Empire Total War is the latest addition to the legendary Total War series and brings back many memories of the previous games, but with new technology and some great graphics, can it outshine its predecessors? Or will the bugs in this game be the thing that kills it?

In Empire: Total War you have three options to delve into, the first being the “Road to Independence” campaign which puts you in the shoes of the American revolutionary army on their road to freedom from the British. It also features several sub-plots such as the British conquering Indian tribes and the French and Indian War, a conflict between Britain and an alliance of French and Indian soldiers. There is also the classic Total War Grand Campaign, in which you choose from eleven playable nations with a goal of conquering the globe. There are about fifty non-playable nations within the game, most of which will emerge through a revolution or if you conquer a nation but not their colonial possessions. Finally, there is a quick battle option which allows you to jump straight into the action to get a taste of combat in Empire: Total War.

I enjoyed the Road to Independence. It gives a great outline on how to play the game and it is a great tutorial for newcomers and old-timers alike. The story is highly immersive and if you are interested in history, the Road to Independence will appeal to you as it is all historical fact. Some of the bugs present in this game show within the Road to Independence, but I will go into these bugs later on.

The Grand Campaign is as good as ever. It has the usual city and army management as well as a huge array of technologies to research in the fields of military, industry and philosophy, and unlike many RTS games, the technology actually makes a huge difference as you get further into the campaign, either improving your economic or military status in the world. Now there are also three types of governments, a monarchy, a constitutional monarchy and a republic. You start out with one of these, but any nation can change with a revolution from either the upper-classes or the lower-classes. When this happens, you have the option of joining the revolutionary army or siding with your government.

The battle system has notably been improved with many more units being available on the battlefield, and much to the praise of the Empire community, you can finally control a nearby reinforcing army. In previous instalments reinforcing armies were controlled by simple AI who would march to a certain point and stop, do nothing and let the enemy run by them. Before going into battle you must either choose to actually fight the battle in real-time yourself, or have the computer simulate it for you. Normally the latter produces much higher casualty rates, unless, of course, you haven’t grasped the tactical side of the game. If you simulate the battles you are missing one of the best parts of of the Total War series, the huge real-time battles that feature several thousand units. There is nothing more satisfying than seeing an enemy soldier being blown up by one of your cannons or your men charging at the enemy with bayonets, skewering any enemy soldier in their path. However, this side of the game also has several game crippling bugs. For one, an awful lot of the time your soldiers just get stuck on random objects on the map such as a hay cart (I had a regiment of 80 men all stuck on a hay cart, they were all blown up by a cannon, which looked cool, but ruined my tactics), or if you put them into cover behind a wall, it may result in them getting stuck and doing nothing, also resulting in a massacre. Another thing that I have noticed is that trees and other scenery don’t seem to be solid. Soldiers often walk through trees as if they weren’t there, I do concede however, there are enough polygons on the maps already and adding more would probably make the game too graphically intense to run on anything! The naval battles only suffered from one major bug, often when you give ships orders they just spin around in circles and get killed, but overall the naval battles work well if you can master them.

The Campaign map had several bugs as well. It would randomly crash when you were simply moving armies around the map or garrisoning troops in cities or towns. I kept playing through these issues thanks to a quite powerful PC, but if you had a lower-end PC, this game would be crash city. There are also several diplomacy issues within the game. Prior to patching the game, it was almost impossible to have any sort of diplomatic talk and it was very hard to make peace with another nation or even get trade agreements. After applying the patch, the diplomacy is too easy. I was playing as The United Provinces (The Netherlands), and when Spain declared war on me, all I had to do was ask for a peace treaty and they accepted, and furthermore, they gave me 2000 in currency!

Probably the best part of the Total War series has been its graphics, and Empire delivers the graphical goods better than any entry in the series to date. The maps are filled with loads of little details and overall the small details just look brilliant. This comes at a price though, you need a pretty good PC to play it with graphics high enough to notice that it is better than previous Total War titles. You will, however, notice a significant improvement in the appearance of the individual units on any graphics setting. They each have detailed animations and defining features not present in previous Total War games. The units in Empire actually look life-like and you can see the determination on their faces as they march forward. As the battle rages, the battlefield becomes engulfed in smoke from musket and cannon fire, and the effects are just brilliant when the muskets and cannons are fired. The naval battles look brilliant even on low graphics settings; the water looks good and reacts to the ships moving. You can see each crewman doing their job on your ships and on the enemies’ ships and it meshes well together. Overall the graphics are the best bit of this game and are reason enough to overlook many of the bugs.

Like the graphics, another shining point of this game is the amazing audio. The musical score is brilliant and it suits the game down to the ground. On the loading screen you can hear cannon shots and gunfire, all sounding highly realistic and they would sometimes send shivers down your spine if you have the volume up at maximum level. The sound when cannons fire or your soldiers shoot are some of the best I have heard in an strategy game. You can hear every individual musket fire and if you listen close enough you should be able to hear the musket balls and cannon balls ripping through the air.

Several of the bugs have been patched, some haven’t and some other bugs have just been replaced with new bugs. Diplomacy is still bugged and the AI is still lacking, which can be devastating in a game such as Empire. I would suggest that you get some AI mods from the vast Total War community to fix many of the problems, especially “DarthMod Empire” or “Imperial Splendour”.

Despite the bugs, Empire: Total War is a solid strategy game with excellent graphics and sound. It’s definitely worth looking into if you’re a strategy fan. The amazing graphics and audio make up for the games shortcomings and if you buy a game solely on the eye and ear candy, this is a must buy!

- Damon “Danny” Foster

Tags: Empire Total War, PC, review, sega

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