Quote Originally Posted by Turbosatan View Post
C'mon guys, you're talking like MTW1 was Europa Universalis. In which TW game have they had a "political, economic & military model, in that order"? 'Cos I sure as Hell must've missed it.

I found the last two games a complete & utter turn-off meself, because there was nothing to do apart from micromanage vast amounts of frankly boring stuff. Which I suppose is why I like Empire so much, because it sort of kinda maybe a bit feels like MTW1 with Caravel's (late of this parish) Pocket Mod installed: levelled playing field & simplified unit-building tree that even the computer can manage, so you can quickly get into some fights & kill some stuff against decent opponents.

With ETW, for all the criticism & the bugs I think they've got the battles back to a standard where you actually have to, you know, concentrate, which I think is why they've only paid lip-service (though a flashy, possibly intriguing lip-service) to the Empire Total Accountant side of the game. The Empire Total Accountant side of the game is there but it feels bolted on. You can tell, it's not the point of the game. It plays sometimes like some kind of cut-down shareware Windows 95 strategy game. Which is fine. If I wanted a game like that, I'd have bought one without the word "WAR" in the title.

Sorry to go on but sometimes I feel like you guys are making a category error, in that you are saying "This part of the game is underdeveloped, it should be changed". Whereas I've got the feeling it was meant to be that way from the start. Which is fine. I didn't develop the game, so I really can't comment on what it was meant to be like. Who can?

Not saying that my opinion is right, but just mentioning that maybe the party line isn't necessarily unanimous either.

I've got this creeping feeling reading the forums that most of the problems are not with this game expressly, but rather the image people had in their heads of what the game was going to be like, & the disconnect between the two.
The feel of the game when it was released, and the feel now are two different animals.

Sure you are in a fight from the start. Improvements are so expensive they don’t get built. The economy is tanked and building troops will put you in the hole. Running an economy in the red results in all units loosing half their men.

There are three factions that start conquering off the bat but that is all. Most of the people who want only to kill troops play those factions. But that is not the sum total of the game.

The AI is no challenge because it is as financially broke or more so than the player. It feels like you are beating up on a kindergarten class.

The AI makes stupid meaningless declarations of war and stands no chance of doing anything but providing a convenient target. There is no strategy. It only leaves you with an operational decision as to which target to take out first and some minor tactical decisions on how to fight the battles you had won before you even attacked.

I usually find the war part of the game the least challenging though at the moment most of the rest has been locked away behind the more aggressive AI to where it is simply something to click but has no other function.