A lot of New Screens!!

[Crusader Invasion]

56 new ones on... These may be Demo screens!

http://www.4players.de/4players.php/...Total_War.html

and more on...

http://www.tothegame.com/screenshot.asp?id=4972

[Dan.o6]

Visual secks.

[Myrddraal]

It's true that the terrain generation is stunning, both visually and in terms of strategic features. A huge improvement in an area RTW was quite lacking.


EDIT There are screens of Agincourt and Hastings in there. Demo battles? And it would appear a tutorial of some kind.

[Lord Adherbal]

no one can deny that it looks phenominal. Not that I think many people will be able to run the game on even half that detail, especially in MP.

If only those battles play like good old MTW and not 5 minute rush fests like in RTW. That would be such a waste.

[Bigfoot]

I don'n know if anyone noticed, but on http://http://www.4players.de/4players.php/screenshot_list/PC-CDROM/7867/Screenshots/13323/1686182/Medieval_2_Total_War.html it says "Dismounted English Knights." I wonder if this means that mounted knights will be able to dismount?

[Myrddraal]

It's probably like it was in MTW I, where you could dismount knights before the battle started. Particularly useful in sieges when you haven't got enough infantry. I assume in MTW II it will be even more usefull in sieges since you can't put cavalry on the walls.

I hope that in MTW II walls will be hard to breach. I find that it is very easy in RTW to take a settlement once a wall is down. If you try without catapaults or sapping, it's harder, and more fun.

[Myrddraal]

http://www.4players.de/4players.php/...Total_War.html

Look at those explosions! I really hope that's naptha, because if it isn't...

[Lord Adherbal]

yeah but I fear CA will care more about what we saw in LOTR RotK in the siege of Minas Tirath then what would be realistic and challenging

[Lord Adherbal]

Look at those explosions! I really hope that's naptha, because if it isn't...

you know as well as I do that those are flaming arrows. Instant igniting soldiers are back.

[econ21]

Very nice graphics. Looks like the tutorial is being a Norman (Rufus?) helping out William at Hastings.

The only thing I don't like visually are the unit cards along the bottom of the screens - at least not the English ones. They don't seem to clearly enough depict the unit (e.g. the dismounted knights don't look so different from the other infantry) and the artwork is less naturalistic than RTW.

[Bakma]

http://www.tothegame.com/res/game/49...en13_large.jpg

are these Timurids?

[eastemnet]

you know as well as I do that those are flaming arrows. Instant igniting soldiers are back.

I hope I am not seeing what I think I am seeing:

http://www.tothegame.com/sshotfeat.a...een=7559&pic=4

[Ignoramus]

you know as well as I do that those are flaming arrows. Instant igniting soldiers are back.

They aren't. Look carefully.

http://www.4players.de/4players.php/...Total_War.html

You can see an arrow with no fire on it. I think econ21's right: it's cannon.

Also, I think motte and baileys are in, I can't find the screenshot, but I definately saw them.

This is amazing! 24 hours ago, I probably wasn't going to buy MTW2, but now I almost certainly will.

[Darth Nihilus]

Those graphics are stunning, I can't wait to play. It would appear, at least to me, that all of the settlements do not look like carbon copies of each other.

[Furious Mental]

Looks like we can see what the most basic castle looks like; pretty much just a stone keep. Hopefully they have some motte and bailey type castles early on though.

[Dooz]

Interesting little detail on the strat map, irrigation province improvements are visible.

http://i.i.com.com/cnet.g2/images/20..._screen012.jpg

[Myrddraal]

If you're talking about the farmland appearing, it did that in RTW, but not very well.

Looks good! I still can't get over the improvments in the terrain. The rolling wooded hills of pre-RTW are back, and greatly improved. Goodbye strange tiny wood outlines on the sides of ridiculouly steep pointy mountains.

[Monarch]

http://www.4players.de/4players.php/...Total_War.html

Can I gather from that theres just a run button, and not the speed slider thingy we had in MTW? I much preffered the speed slider.

Other than that if Hastings and Aginccourt are in the demos then thats pretty cool. Because that means we get English, HRE and France at least, three of the factions I'm most looking forward to playing (but I'd really like an Islamic faction in there too)

[sunsmountain]

Attack 19 Defence 28, Admittedly half of that value is armour but setting the defence stat higher than the attack ones is a tactic used in many mods to slow down the dreaded kill rate...

What I don't get is why still use 1 hitpoint, when you can get combos? That must mean that the success rate of attacks has gone down (else you'll never get combos), effectively slowing down the dreaded kill rate as well

The chain of attacks and the lower attack success rates effectively raise the number of attacks during a fight, meaning better statistical results. Lower hit probabilities also apply to hitting somebody from behind (ie very low armor value), meaning they can still miss, unlike in Rome (where even town watch score a hit from behind).

[caravel]

http://www.4players.de/4players.php/...Total_War.html

Can I gather from that theres just a run button, and not the speed slider thingy we had in MTW? I much preffered the speed slider.

Other than that if Hastings and Aginccourt are in the demos then thats pretty cool. Because that means we get English, HRE and France at least, three of the factions I'm most looking forward to playing (but I'd really like an Islamic faction in there too)

Looks to me as if the speed may be variable via those left and right + and - arrows.