasn't every Total War expansion done this? Different period, more units, more campaigns.

That's been their business model all along.

[Meneldil]

Honestly, I feel NTW is the very obvious choice to make.

The napoleonic era, unlike the ACW, or the colonial wars of the 17th/18th, is more or less well-known. Most people have heard the basic steps of the conflict. Plus, the amount of 'napoleonic freaks' or of mere enthusiasts all over Europe, from Spain to Russia, is simply crazy.

I'm not saying the game will be great, because I don't think it will, given how the TW serie becomes worse and worse with every new installement since MTW, but honestly, they would be stupid by not doing a Napoleonic TW at some point. True, I would rather have seen it as an extansion at first, but if they want to make it a whole new game, why not?

[HopAlongBunny]

I agree with Meneldil.

NTW is the obvious next step; even though it is a tough market to please.

CA could really fall on its face with this or hit a home run; the amount of research the "casual" Napoleonics gamers do is frightening, and they will expect any professional product to be accurate.

From a marketing perspective this has to be a separate game. The niche just would not respond to a TW product that was "just" an add-on imho.

[Beskar]

CA could really fall on its face with this or hit a home run; the amount of research the "casual" Napoleonics gamers do is frightening, and they will expect any professional product to be accurate.

Isn't this Napoleon guy an angry short dude that kept kicking everyone's behinds so much, they cried to the British, who sent the person who designed Wellington Boots to defeat him at the battle of Waterloo?

[Peasant Phill]

...CA could really fall on its face with this ...

I would welcome such an event. It could shock CA out of the comfortable position it is now and just maybe make them think about the shortcommings of their last games.

[Prussian to the Iron]

i dont mind having a napoleonic expansion, but i honestly wuld have been happier with a kingdoms-like mod, with napoleon, maybe the american civil war, an asian campaign, and an african campaign (asian and african obviously covering entire continents, with european settlers and native factions alike.)

[Durallan]

I would welcome such an event. It could shock CA out of the comfortable position it is now and just maybe make them think about the shortcommings of their last games.

I would find it hard to believe it could happen, if no major reviewer picked up on the AI's problems in ETW how will they pick them up now?

[Discoman]

Yea, Kingdoms was a really good expansion.

I'm unsure if I'll buy Napoleon. Considering it has a grand campaign, that's a plus, but it removes theaters of America and India. This is semi-annoying because I really wanted the war of 1812 for America. Frankly I just wanted a fair campaign where I could play as America, the grand campaign for America in ETW is too short, unbalanced (Every other nation has full tech), and pretty hard (when France, Spain, Britain, Cherokee, and Iroquois all DOW on you)

I think N:TW should feature missions. ETW doesn't have any missions, which is annoying because there's an entire tab dedicated to it, but only 2-3 nations actually use it. I think the missions should reward the player for replicating actions Napoleon did, like attack this nation, or take this settlement.

How different is the unit roster from ETW anyway? Is it just different uniforms? Any new cannons?

[edyzmedieval]

Hasn't every Total War expansion done this? Different period, more units, more campaigns.

That's been their business model all along.

Yeah, that was the business model, but the previous expansions brought something fresh to the genre. Viking Invasion was the best, they should learn from that experience.

[Owen Glyndwr]

I think that the fact that CA is omitting the colonies already shows a lack of concern for historical accuracy. Sure, most of Napoleon's conquests did occur in Europe proper. But a lot of things in America shaped out due to Napoleon's conquests. Remember that in addition to expanding through Europe, Nappy also had to deal with the Spanish colonies after deposing the Spanish monarchy and putting his brother (?) on the throne, in addition to what was left of the French ones. These colonies proved to be a constant thorn in his side with revolts such as the Haitian one. We can see this simply due to the fact that he was forced to sell the Louisiana territory to the States, because managing foreign colonies was more trouble than they were worth.

As for the British, a lot of their wealth and power came from their Foreign colonies such as in India.

I think it would be more interesting to include those realms. It would make playing as Napoleon more challenging. You could choose to follow Napoleon and sell off the colonies to the highest bidder to focus on Europe, or for added fun, hold on to them and try to make a multi-continental Empire as he originally desired.

[antisocialmunky]

Yeah, that was the business model, but the previous expansions brought something fresh to the genre. Viking Invasion was the best, they should learn from that experience.

Mongol Invasion was best. Seriously AUTO DEATH GEISHAS and THUNDER BOMBERS were made of hilarity and win.

[econ21]

I was really hoping they were going to expand the grand campaign map, maybe make europe a bit more detailed, add africa, maybe complete off the rest of the america's (not sure how long it took to go from east - west coast) extend the grand campaign a bit, have an option to have historical revolutions or not, appearance of boney etc, at least for the grand campaign. The story campaigns don't overly thrill me lots, I'd rather play in a big world but I'll probably play it if I bought it.

I am glad they did not try to shoe horn the Napoleonic wars into ETW - it just would not fit. NTW needs more European provinces, more turns per year and America/India would add precious little. Personally, I think trying to play in a big world is part of what undermined ETW: the AI could not adjust.

How different is the unit roster from ETW anyway? Is it just different uniforms? Any new cannons?

Just different uniforms. The armies were rather standardised in terms of hardware, which had not changed much - if at all - from ETW.

ETW has too many types of cannon as it is:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=118988

However, troop "quality" in NTW should differ from ETW. The Prussians were no longer the top dogs, while English infantry was more pre-eminent. Quality should ideally wax and wane over the period. Prussian modernised after its defeat, while France suffered from its losses of veterans in Russia, Spain and elsewhere. Similarly, French leadership was markedly superior early on, but gradually nearly all factions found leaders who had learnt from Napoleon and could give him a run for his money.

[ICantSpellDawg]

Honestly, I feel NTW is the very obvious choice to make.

The napoleonic era, unlike the ACW, or the colonial wars of the 17th/18th, is more or less well-known. Most people have heard the basic steps of the conflict. Plus, the amount of 'napoleonic freaks' or of mere enthusiasts all over Europe, from Spain to Russia, is simply crazy.

I'm not saying the game will be great, because I don't think it will, given how the TW serie becomes worse and worse with every new installement since MTW, but honestly, they would be stupid by not doing a Napoleonic TW at some point. True, I would rather have seen it as an extansion at first, but if they want to make it a whole new game, why not?

Worse and worse? This game is lightyears better than Medieval 2 in nearly all ways. The only major complaint that I have is that diplomacy seems to be getting more and more rudimentary. It has been broken since before I can remember, but this game brings Fail to an epic level.

There are simple things that they could do to make it better. Lend/lease of troops and assets is one - such as the lease a fort, ship, port or a few units for a set number of turns or outright sale/gift. They should create an ownership angle to protectorates, where special troops can be recruited, assets used and the land would count as yours for purposes of victory.

Additionally, "nation creation" is a must. Puppet governments taken from a pool of potential regional claimants has to exist in Napoleon TW since the theater was plagued with them during the Empire.

I want night and fog for land and naval battles - I don't see how this would hurt performance if it was thick enough.

Plus - break up the stupid native americans. They never had an empire powerful enough to direct the fall of the colonies in a uniform way. make them strong, but come up with a tribal system - maybe various portable powers like in barbarian invasion.

[Prussian to the Iron]

^agree 100%

[Meneldil]

Worse and worse? This game is lightyears better than Medieval 2 in nearly all ways. The only major complaint that I have is that diplomacy seems to be getting more and more rudimentary. It has been broken since before I can remember, but this game brings Fail to an epic level.

ETW is lightyears worse than MTW or STW. I haven't played either ETW or M2TW for more than 10 hours, so yeah, I couldn't say which one is worse. In any case, neither of them is nearly as good as an unmodded, unpatched STW.

[Prussian to the Iron]

I've never even played MTW or STW, so I really can't judge, but from screenshots I've seen, it just seems that M2 and RTW are better. E:TW I think is a better system than previous games (No need for diplomats, Spies and Assassins combined, You cannot simply roam around in everybodies territory without military access, etc.), but as with everything, there are cons as well. For example, I miss the assassination and spy movies from M2, and detest the A.I.'s limitless money train.

[johnhughthom]

Viking Invasion was the best, they should learn from that experience.

They should learn from a game where the AI factions never went to war with each other? That said VI is the only vanilla CA game I bothered finishing a campaign with.

[Peasant Phill]

I've never even played MTW or STW, so I really can't judge, but from screenshots I've seen, it just seems that M2 and RTW are better.

That's an odd thing to say. Sure graphically, RTW & M2TW are of course light years ahaed of STW and MTW. But I fail to see how you can judge gameplay, AI and immersion by looking at screen shots?

[johnhughthom]

That's an odd thing to say. Sure graphically, RTW & M2TW are of course light years ahaed of STW and MTW. But I fail to see how you can judge gameplay, AI and immersion by looking at screen shots?

It may be odd, but it's a very common method of judging games nowadays, so common that we end up with beautiful, shallow games like ETW.

[Prussian to the Iron]

That's an odd thing to say. Sure graphically, RTW & M2TW are of course light years ahaed of STW and MTW. But I fail to see how you can judge gameplay, AI and immersion by looking at screen shots?

you misunderstand; I mean that looking at gameplay aspects in screenshots (as well as graphics though) they don't seem to be as good.

Honestly, I think E:TW perfected alot of things, my favorite being the fact that lots of buildings are outside the cities, and you dont just click 'build' and get the same stuff in every region.

I think if they took E:TW and immediately made a Rome or Shogun out of the system (after flattening out a few bugs and improving the A.I. of course) it would be truly epic. I can't even imagine Rome's units, with E:TW's graphics. Add to that a probable EB III (since R:TW II wouldn't come out for several years I'm sure) and you have the epicest of epic wins.

of course I'm rambling on but whatevs.

[antisocialmunky]

a probable EB III

I bet Foot would love to know the source on that official statement.

[Prussian to the Iron]

lol.

You have to admit though that they will probably just keep churning 'em out for at least a couple more Total War's.

[Peasant Phill]

you misunderstand; I mean that looking at gameplay aspects in screenshots (as well as graphics though) they don't seem to be as good.

I fail to see your point. Gameplay is something you experience, not just look at.
Sure, if it all worked perfectly ETW would be a lot better than MTW gameplay wise but that isn't exactly the case now is it. Hence you can't make an objective judgement about gameplay on screenshots alone.

[Martok]

you misunderstand; I mean that looking at gameplay aspects in screenshots (as well as graphics though) they don't seem to be as good.

A fair enough statement. I don't necessarily *agree* with it, but I can see why you might say that.

For all that STW and MTW remain my favorite games in the series, they wouldn't appeal to everyone. Graphics-wise, I couldn't care less -- indeed, in some ways, I actually find STW/MTW to be visually superior to their successors -- but I'll be the first to admit that Rome & Medieval 2 did incorporate some gameplay improvements, particularly with regards to the combat UI.

Honestly, I think E:TW perfected alot of things, my favorite being the fact that lots of buildings are outside the cities, and you dont just click 'build' and get the same stuff in every region.

Indeed. I actually really like Empire's gameplay overall as well, what with all the improvements and streamlining CA has added. It's just that the AI and diplomacy are so gods-awful that for me, it breaks the game. If those things were fixed, however, this would probably become an instant classic that would forever stay on my hard drive.

[Prussian to the Iron]

I fail to see your point. Gameplay is something you experience, not just look at.
Sure, if it all worked perfectly ETW would be a lot better than MTW gameplay wise but that isn't exactly the case now is it. Hence you can't make an objective judgement about gameplay on screenshots alone.

once again, I have never played MTW, so I cannot judge, but E:TW is better than Rome, and vanilla Medieval 2. judging by that, I think its safe to say I (and many others) would prefer it to MTW or STW.

[antisocialmunky]

lol.

You have to admit though that they will probably just keep churning 'em out for at least a couple more Total War's.

The team has unofficially stated that they will take a long vacation and goto Disney Land, besides ETW takes away many features such as horse archer mechanics, siege machines, and fighting to the the death.

[Prussian to the Iron]

.....I know they won't make one for E:TW, I was reffering to a possible Rome or Shogun 2 after E:TW, that EB III would be on.