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Thread: The Fourth Age: Total War - The New Shadow Released!
Apoc 03:06 07-21-2007
The Fourth Age: Total War Development Team are proud to present:

The Fourth Age: Total War – The New Shadow (2.0b)
(note that 2.0b is the former 2.0 but with the 2 hotfixes (2.1 & 2.2) included)



‘Strategists and Lord of the Rings fans should immediately download this mod.’ – PC Games, on ‘Forth Eorlingas’

‘The Fourth Age: Total War – The New Shadow’ is a modification for ‘Rome: Total War – Barbarian Invasion’ (v1.6). TNS is the third instalment in our successful series of releases, begun with ‘Corsair Invasion’, and followed by ‘Forth Eorlingas’, which have been downloaded by over 60,000 people. CI was given coverage in the PCGamer and PC Action magazines, as well as being 'Mod of the Week' on krawall.de. It was also voted 'Best BI/Alexander Mod' by the users of Total War fansite totalwar.org. FE has been mentioned by PC Games, GameStar.de, 4players.de, and was voted 'Best RTW/BI Fantasy Mod' & 'Best RTW Battle Map Experience' by the users of the TW fansite twcenter.net.



‘Class mod for Rome: Total War … Very Good’ – PC Action, on ‘Corsair Invasion’

One of the main goals of FATW has been to faithfully portray the lands and inhabitants of Middle-earth in the Fourth Age, and immerse the player in the world that Tolkien created. We hope and believe that we have achieved that goal. ‘The New Shadow’ is a provincial campaign taking place on a map that is roughly half that of the full map of Middle-earth. Players can choose between six factions: The Reunited Kingdom, The Kingdom of Rohan, The Empire of Harad, The Chiefdom of Rhûn, The Kingdom of Adûnabâr, and The Chiefdom of Dunland. In addition there are three new factions playable in custom battles: The Kingdom of the Elves, The Kingdom of the Dwarves, and The Kingdom of Dale. You will be treated to a whole host of new features including a new alignment, over 50 new units (more Dwarves, Elves, Orcs, & Trolls), a complete overhaul of the unit & faction balance systems, new animations, new traits and ancillaries, new music, and more.



‘Impressive…’ – PCGamer, on ‘Corsair Invasion’

It is the 238th Year of the Fourth Age of the Sun, and over 200 years have passed since the Return of the King, and the downfall of the Dark Lord. The Reunited Kingdom is beset on all sides by foes, and now even her own people are rebelling. The new Kingdom of Adûnabâr has seized Mordor and all its lands to the East of the Anduin. Their alliance with Rohan is faltering, as the Rohirrim are in open war with the Dunlendings. To the East the hordes of the Easterlings are once again moving, and the Haradrim are mustering their forces for yet another invasion. And as if that was not enough, rumours of a dark cult have been spreading through the lands of Gondor…



‘Countless descriptions, graphics, and even quotes from the books escort you through the whole game to get you in the right Lord of the Rings mood.’ – www.krawall.de

For a sample of FATW gameplay, check out 'The New Shadow Action Trailer' by Crian. For more information on The Fourth Age: Total War please visit our homepage and accompanying forums at: http://www.thefourthage.org

The New Shadow includes:




Download links:

The New Shadow (239 MB)

The New Shadow 2.4 Patch (7.52 MB)

Musicpack:

The New Shadow Musicpack | Mirror 2 | Mirror 3 (192 MB)

Installation Instructions for The New Shadow (FATW 2.0b)

The New Shadow functions from a mod folder ("ci") that sits under your "bi" folder. The mod in no way overwrites or spills into your RTW or BI folders. It will thus not affect your original games. It is compatible with any other mod that works from within its own modfolder. It can be uninstalled completely simply by deleting the "ci" folder should you wish to grab back space from your hard drive. If you have a previous installation of FATW then please delete the "ci" folder (in the "bi" folder) to avoid complications. The New Shadow assumes you do not have any previous versions of FATW installed.

Brief Instructions (for advanced users):

1. You will need a clean (i.e. unmodded) installation of Rome Total War - Barbarian Invasion version 1.6

2. After downloading the 2.0 executable, click on it to run it and follow the installation process; you must make sure the installation path is correct

3. When the files are extracted you will exit the installer and a dos window will run for approx 6 minutes. Leave this to run and it will disappear when its work is done.

You should now be ready to play The New Shadow - just click The New Shadow shortcut that should now be on on your desktop! (Do not click this before the dos window closes!)

Elaborations (for those new to installing mods):

1. In-game in Barbarian Invasion click on the Options menu item and you will see the version number in the top right of the screen. If this is not 1.6 you will need to patch it up by using the official SEGA 1.6 patch. This can be found the following link: http://www.sega.com/support/support....upport_patches

2. In most cases the default path of "C:\Program Files\Activision\Rome - Total War" will be fine, but in cases where the Gold Edition of RTW are used (or where you have changed your directory names) the path must reflect that. The installation path will always be the directory that holds the RTW-BI.exe

3. Some users have problems with the dos window, this may be because of an unusual or varied setup on your PC. Please visit out support forums at thefourthage.org if you have problems.


Special Thanks:

To the Creative Assembly for making quite possibly the best strategy game out there, and for allowing us to mod it. (www.totalwar.com)

To the entire modding community for making wonderful tools, and generally being great chaps.

To Vercingetorix for making xpak, xidx, and the cas exporter.

To Europa Barbarorum (and Bouchious specifically) for allowing us the use of 50 de-tattooed Barbarian portraits (we are told the barbarian leaders did not complain too much despite this painful process, though one member of EB was rumoured to have received a rather nasty axe wound to his shoulder and was unable to mod for 8 weeks) - (www.europabarbarorum.com).

To Alin and EB for use of their mounted standard, 2-handed foot spearman, 2-handed mounted spearman and gladius skeletons and animations.

To Teleklos and Shifty (both of Europa Barbarorum) for their work on and permission to use the palm-forest mod.

To Burns of ME:TW for creating Osgiliath for us at late notice.

To Middle-earth:Total War for use of their Argonath and Edoras strat-map models. (http://www.chamber-of-records.com/fo...splay.php?f=95)

To Myrddraal (Wheel of Time: Total War) for his gemstones model. (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/forumdisplay.php?f=99)

To The Lordz for granting the use of their realistic skies clouds. (http://lordz.thelordz.co.uk)

To Sinuhet for his AI Formations. (http://www.twcenter.net/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=130)

To Uranos for doing many unit cards at short notice.

To Justin R. Durban, musical artist, for the use of a large number of his great songs. (www.edgen.com)

To Simon Daum, musical artist, for letting us use his song, 'The Return of the King', as the signature music for the mod. (www.simondaum.com)

To Tapani Siirtola, musical artist, for permission to use some of his wonderful music in the mod. (www.mikseri.net/artists/?id=37335)

To Matti Paalanen, musical artist, from 'The Celestial Aeon Project' for permission to use some of his songs in the mod. (http://www.mikseri.net/artists/celes...ject.48147.php)

To David Arkenstone for the kind use of his music - (www.davidarkenstone.com)

To Xerex & Aradan for their unrelenting commitment to engage in months of research and testing to create the most rigorous and accurate unit balance system of any mod out there!

To Crian for his beautiful mod-enhancing videos.

To Christopher Tolkien for revealing more of the wonderful world of Middle-earth in his 'History of Middle-earth' books.

And last, but certainly not least, to John Ronald Reuel Tolkien for creating the greatest fantasy epic of all time.

Reply
Dol Guldur 08:45 07-21-2007
Note: If you have a previous installation of FATW then please delete the "ci" folder (in the "bi" folder) to avoid complications. The New Shadow assumes you do not have any previous versions of FATW installed.

Reply
Apoc 16:36 07-21-2007
The New Shadow 2.1 Fix Patch:

TNS 2.1 Patch | Mirror 2

Fixes:



Installation Instructions:

Click on the downloaded .exe and choose the correct installation path (the one you installed TNS 2.0 to). After you exit the installer a dos window will open - it should close by itself after approximately 3 minutes. You are now ready to play.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

The New Shadow 2.2 Fix Patch

TNS 2.2 Patch | Mirror 2



Installation Instructions:

This patch is not cumulative so you must have the 2.1 patch installed first. Click on the downloaded .exe and choose the correct installation path (the one you installed TNS 2.0 to).

Reply
Dol Guldur 12:37 07-28-2007
IMPORTANT: To ensure youi have the latest version please visit the release post at our official forums at http://www.thefourthage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1775 or, if they are down, at the Chamber of Records http://www.chamber-of-records.com/fo...ead.php?t=1687

Reply
Vuk 01:08 08-02-2007
Awesome!

Reply
Myrddraal 18:16 08-02-2007


Top work

Reply
PapaNasty 07:27 10-03-2007
This mod is wicked!! Runs smooth and is great. 3 turns in I had already fought half a dozen battles with Adunabar, playing as RK :) Top work!

Reply
Aradan 09:42 10-03-2007
Great! We're glad you are enjoying it. I trust you have downloaded the latest patch... - TNS patch 2.3

Reply
PapaNasty 12:42 10-03-2007
I have indeed, downoaded the mod, music pack, 3 patches and installed em all before playing, works like a charm :) Campaign balance is quite nice, although I really had to juggle things around as RK in the first turn to avoid major negative income, even then it took a few settlements captured to even things out :)

Best thing is (besides the wicked subject of the mod hehe), I can run this mod with the settings much higher than the original RTW and BI expansion, it seems to be a lot less draining on my system, and runs much smoother on the campaign map and battlemap as a result.

Reply
Apoc 11:56 11-16-2007
Some screenshots from TNS:


The Captain of Gondor orders his troops to attack.


The Guards of the Citadel are the finest soldiers in the realm.


The shield-wall of the Men of Gondor is unbreakable...


The Guards of the King's House


Durin's Guard


The dreadful Olog-hai.


'Let All the Foes of Gondor Flee!'


Reply
Myrddraal 21:17 11-21-2007
Stunning, how high res are those textures?

Reply
Aradan 21:26 11-21-2007
Most of them 512x256 incuding the MIP maps, though some, like the Mumakil ones, are 1024x512. Balbor has done a great job with them!

Reply
Apoc 17:13 11-23-2007
Few more screens:


'The Mûmakil approach...'


'A Guard of the Citadel'


'The King's Spearmen charging...'


Reply
vegeta 17:38 11-05-2008
omg cool pics and how abt a war now in this era will luk lyk xD

Reply
ooredoo 08:00 01-04-2009
do i need to download the music pack????

Reply
Aradan 14:15 01-04-2009
It's not necessary for the mod to run, bit it adds a lot to immersion and it has some great tracks in it by some very talented artists (JR Durban, David Arkenstone, Celestial Aeon, to name a few). It's "highly recommended" you get it.


(And don't forget to download the latest patch, TNS 2.6 and its fix)

Reply
mynameis1234 15:00 04-09-2011
How do you install, I have followed all intruction and yet when I click on the shortcut nothing happens. PLEASE HELP. It mightbe something to do with my instalation path cause I installed RTW and BI in d folder

Reply
mynameis1234 16:21 04-09-2011
Never mind got it to work

Reply
Dol Guldur 11:10 04-11-2011
This is an old thread. Please visit http://www.twcenter.net/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=89 for the current build (2.6) of FATW, and for news about the full release, The Dominion of Men, in 2012.

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