E3 Preview

[Fearless]

This review I read by Yoink in the .com so our thanks to him. Interesting

Hello friends

Please allow me to introduce myself I go by "Yoink" and I've been an avid reader of this board for about 8 months now. I discovered Medieval: Total War about 9 months ago and have been hooked on it ever since The insight, advice and discussion on this board helped to make my game experience the best it could be, so for that, I have to give a BIG THANK YOU to all the regular contributors to this board. I thought it was only fair that I give something back.

Today, I went to E3 at the Convention Center in Downtown Los Angeles. Today, I saw many, many people playing Rome: Total War. Today, I got the shivers. I may actually have to break up with my girlfriend over this game (or more, specifically, she may break up with me.)

Here's the story:

For anyone that's ever been to E3 before, you know in the past it's been huge. HUGE. Well, this year was no exception. The Microsoft area took up almost 1/4 of an entire hall at the convention center. The Electronics Arts area was a feast for the eyes. The Nintendo area was kinda like a giant electronic carnaval. My buddy and I walked around for 2 hours in this maze of million-dollar sets and blazing laser light shows. Then, we came across the Activision area. I told my friend Simon, "Stop. We have to go in here."

I walked into the area and there it was...a whole section of the Activition area devoted strictly to Rome:Total War. It was amazing. Running on no less than 10 top-of-the-line machines was an almost totally complete version of Rome:Total War. I (nearly) fell over myself trying to get to the front of a small crowd that had grown around these computers for a better look. I ponied up to the first computer I could and started talking to this blonde haired guy who was playing RTW and talking to some other conventioneers about the game. The guy was wearing a red RTW t-shirt and an E3 "developer" badge and I quickly learned that he was one of the producers of RTW. He said his name was "Guy". He had a British accent. We started to talk. And then he started to show me the game.

First, I gotta say that RTW looks like a game that's *AT LEAST* three generations ahead of Medieval: Total War in terms of technology and production value. I remarked to Guy that it seems like there should be two or three games between MTW and RTW because the two look SO different. It's like there were some sequals that everyone missed. Guy told me that the engine for RTW was totally new, everything was rebuild, but they aimed for the same experience of play as MTW.

Now I know everyone has read the professional previews of RTW on gamespy and ign and avault, blah, blah, blah...so I'll talk about the things that JUMPED out at me (an avid MTW player) and the stuff that I think will REALLY interest other avid MTW players like you guys.

First, we all know that the sprite graphics for individual soldiers are gone. Each soldier is now rendered with 3-d polygon-type graphics. But what I didn't realize is what *AMAZING* detail and animation each soldier is given. When fully zoomed, each soldier, archer, commander, and horse have the same level of detail you would expect from a solid First-Person-Shooter game like Unreal Tournament 2004 or Call of Duty. I was STUNNED When standing at attention, each soldier shifted while standing in the heat, scratching their heads, fiddling with their swords, or looking at their commander. When marching, they all marched in step...kinda. Here and there, a soldier would get out of step, giving the whole appearance a much more lifelike appearance. It was a joy to behold.

Second...the archery graphics were AWESOME. One thing I was kinda disappointed in with MTW was how relatively poor the archery graphics were. Arrows were just kinda like blurry little grey lines that moved quickly across the screen and didn't seem to have any depth or substance to them after being fired. Not so in RTW. Squads of archers firing arrows in RTW light each arrow on fire, and then launch them in unison into the sky. Each arrow blazes to life with a firey burst and leaves a smoke trail behind it as it streaks towards the enemy. The arrows in MTW looked kinda pathetic. The arrows in RTW look (and I'm not exagurating) postively deadly. And when they strike enemy soldiers, depending on where they hit, they can knock a soldier over, decapitate him, spin him around, strike his shield, etc. I got my first shiver watching this.

(more later...I'm at work and my lunch hour is over.)

-Yoink

[ThijsP]

Citaat[/b] (Fearless @ Mei 14 2004,03:53)]And when they strike enemy soldiers, depending on where they hit, they can knock a soldier over, decapitate him, spin him around, strike his shield, etc. I got my first shiver watching this.

Mmmmmm, like too see that

[[DnC]]

Yoink's second post:

Citaat[/b] ]Okay fellas,

Thank you everyone for the kind response to my post above. I'm honored that the very best players in the Total War universe are interested in what I have to say. Before I continue my thoughts on RTW at E3, I'll try to answer some of your questions.

First...how the hell did I manage to get into E3? Well, there's a couple of reasons. First, I'm a native of Los Angeles (it helps to be living in the city where the convention is taking place) and second, I work at the assignment desk in the newsroom of KCBS Channel 2 news. On Wednesday, we sent a reporter and a photographer to the convention center to do a story for the 6 pm news on all the exciting stuff at E3. After they were done, said reporter and photographer gave me and my buddy Simon their press passes (a slight indiscretion, I'm sure) so we could check out the show on Thursday.

Fellas, I gotta tell ya, walking around with a press badge at E3 that says "CBS NEWS" on it DEFINATELY gets the attention of all the Public Relations people at the show. One PR girl from Blizzard saw me and said, "HI Oh my God....you're from CBS News?? And you're *HERE*? What are you doing *HERE*? What is CBS doing HERE?" I said, "Hey toots, relax, I'm just here for fun, I'm not working." And she said, "Oh that's okay, lemme show you around Right over here is the World of Warcraft area Did you know that World of Warcraft *blah, blah, blah* and that we have developed a *blah, blah, blah* with the BLAH, BLAH, BLAH?" So I said, "Riiiiiiiiiiight. Okay. Um, hey, where's the food court?"

Anyways...that's how I got into E3. Next...I apologize if this post is kinda disjointed because I'm writing it after having a whole bunch of scotch. One of our anchors at CBS had his 50th birthday tonight, and there was a party, and all the booze was free...and well you know the rest. I mean, c'mon If you had the chance to drink Johnny Walker Blue Label scotch for free all night...wouldn't you take up the chance? Okay...back to the topic at hand. Rome: Total War.

Here are the other things that jumped out at me, an avid MTW player:

After developer "Guy" showed me how archers worked in the game, he executed a full-scale battle between an army of Roman Legionnaires and a group of barbarians. The Roman Legionnaires advanced and met the barbarians head on in a pitched battle in the middle of an open plain. And just like in MTW, as the two armies marched toward each other, both broke into a run during the last one hundred yards or so, creating a spectacular clash of iron on iron in the middle of the screen. Now I've got to admit, the whole thing looked exactly like something I'm sure everyone has seen recently on TV. I'm sure everyone who's reading this has seen the trailer for the new movie "Troy". There's a part of the trailer where a whole bunch of troops run up the beach and charge into a standing group of pikemen as the camera zooms forward along the line of battle. Friends....RTW looks *EXACTLY* like that. The whole line of defending soldiers buckled as the Roman Legionnaires charged the barbarian lines...to my untrained eye, it seemed like every single soldier had a different animation as combatants hacked away at each other...some turning to run and some leaping over one another to strike at another foe. But this STILL wasn't where the combat sequence really shined.

About thirty seconds into this battle, developer "Guy" says, "Okay...you're an experienced MTW player. You know what I've got to do next. I've got to take my cavalry and FLANK" And flank he did. Guy moved a unit of Roman cavalry around the lines of battle and pushed them into a charge aimed directly at the back of the barbarian lines. However, before he could completely execute his run, the computer moved some kind of spear unit in between the rear barbarian line and the path of the charging cavalry. The result was jaw-dropping.

Guy's cavalry slammed directly into a phalanx of barbarian spears. Here's where I got my second shiver of the day. I saw the following things:
1) A horse flipped over. Rendered beautifully in full 3-d graphics, this horse dove on a spear, threw it's rider, and flipped over backwards landing in a cloud of dust.
2) A horse reared back on it's hind legs, kicking up into the air, throwing it's rider and then falling over.
3) A spear snapped as a horse ran into it, trampling the spearholder as the rider of the horse swung his sword in a low arc.
My point, my friends, is that the amount of animation associated with a cavalry charge hitting a wall of spears was simply *UNPRECEDENTED*. I could not believe what I was seeing. I could not count the number of different animations taking place all at the same time. The net affect was the sensation of viewing a real-life, fluid, unpredictable battle Amazing And all while maintaining the integrity of the tried-and-true Total War engine. This wasn't just eye-candy. All this stuff was calculated just like a MTW cavalry charge.

Next, and possibly the most exciting point of my whole experience, was the soundtrack for the game. Okay, let's face it...MTW didn't have much of a soundtrack during the combat sequences. You basically got three short pieces of music at any given time. You got the "Combat is starting" music...you got the "I'm moving my units" music, and you got the "I'm meeting the enemy for the first time in battle" music. Then, after 60 seconds or so, the music stopped and all you were left with was the sound of the breeze blowing puncuated by the sounds of battle. NOT SO IN RTW For the entire battle that I saw, there was music (that could be toggled off, according to Guy) that seemed to CHANGE DYNAMICALLY according to what was going on. The music was a rousing drum beat that quickened as the battle progressed. For instance, when Guy charged his cavalry down a hill toward the back the barbarian lines, the music shifted from the "infantry attack" motif to the "cavalry charge" motif. Now I don't think I can put into words exactly what a PROFOUND affect this had on the overall experience of game play. It simply made me grip the desk and watch in awe as the cavalry charged down the hill. It was kind of difficult to hear exactly what the music sounded like, because the sound coming from the speakers on Guy's computer was overpowered by the UNBEARABLY LOUD RUCKUS coming from the Ninentdo booth next door where some bimbo was yammering ON AND ON about Mario Kart 15 or whatever lame-ass product Nintendo was hawking for 2005. But seriously fellas, I have tried to search for SOMETHING that would give you guys a taste of what the AMAZING soundtrack to the battles in RTW sounds like.

The closest thing I can find is (strangely enough) the Matrix: Revolutions soundtrack. Seriously, it sounded like a portion of the last track on the soundtrack entitled "Navras". For those of you that don't have it, just jump on Kazaa or Morpheus or whatever Peer-to-Peer client you're using these days, and search for "Matrix Navras". It's about a nine minute and eight second song. When you're done downloading, play it and fast forward to about sixteen seconds into it. Press play and close your eyes and imagine an entire unit of Roman cavalry charging down a hill to that music. Um...only without all the techno crap. *THAT'S* what RTW feels like. It was amazing.

Whew...okay...It's 4 am and I'm done for the night. More tomorrow.

Ya, there's more. Pigs on fire and elephants running around. I'm not kidding.

-Yoink

I haven't been SO anxious to play a game in AGES

Someone pinch me and tell me this game is really coming out

[Myrddraal]

I'm not sure I can believe this, there's some kind of mental block.

I'm jumping up and down in anticipation


But its not out yet...

[MiniKiller]

Quote[/b] (ThijsP @ May 14 2004,06:58)]

Quote[/b] (Fearless @ Mei 14 2004,03:53)]And when they strike enemy soldiers, depending on where they hit, they can knock a soldier over, decapitate him, spin him around, strike his shield, etc. I got my first shiver watching this.

Mmmmmm, like too see that

did he always kill them? im sure in battle men have been wounded with arrows but not dead.

[Kraxis]

Well Mini it doesn't seem the engine can calculate with injured soldiers. I guess you have to assume that those hit but not killed can be injured (those staggering back a little).

[Shahed]

WOW Amazing write up Thanks for posting.
Do you have a link to this thread at .com ?

[[DnC]]

Here's the link you asked for: Yoink15's E3 Thread.

And here's another thread made by someone whom claims to have been at the E3: Tommh's E3 Thread.

[Shahed]

Bedankt

[[DnC]]

You know (some of) the Dutch language? Or used babblefish? Or it's a spoken language in Luxemburg and I was never aware of it? I thought in Luxemburg people spoke German and/or French, but maybe that's just my lack of knowledge?

*I'm really curious by nature, I hope you don't mind me asking
Could be considered a rather dull question.

[Shahed]

Not at all. I lived in Flanders, so I can understand and speak some Dutch. Luxembourg's official language is French. Most baby boomers speak Luxembourgish, German, and French. The generation X and beyond mostly speak English in addition to the above 3. The high non Luxembourgish population means that many people speak Portuguese or Italian (the largest foreign populations) as well. My brother speaks, Luxembourgish, German, French and English, fluently. In school you have to take 3 languages in addition to Luxembourgish. It's common in a country so small to get to know other languages, the Luxembourgers need them to get around, since no one outside of here speaks Luxembourgish.

Excellent I really recommend reading those links, lots of great info there. Thanks again to both of you.

[[DnC]]

Citaat[/b] (Sinan @ Mei 20 2004,13:38)]It's common in a country so small to get to know other languages, the Luxembourgers need them to get around, since no one outside of here speaks Luxembourgish.

I can understand that, in the Netherlands it's somewhat the same

[Jango Fett]

i dont mind waiting for this game to come out, i want CA to make it as good as possible