STW MI MTW: What\'s the Verdict?

[Koga No Goshi]

Hey Everyone,

I'm an old original STW-er and was around for the first 3 months of Mongol Invasion online too, but had to leave to focus more on school. I've got a bit more free time now, and was thinking about playing Shogun online again but have had some problems with the MI online server like a lot of people seem to. My question is, for those of you who played BOTH STW/MI online AND Medieval Total War, what's the verdict? Better? Worse? Is Medieval Total War worth buying? I like strategy/strategy war games, but I have to admit that STW being set in Japan was one of the major drawing points for me, I'm not really into European/Crusading history or warfare. Would like imput from some of the older posters who've played both games.



------------------
Koga no Goshi

"Hokusai"
Now as a spirit
I shall roam
the summer fields.

[Ferocious Imbecile]

I haven't played MTW yet despite friends eagerly pushing bootlegged copies on me. As a student of history, there's a lot of problems there and a lot of missed opportunities too. STW seems to be an excellent introduction to Japanese culture and history. I have my doubts the same could be said for MTW as an introduction to European medieval history. But I suppose I will eventually try it, if for no other reason but to explore 350 3D battlefield maps.

[Mithrandir]

Different...

MTW has more units.provinces,strategic agents,everything but it lacks the goodold feeling of STW(MI)...

If you have money to spend buy it,ifnot spend it on another game....


tis a fun game nonetheless though.

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http://members.home.nl/jvanbaars/cup.gif

[dej2]

I too was reluctant being more into Asian cultures than that of European ancestry. But I have found Medieval very entertaining, Note that the most European archers did not have the sword background that most Samurai Archers did and hence the game play is totally different from that aspect. Also siege equipment for castle assaults are new. The Strategic game is totally been revamped and now Generals have vices and virtues, such as "highly organized", "eager to retreat", "embezzler", "Incest".... Amongst others. Also princesses are able to marry princes from other factions to create alliances. Generals can be appointed titles… which could bring in more money from taxes, and increase that generals loyalty.

If you’ve enjoyed STW, I don't see any reason why you would not enjoy MTW. Having Asian roots myself.... My only gripe is that the Mongols should have been able to be a playable faction, other than one historic campaign, which consist of 3 battles.

[Orda Khan]

Quote STW seems to be an excellent introduction to Japanese culture and history. I have my doubts the same could be said for MTW as an introduction to European medieval history. But I suppose I will eventually try it, if for no other reason but to explore 350 3D battlefield maps.[/B][/QUOTE]

I agree with Ferocious Imbecile regarding the cultural side of the game, as for the maps....I hope you don't expect too much, you will be sadly disappointed. There are well over 400 Shogun maps, the vast majority of which are far superior to those in MTW. I say this for many reasons. MTW maps are huge, why is it then that you do not have to locate your enemy? The deployment zones are too small and in multi games they all seem bunched together in the middle with areas of space around them. I would have expected improved deployment, such as an attack area, defend area and a 'no man's land' between them, deploy anywhere in your zone. Sadly the battle starts with your enemy there in front of you. In my opinion they are a bit gaudy, a fine day always seems like the height of summer. There are fields bordered by hedgerows....that armies just walk over!! Not to mention those annoying buildings that interfere with unit movement, a lot of these maps have them. 350 sounds a lot but there are so many that are so similar. In fact not very interesting, this will change no doubt when custom maps are created.
On to units. There are so many to choose from, TOO many. Here again there are units that are so similar. Then there is the actual movement. I find the animated appearance of the sprites combined with the exaggerated swinging of arms and legs of infantry units detracts from the feel of the game. It annoyed me to hear people say the sprites of Shogun were bad, their movement is much more realistically human. They do not run with the limb movement of a sprinter and considering armour and weapons this alone is more realistic but when they engage they actually fight better. A couple of times in MTW I've mistakenly thought a fighting unit was standing due to the fact over half of it was stationary. The many archer units are not really worth the effort as they appear to be pretty useless. Cavalry units are very disappointing, they move in slow motion. I watched a unit of Alan mercenaries (supposedly fast) at full gallop being pursued by Italian infantry. They were going the same speed!!
Units route in all directions now but will keep rallying if not pursued. I do not like this feature it is totally unrealistic. Rally once maybe but not over and over.

In Shogun you had units for a specific purpose and a time and place to use them. This was down to timing and strategy. The skill factor was more evident - your opponent had the same unit choice.

Until they patch it I would save your cash. To be honest, I don't think I would bother if it weren't for the fact that the Total War Community has migrated to MTW. There are a few who still play Shogun online, there are great new stat mods, the game is still great fun.
Please be aware that these comments are mainly MP biased as I don't bother much with SP and all Shogun references are MI/WE as STW is no longer running.
(STW was also a better game)

........Orda

------------------
" Send us your ambassadors and thus we shall judge whether you wish to be at peace with us or at war..if you make war on us the Everlasting God, who makes easy what was difficult and makes near what was far, knows that we know what our power is."

[Orda Khan]

Quote Originally posted by dej2:
... My only gripe is that the Mongols should have been able to be a playable faction, other than one historic campaign, which consist of 3 battles.[/B][/QUOTE]

Don't start me off on this subject!! I have said so many times that their absence in anything other than a token, all too easy campaign is very, very disappointing

......Orda

------------------
" Send us your ambassadors and thus we shall judge whether you wish to be at peace with us or at war..if you make war on us the Everlasting God, who makes easy what was difficult and makes near what was far, knows that we know what our power is."

[Mithrandir]

The mongols are also very easy to beat, esp. being the almhads with all the cheap, super anti cav. troops like nigerian spearman, almohad urban militia, and the guys in the zebra stripes...

[sdrga]

I, like many other posters, was intrigued by the Japanese setting of Shogun and MI. When I first saw MTW on sale and realized it was the same engine applied to the Medieval time period, I was hesitant as well. I didn't want the same game in new clothing, so to speak

At the last moment, I canceled an order for Emporer - Rise of the Middle Kingdom (city building) and purchased MTW instead. It's been just fantastic. In fact, it has even reinvigorated my interest in STW and MI because I once again realized just how special all of these games are.

As other posters have said, MTW's strategic game is much more complex and detailed, with generals, princesses, spies, vices, virtues, personality strengths and weaknesses, inquisitors, the list goes on and on. On the other hand, the relative simplicity of STW's strategic game is appealing as well, depending on my mood. Both games are just damn good, flaws aside, since all games have them.

One of the features I really like about MTW is the Quick Battle menu choice. Exactly one mouse click and the computer picks forces, the map, everything and puts you on the battlefield without any setup. Satisfies the lazy part of me!

To sum up, if you think that what you'll get is just STW dressed up in Medieval clothing, put those fears aside. Medieval offers plenty of new stuff, albeit more on the strategic side than the tactical side. Nonetheless, with the addition of so many new unit choices on the tactical side, there's plenty new there as well.

Enjoy.

[Ferocious Imbecile]

Quote Originally posted by Orda Khan:
I agree with Ferocious Imbecile regarding the cultural side of the game, as for the maps....I hope you don't expect too much, you will be sadly disappointed. There are well over 400 Shogun maps, the vast majority of which are far superior to those in MTW. I say this for many reasons. MTW maps are huge, why is it then that you do not have to locate your enemy? The deployment zones are too small and in multi games they all seem bunched together in the middle with areas of space around them. I would have expected improved deployment, such as an attack area, defend area and a 'no man's land' between them, deploy anywhere in your zone. Sadly the battle starts with your enemy there in front of you. In my opinion they are a bit gaudy, a fine day always seems like the height of summer. There are fields bordered by hedgerows....that armies just walk over!! Not to mention those annoying buildings that interfere with unit movement, a lot of these maps have them. 350 sounds a lot but there are so many that are so similar. In fact not very interesting, this will change no doubt when custom maps are created.
On to units. There are so many to choose from, TOO many. Here again there are units that are so similar. Then there is the actual movement. I find the animated appearance of the sprites combined with the exaggerated swinging of arms and legs of infantry units detracts from the feel of the game. It annoyed me to hear people say the sprites of Shogun were bad, their movement is much more realistically human. They do not run with the limb movement of a sprinter and considering armour and weapons this alone is more realistic but when they engage they actually fight better. A couple of times in MTW I've mistakenly thought a fighting unit was standing due to the fact over half of it was stationary. The many archer units are not really worth the effort as they appear to be pretty useless. Cavalry units are very disappointing, they move in slow motion. I watched a unit of Alan mercenaries (supposedly fast) at full gallop being pursued by Italian infantry. They were going the same speed!!
Units route in all directions now but will keep rallying if not pursued. I do not like this feature it is totally unrealistic. Rally once maybe but not over and over.

In Shogun you had units for a specific purpose and a time and place to use them. This was down to timing and strategy. The skill factor was more evident - your opponent had the same unit choice.

Until they patch it I would save your cash. To be honest, I don't think I would bother if it weren't for the fact that the Total War Community has migrated to MTW. There are a few who still play Shogun online, there are great new stat mods, the game is still great fun.
Please be aware that these comments are mainly MP biased as I don't bother much with SP and all Shogun references are MI/WE as STW is no longer running.
(STW was also a better game)

........Orda

[/QUOTE]

[Ferocious Imbecile]

Quote Originally posted by Orda Khan:
I agree with Ferocious Imbecile regarding the cultural side of the game, as for the maps....I hope you don't expect too much, you will be sadly disappointed. There are well over 400 Shogun maps, the vast majority of which are far superior to those in MTW. I say this for many reasons. MTW maps are huge, why is it then that you do not have to locate your enemy? The deployment zones are too small and in multi games they all seem bunched together in the middle with areas of space around them. I would have expected improved deployment, such as an attack area, defend area and a 'no man's land' between them, deploy anywhere in your zone. Sadly the battle starts with your enemy there in front of you. In my opinion they are a bit gaudy, a fine day always seems like the height of summer. There are fields bordered by hedgerows....that armies just walk over!! Not to mention those annoying buildings that interfere with unit movement, a lot of these maps have them. 350 sounds a lot but there are so many that are so similar. In fact not very interesting, this will change no doubt when custom maps are created.
On to units. There are so many to choose from, TOO many. Here again there are units that are so similar. Then there is the actual movement. I find the animated appearance of the sprites combined with the exaggerated swinging of arms and legs of infantry units detracts from the feel of the game. It annoyed me to hear people say the sprites of Shogun were bad, their movement is much more realistically human. They do not run with the limb movement of a sprinter and considering armour and weapons this alone is more realistic but when they engage they actually fight better. A couple of times in MTW I've mistakenly thought a fighting unit was standing due to the fact over half of it was stationary. The many archer units are not really worth the effort as they appear to be pretty useless. Cavalry units are very disappointing, they move in slow motion. I watched a unit of Alan mercenaries (supposedly fast) at full gallop being pursued by Italian infantry. They were going the same speed!!
Units route in all directions now but will keep rallying if not pursued. I do not like this feature it is totally unrealistic. Rally once maybe but not over and over.

In Shogun you had units for a specific purpose and a time and place to use them. This was down to timing and strategy. The skill factor was more evident - your opponent had the same unit choice.

Until they patch it I would save your cash. To be honest, I don't think I would bother if it weren't for the fact that the Total War Community has migrated to MTW. There are a few who still play Shogun online, there are great new stat mods, the game is still great fun.
Please be aware that these comments are mainly MP biased as I don't bother much with SP and all Shogun references are MI/WE as STW is no longer running.
(STW was also a better game)

........Orda

[/QUOTE]

Reading your excellent assessment made something odd occur to me; why should Shogun Total War be more historically and culturally correct than MTW? Because frankly, if you want an idea of what Japanese feudal culture was like all you have to do is turn to the excellent movies of Kurosawa and several others. But where are the concurrent medieval movies for our Western culture? Where do we go in popular culture for our feudal traditions. Frankly, they scarcely exist and when they do, they are so full of anachronisms in costume, thought, morality, and even music that they are worthless. And from what I have heard of the MTW music it is just as guilty of this as STW was splendid in it's use of oriental music. After playing a full expert campaign all the way to shogun of Japan, I had this overwhelming feeling that STW was more than just a game; it approached the realm of being a very good work of art.

[kamizaki_nurizeko]

lol, i even said that when you dont enjoy medieval dont come complaining to me back at shoggtys "dying" day...but here it is, still being played..and medieval being griped about..lol..gotta love fate :P

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The bell rings against a hollow sky; the raven caws...NO MERCY!...all samurai walk the path to nothingness.~Kuroi Sabato

[Orda Khan]

Quote Originally posted by Ferocious Imbecile:
After playing a full expert campaign all the way to shogun of Japan, I had this overwhelming feeling that STW was more than just a game; it approached the realm of being a very good work of art.[/B][/QUOTE]

Very well said, I totally agree

.......Orda

------------------
" Send us your ambassadors and thus we shall judge whether you wish to be at peace with us or at war..if you make war on us the Everlasting God, who makes easy what was difficult and makes near what was far, knows that we know what our power is."

[CaPeFeAr]

for all you stw fans out there.... there have been some major breakthroughs recently and a stw mod will be available for mtw very shortly.... this is made by players so wont cost any extra. ive always missed stw and im so excited about playing it again!!!

[Koga No Goshi]

Quote Originally posted by Ferocious Imbecile:
Reading your excellent assessment made something odd occur to me; why should Shogun Total War be more historically and culturally correct than MTW? Because frankly, if you want an idea of what Japanese feudal culture was like all you have to do is turn to the excellent movies of Kurosawa and several others. But where are the concurrent medieval movies for our Western culture? Where do we go in popular culture for our feudal traditions. Frankly, they scarcely exist and when they do, they are so full of anachronisms in costume, thought, morality, and even music that they are worthless. And from what I have heard of the MTW music it is just as guilty of this as STW was splendid in it's use of oriental music. After playing a full expert campaign all the way to shogun of Japan, I had this overwhelming feeling that STW was more than just a game; it approached the realm of being a very good work of art.[/QUOTE]

That's the problem with cultural/social/historical studies. It's much easier to objectively look at other people than your own culture. Most people don't even "see" their own culture, because they're inundated to it. If anything, you'd be better off looking for movies non-Europeans have made about European history, though they'll probably be small budget and not well heard of. So many of Kurosawa's movies have really just been adaptations of Shakespearean plays, and are not necessarily picture-perfect historical truths for Japanese feudalism.

But Feudal era stuff is just rare period. To be honest I roll my eyes when movies like Braveheart come out, because it's only for every 5 or so movies like that that anything similar will be done for Asian history, and even then it's bound to be smaller budget and probably about China. >:O



------------------
Koga no Goshi

"Hokusai"
Now as a spirit
I shall roam
the summer fields.

[Orda Khan]

Quote Originally posted by CaPeFeAr:
for all you stw fans out there.... there have been some major breakthroughs recently and a stw mod will be available for mtw very shortly.... this is made by players so wont cost any extra. ive always missed stw and im so excited about playing it again!!![/QUOTE]

Please enlighten us ?

------------------
" Send us your ambassadors and thus we shall judge whether you wish to be at peace with us or at war..if you make war on us the Everlasting God, who makes easy what was difficult and makes near what was far, knows that we know what our power is."

[Ferocious Imbecile]

Quote Originally posted by Koga No Goshi:
That's the problem with cultural/social/historical studies. It's much easier to objectively look at other people than your own culture. Most people don't even "see" their own culture, because they're inundated to it. If anything, you'd be better off looking for movies non-Europeans have made about European history, though they'll probably be small budget and not well heard of. So many of Kurosawa's movies have really just been adaptations of Shakespearean plays, and are not necessarily picture-perfect historical truths for Japanese feudalism.

But Feudal era stuff is just rare period. To be honest I roll my eyes when movies like Braveheart come out, because it's only for every 5 or so movies like that that anything similar will be done for Asian history, and even then it's bound to be smaller budget and probably about China. >:O

[/QUOTE]

Really one of the few I can recommend is Ingemar Bergman's Virgin Spring and Eisenstien's Alexander Nevsky set in Russia's 13th century. Also Tarakovsky's Andrei Rubelyev. Top notch works
http://www.bestbuy.com/movies/ProductInfo.asp?e=10082235&m=270&cat=

[Richard the Slayer]

Quote Originally posted by Orda Khan:
I agree with Ferocious Imbecile regarding the cultural side of the game, as for the maps....I hope you don't expect too much, you will be sadly disappointed. There are well over 400 Shogun maps, the vast majority of which are far superior to those in MTW. I say this for many reasons. MTW maps are huge, why is it then that you do not have to locate your enemy? The deployment zones are too small and in multi games they all seem bunched together in the middle with areas of space around them. I would have expected improved deployment, such as an attack area, defend area and a 'no man's land' between them, deploy anywhere in your zone. Sadly the battle starts with your enemy there in front of you. In my opinion they are a bit gaudy, a fine day always seems like the height of summer. There are fields bordered by hedgerows....that armies just walk over!! Not to mention those annoying buildings that interfere with unit movement, a lot of these maps have them. 350 sounds a lot but there are so many that are so similar. In fact not very interesting, this will change no doubt when custom maps are created.
On to units. There are so many to choose from, TOO many. Here again there are units that are so similar. Then there is the actual movement. I find the animated appearance of the sprites combined with the exaggerated swinging of arms and legs of infantry units detracts from the feel of the game. It annoyed me to hear people say the sprites of Shogun were bad, their movement is much more realistically human. They do not run with the limb movement of a sprinter and considering armour and weapons this alone is more realistic but when they engage they actually fight better. A couple of times in MTW I've mistakenly thought a fighting unit was standing due to the fact over half of it was stationary. The many archer units are not really worth the effort as they appear to be pretty useless. Cavalry units are very disappointing, they move in slow motion. I watched a unit of Alan mercenaries (supposedly fast) at full gallop being pursued by Italian infantry. They were going the same speed!!
Units route in all directions now but will keep rallying if not pursued. I do not like this feature it is totally unrealistic. Rally once maybe but not over and over.

In Shogun you had units for a specific purpose and a time and place to use them. This was down to timing and strategy. The skill factor was more evident - your opponent had the same unit choice.

Until they patch it I would save your cash. To be honest, I don't think I would bother if it weren't for the fact that the Total War Community has migrated to MTW. There are a few who still play Shogun online, there are great new stat mods, the game is still great fun.
Please be aware that these comments are mainly MP biased as I don't bother much with SP and all Shogun references are MI/WE as STW is no longer running.
(STW was also a better game)

........Orda

[/QUOTE]

One glaring disadvatage I see in STW was refighting a battle over the same stale map again and again, especially if your battling for the same province. The problem with this is that your stratgey is the same for 3 or 4 battles in a row. In one campaign the comp attacked me again and again in the same province and I with the same strategy and deployment repulse him again and again. Unlike STW, I find MTW offers 2 or 3 different maps of the same province, giving you a unique situation every time. So in many ways Shogun maps are a major disapointment. However, I do agree that Shogun maps were quite prettier than MTW maps.

[Orda Khan]

This point I can understand for I had the same scenario and it was a costly bridge province.

Something has been lost on the battle field, I can't put my finger on it but there you go.....

....Orda

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" Send us your ambassadors and thus we shall judge whether you wish to be at peace with us or at war..if you make war on us the Everlasting God, who makes easy what was difficult and makes near what was far, knows that we know what our power is."