Medieval II Total War - Impressions from a TW Veteran

Well, folks, I'm an old (in more ways than one) TW player. I've enjoyed the series immensely, and have played more campaigns/mods than I ever care to remember. Have never played MP, though, except with my clan in COD. With strategy games, however, the dual-map structure is the only way to go. Fascinating and hugely extensive game play, with the the added options of extending game play with some of the outstanding mods the community has made. Can no longer handle RTS click-fests nor straight board games.

Now, that said, I still have this odd yearning for MTW, and return to it quite often. I have never been able to figure out why this is so. It has finally dawned on me the huge difference between the style of campaign maps is fundamental. The individual battles are no longer important. Losing a city/provence is no longer important. On VH/VH, I am constantly at war with three or more factions, almost from get-go. That's just not realistic. I seldom have the time or money to upgrade to the better units and facilities, and end up playing the game with mediocre troops, as does the AI. It seems to have the same problem. With MTW, there seemed to be far more "suspense" on campaign. You could go for years without actually fighting, while upgrading and advancing your faction. But be careful, because the AI had the ability to literally crush you in a few turns, though I seldom allowed it. They had the ability to launch attacks from multiple directions that you would never see coming through FOW. And when they did, the battles were certainly tougher, again for fundamental reasons that should never have been changed. Granted, you couldn't bring more than one army on the field at once, as we may be able to do with the patch, but you could bring up reinforcements at your discretion in the order you wanted. And the AI never attacked by rushing archers, lol. but now we can move seige equipment. Trade off. Bottom line for me is, the MTW style of play was more relaxing, but far more suspenseful. I enjoyed that, but I'll keep following CA as long as possible. Nothing else compares.

MTW's lack of "quality" , if I might say it like that, is compensated by the excellent mods produced by the community.

The only thing which will surely make M2TW rise up very much in the eyes of the veterans is the moddability. If this is really what we wanted, then we can surely say that M2TW is the best TW game ever made so far.

been off TW for a long while because of M2. it's too much alike RTW. that said it's on the same engine as RTW.

i say anyone who has played MTW thourughly and can beat the AI is a TW vet.

MTW was imo best TW game because it was slow and steady, in M2 if someone charges you with heavy cav it's much harder to counterattack as fast.

MTW camp. had good ai, but after playing RTW camp. the MTW 2D map bore me. too hard to go back.

music i say RTW and M2TW had the best music. the only music i like in MTW was the eastern music.

RTW had good music? You're kidding. MTW and STW have the best soundtracks ever. MTW's Eastern rocked, and even the Western was good. STW was also incredible, extremely relaxing and pleasurable music.

I agree that the 2D map bores you, but you can't ignore the feeling and huge variety of MTW.

i did play the MTW camp. wild loads of fun. just the map was unappealing.

i didnt play or hear STW's soundtrack however.

Lord Ovaat is right on. I went back to a MTW VI Scots campaign just the other day, playing on Expert. As I do with basically all TW games, I turtled. For awhile I was just clicking through the years, making buildings, training troops, and trying to forge alliances. My rule was to not start any wars, but to get into a strong position from which to strike out once someone attacked or I ran out of money. So the Irish kicked me out of Ulster, and a few years later the Picts came knocking. It was a crazy wild ride, I can tell you -- there were years when I only had one province under my control, and 2 provinces under siege. And despite the Risk-board style map, the movement of the Scots-Picts war was incredibly dynamic -- more dynamic than what you see in RTW or M2TW. I had a single strong army that I was just moving around wherever the Picts were weakest, and trying to hold onto *something*. It went back-and-forth across the mountains of Scotland for years -- I'd be fighting 3 or 4 battles a year -- and eventually, against the odds, I was able to relocate the center of my power in the north. Managed to capture the Pictish king and get some badly-needed cash in ransom. But just when I was about to destroy them utterly, when they were down to one besieged province and another province I was about to attack, they got a huge loyalist rebellion in the besieged province. So now I don't know *what* is going to happen. Thing is, even if I come out of this war, the Mercians have taken all of southern England and will be heading north soon....

The point of all this is that you don't usually get that sort of feeling with the later TW games. I played for hours yesterday, on the edge of my seat the whole time, because each battle mattered critically to the future of my kingdom. And I think it's significant that there aren't a lot of threads of people wishing M2 was more like Rome -- they're wishing M2 was more like MTW. In other words, it's not simply a matter of people getting nostalgic for the last iteration of the game; it's a matter of people genuinely being drawn to something about the dynamic of MTW. It's not that I hate M2 -- I do enjoy it, and I'm looking forward to the expansion. I don't think it's reasonable to expect designers to go back to the 2D map style. But I wish there was some way to replicate that sense of real danger and, at the same time, the sense that it *is* possible to pull out a crazy victory through some risky and lucky maneuvering.

MTW was the only TW game where I have been knocked out twice. On expert, got eliminated by Almohads, playing as Spain, and playing as Russians, from Early, got butchered by Poles. ~:eek:

In Shogun, I was knocked out only once. In RTW or M2TW, never...