Shogun 2 FOTS - Imagine a realm divide where you saved up lots of Koku and lots of settlements playing tall and only attacking 2 factions. Once realm divide kicks in, you can win in one turn by bribing everyone to shogunate or imperial side. OK now below... Pharaoh "Civil War" - This new end game mechanic. You basically know exactly which factions will be involved in the civil war. So you carefully choose their 2-3 enemies to help them and increase diplomatic relations. Build up resources and keep aside dump settlements you don't intend to develop as bargaining tools. Now manually trigger civil war, then give them gold and settlements to have non-aggression pacts. Hit end turn 12 times and you're Pharaoh. Whilst you're hitting end turn 12 times the game still thinks Civil War is in progress, but not really since you've made non-aggression pacts with civil war participants, so nothing happens. Civil War with no casualties. UN Peace keeping exercise achieved. Maybe that was intended alternative method or maybe CA forgot to lock in factions involved in Civil War into War status for duration of this mechanic. That is considered ultimately victory. Well funny thing it does convey Sun Tzu reference "To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill"
Fun fact by the way, the game advertises full audio on chinese and german, but none of the new like most prominently Aegeaen/Mesopotamian factions have this, so the game is half chinese/german and half english for people playing on those languages. Also, obligatory I hate the new hitpoint system comment.
@@reichspepe1587 Aha gotcha, havent played anything after Rome 2 for a long while so was unsure if a new system was added. Thanks for the elaboration! Also hate the newer hp system.🤌🤌🤌
I also wanted german audio for greeks and was surprised. And it is not even possible to use cyrillic in a bulgarian game to name cities or armies. LOL.
An update here; I wrote the support about what was going on here. No response. Oh wait, that's wrong. They responded by just changing the supported audio to english on Steam. What utter and complete ... !
One thing I do miss from the older total wars that you mentioned, was how they get you interested in the period. Having historical events pop up some years during the campaign (e.g. events around stoicism in RTW, enlightenment in ETW). They might not have effected the actual decisions you make but they were nice and got me into the period a lot.
@shmekelfreckles8157 idk man, if they were fine adding mythological creatures to Troy after marketing it as "truth behind the myth" then maybe they don't really care about historical accuracy after all
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 so pretty much invent the events? We have sea peoples invasion, civil wars and civilization collapse. Maybe having some extra things would’ve been interesting, like invention of steel or something.
Rome 2 is the most influential Total War game of all time. Think about that All of the features of prior Total War games were removed or iterated upon aside from the obvious basics. The battles, the campaign, the agents, the traits system, the province system, economy management, recruitment system etc were changed from Total War to Total War, making each game a different experience, each game with its own particularity and flavor beyond the historical dressing. It wasn't always perfect, but it showed that the devs were willing to take risks with the fundamentals and were willing to push the limits of the genre. Then this mangled corpse called Rome 2 shows up, and the game that nearly ran the franchise into the ground gets to be the fucking template for every game after. It's been over 10 years and nearly every bad feature still carries over into the modern total wars, like some hereditary disease that future generations are cursed to bear. We still have to deal with the awful province system, the 6/4 building slots cities, generals being tied to armies, the hitpoint system and the prevalence of unit quality over tactics which cripples the battles, the awful engine (a gift from Empire, another gem of the franchise) and worst of all, the DLC whoring (began in Emplre, but truly became its own ugly beast in Rome 2). Atilla was their last decent post Rome 2 game, but sadly it was absolutely crippled by the features carried over from Rome 2. Unbelievable how they just doubled down instead of going back to Shogun 2 which had critical and fan success. And ever since Rome 2 they have shifted the focus towards creating even more streamlined campaign experiences, filled with incredible mechanics such as pressing button to gain temporary 5% modifiers. But there's a lot historical salad behind it, so you can truly immerse yourself in the experience. I watched all their promotional materials for Dynasties, and most of the stuff was about the campaign and how they added even more Paradox style depth to the campaign, and only a 7 minute video was dedicated to the battles, which just consisted of "well guys, we get you liked Rome 1/Medieval 2/Shogun 2 combat so here's a cheap knock off of that system". The CA execs are just completely delusional, living in a reality where they actually think Paradox is their main competitor (which, to be fair, is a self fulfilling prophecy at this rate, if they keep paradoxifying their games they will ultimately get taken over by them since Paradox just has much more experience and acumen at developing these kinds of games). Total War now is just a cheap larping simulator, and partially I get the appeal, larping is fun. I myself do enjoy acting out my fantasy of being a general commanding armies on the battlefield, and everyone became a fan because this was the only series that allowed for large scale tactical combat in real time. But I simply cannot give up my sense of disbelief when the game stands in my way in so many ways. I am not allowed to meaningfully carry out my fantasy, to do things the way I want. Everything is being built for mass appeal, for the casual guy who doesn't spend more than 10 hours overall, or for the ultra historical nerd who geeks out at whether the Thracian Nobles use the correct shield heraldry because they read it on a wikipedia article (I mean, these things are nice to have, but are secondary to gameplay), but is otherwise content to live within the confines CA lay out. For those people, Pharaoh is a huge success. Wide as an ocean, deep as a puddle... And I just want to add that even when in it comes to the artistic/style department, these games have gone a long way down. Losing Jeff van Dyck has been a huge blow as his soundtrack breathed actual life into the game, whether the calming, introspective music of the campaign map or the riveting, blood pumping themes of the battle map. The UI has become extremely generic, unintuitive and inelegant - what they did to Rome Remastered is an actual travesty, a war crime against UX. The sounds of battle are dull and plastified, the models look like wax figures, units shouting is performative with no soul but in to it. The whole experience is like watching the highschool theater troupe trying to re-enact the battle of Cannae. How do people actually larp to this shit, what the hell man? I resigned myself to the idea that there will never be a good total war game again. A few years back I would have been hyped, I would have pre-ordered any edition, I was prepared to spread my cheeks and accept the ramming, if that meant we will get Medieval 3. Now I'm just jaded, I really don't care... I know already it will be yet another sterilized Rome 2 knockoff, a cashgrab, hyperfocused on copying Paradox style spreadsheeting gameplay, quite likely to be cut into pieces and sold a few times like the Warhammer games were. I can already see a Medieval 3 with HRE as a pre-order bonus, 4 factions at start - England, France, The Byzantines and the Principality of Fuck off land (because now we have to be very in-depth and historically accurate), but have only Europe and a bit of Anatolia. Then they'll start selling DLCs to unlock more factions presently existing on the campaign map, and finally they will release a new game, Medieval 3.2 with North Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia, with its own suite of DLCs and of course an Immortal Empires campaign. This is the future, it's either going to be milquetoast releases like Troy, ToB or Pharaoh or it will be big, bombastic but ultimately unambitious and chopped off games that you will need to throw hundreds of dollars to get the proper experience. Though I think they might not even attempt Medieval 3 out of fear of being exposed - expectations would be extremely high and a lot of the old fans would return for such a title. Better to stay under their radar and keep shitting out mediocre games. Fuck this shit. Sorry for the wall of text but I had to RANT. It's been 10 years of absolute bitter disappointment that was bottled up inside me, and now I just released it. Fuck Rome 2. Fuck CA. Fuck corporate greed.
dont worry, a very insightful read and i dont feel i can really add anything, other than the fact that you can argue that the whole RPG general stat stacking thing had its roots in shogun 2 with stuff like stand and fight
It feels funny that games like pharaoh and warhammer 3 try to add replayability with unique rosters and arbitrary mechanics that are just glorified minigames (le fill a bar to get some units, get currency to upgrade something). Old games didn't have that, hell, some factions in shogun 2 and all in shogun 1 have almost identical rosters, but CA focused on providing a great base gameplay foundation that resulted in high replayability that just came from different start positions or strategies you could use. They didn't have to make it so Oda will get 6 long yari ashigaru units if they spend 500 honour points in the heavenly foundry, they just had to make it so Oda started in an interesting place, had some surface level bonuses - repeated this for every clan and voila, we got an extremely good and replayable game.
it's even more depressing when the warhammer lore already provides a strong basis on faction differentiation and yet none of that gets reflected, they have all these bloated rosters with fanciful unit descriptions that let you IMAGINE what a great game this could have been, meanwhile all factions raise funds in the same way and recruit armies in the same way
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 yeah dude but there are like dragons flying around and epic giant men smashing dwarves to the ground :) Youre just a hater...
the thing is, total war already nailed real time historical battles decades ago. they SHOULD be adding depth to the campaign. it's not a zero sum problem where adding depth to one part removes depth from the other. they have actively removed key features of real time battles for no good reason. removing these previously existing features takes more effort than just retaining them. they are deliberate design decisions by shitty designers. look at mods for RTW, M2TW, etc. they always try to add campaign depth, building on the incredible real time battles the old games offer. this is all the total war series had to do.
Would play if they bring back leaderless armies. But this is suppose to be the last update. Warhammer 3 needs lethality and leaderless armies as well as garrison recruitment and it would be up there with the best, they mentioned multiple dlcs so there is a possibilty for them to make it happen.
I enjoy Pharoah Dynasties for what it is solid 7/10 but CA really have to abandon Rome 2 engine for future games and develop something better that's the only option for big noticeable improvement.... But besides that I think that the best combat balance in Rome 2 engine was achieved by people who made Devide et Impera mod for Rome 2 everything there feels better balanced than any other newer game...
bro they are underapid bulgarians. UNDERPAID BULGARIANS. Expecting a good game from underpaid people who dont have a tradition of designing video games is insanity. I stayed far away from this game and will continue to do so.
I think you hit on some good points regarding the campagin and the battles .. modern campaigns feel very bloated with information to the extent that you spend alot of time reading than actually playing.. However I think that TW should naturally improve its campaign aspects due to the arrival of 4x competitors in CK and other 4x strategies. Also .. campaign is the one aspect that makes you want to spend more hours on the game. Battles still needs to be an important aspect .. one addition to total war should be an unreliable autoresolve toggle were it forces you to think before autoresolving. I miss payed replenishment or a retraining mechanisim as it also makes you want to play your battles to minim8se casualities. Passive unit replenishment is a convenience but takes the strategic element of micromanaging your armies.
I agree with completely except for the part about finding the campaign customization bothersome, to bring depth to the campaign map and how you can interact with it i like how i can have access to change up some of the buffs and modifiers or turn of lethality 😂 etc. Now do they do any of this well...not compared to the other games you mentioned. The battles are this games strength(we don't disagree here tho lol) but even that is starting to faulter.
I still don’t understand why warhammer moved away from the tech tree research and shifted into the growth model. Like it makes the tech tree only a stat buff
It went from a game i didnt bother buying to being ok in my book. I vonsuder that a big improvement. Wish it was like this from the start and that they had time to improve things more over the last year instead
it's funny how you can guess what the person like in TW when hearing the reviews. I heard the review / history videos of a big bronze age history fan and he was complaining that cavalry existed in the game because it didn't exist back then. The one thing I agree with in your review is the technology and you made me realize that it would be cool to "unlock" cavalry by beelining the cavalry tech... less incremental buffs and more "civilization" kinda tech. The other thing that just hit me hearing your review is that I've been playing since the beginning of the franchise and clearly we are not looking for the same things at all in the game... it must be so complicated to please all those people at the same time.... and also about the battles... for me the AI always sucked quite a bit so I don't see your point because I really have the memory of the AI being clueless since day 1 lol. Like... once you play enough to understand how to cheese it it's like you pull the curtain and for me at least I don't take it that seriously on a tactical level at all. All strategy games lean quite hard on buffs to make the AI competitive and yes, it is frustrating. The one time I saw otherwise was a mod for civ 5 I think that was really good. Most of the time AI don't use the game mechanics much and just give you an illusion of using it (like in CIV where there's a religious victory but after 2000 hours I never seen any come even close to winning it lollll)
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 I know civilization franchise and TW better, I was refering to them. I don't like RTS as much. But listening to the video I see why you would like it.
While I have no interest in Pharaoh and haven't played FOTS, I do think some of your arguments are flawed or missing the point. For instance, technologies unlocking units and abilities isn't that great. I know this from the 1000+ hours I've put into Attila, where most tech unlock a unit or unit upgrade or a building with new units. The problem is that the player is going to figure out over 1 or 2 playthrough which units, buildings, and abilities are best, and then go for those every time while maxing research speed along the way. This is how I play Attila every time. Technology ends up being exactly the sort of boring busywork that you describe the stat bonus tech trees as. The battles have always been the main marketing and selling point of the series. I think the big milestone for marketing was the Siege of Carthage trailer for Rome 2. Once CA realized their marketing department could cobble together some gameplay footage and present a completely broken, unfinished mess of a game as a beautiful masterpiece and sell a million copies solely on that false basis, they had their marketing model for all time. Every Warhammer DLC is unveiled via a battle gameplay trailer that is essentially a 2 minute summary of the Siege of Carthage trailer: slow build up, big dramatic set piece reveal, zoom out & fade to black with release date. Ultimately the main criticism of this series, and one that is missing from this video, is the AI. Total War's AI is the supreme limiting factor that will always hold the series back from greatness. They can't make the battles long and varied with deep movement and flanking mechanics because the AI is too stupid to know how to use them. They can't make a Crusader Kings level campaign with a hundred mechanics to manage because the AI is too stupid to use them. Just look at Pharaoh, the AI ignores the entire resource system - they always have resources available to trade even when they have no way of obtaining them, because the AI is too stupid to manage 5 resources so they simply have infinite of all 5. And in Warhammer, DLC is often sold on the basis of factions with hugely overpowered campaign mechanics that let them destroy factions at the click of a button or power up certain units to the point of invincibility - but the AI often does not have access to these mechanics, either because it is too stupid to use them, or the mechanics are so overpowered that even developers recognize they would not be fun to play against. Total War will never advance into greatness because it is mostly a game about fighting AI that is bad at the game. The simpler historical games are, the less variety they have, the fewer unit types they have, the simpler the maps and cities layouts, the better the AI will function. Thus, the games are always designed in these ways.
Shogun 2/ Fots campaign AI was more than capable of holding its own against the player, and it had fewer cheats than previous games (and sequels) While it was bad in battle the fact that it would field large consolidated armies and actuality pool its forces together made the game somewhat worth playing.
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 Seems like most of what I've seen of FOTS is gunlines and artillery evaporating larger AI forces with few losses. One of the great weaknesses of the Total War AI is that it doesn't link the campaign to the battles at all; the AI doesn't understand that actions on the campaign map effect the coming battles. For instance, the battle AI in Attila is actually quite good. They know how to flank with cavalry, harass with ranged, they will focus down units with low missile resist over those with high resist. However, the Attila campaign AI is some of the worst in the series. It's not unusual for the AI to still be fielding armies of 19 tier 0 levies 150 turns into the game. At that point, even the best battle AI in existence that never makes a mistake can't pose a challenge due to poor campaign decision making. AI in games like FOTS or Napoleon or Warhammer has the same problem: it doesn't know how to make a balanced army that can challenge the player. It doesn't understand that the units it recruits will effect the battles it fights, it just recruits because it can. The AI doesn't field balanced armies, it doesn't think about needing a gun line and infantry and cavalry to cover them. Much of the reason why the Hun AI in Attila is such an unholy terror is because its armies are all auto-generated from 2 pre-made templates, so they are always a challenge. I wonder why the AI in these games hasn't been made to use standard templates for building its cities and armies. Make a few templates for each tier of unit and building and have the AI always select those templates. It will made things more predictable, but also tougher, and the AI can be designed around the use of these template armies which would make it easier to improve.
Its crazy to me that this has a 90% rating on Steam when it is literally the *bare minimum* that should be accepted by the fan base.. I say that, because the game should have been *better* than this with even more features on release when you compare it to older titles. But the franchise has fallen so low that simply making the game somewhat enjoyable and reintroducing features from previous entries that THEY cut, which you of course have to pay even more for, is seen as a God Tier update. I truly don't think I will ever get another Total War game, as aside from graphics, they have nothing to offer when compared to entries from more than a decade ago.
Lmao cavalry were almost non existent or as experimental scouts during this era, stop complaining how flaccid their charges were. Would you want yari ashigaru with ak47s? These two around 400 years apart
muh historical accuracy inbred mouth-breather who spends more time checking to see if his units have the right color sandals than he does playing the game i found one of the 12 people who enjoys pharaoh
they mightve been almost non existent or experimental but that doesnt justify how unfun they are to use. For example, muskets/handcannons werent common in medieval 2's time period, but they hit hard as fuck and have great feedback.
I'm a more casual player, though I got a lot of hours in multiple Total-War titles. I've never touched multiplayer-battles, but enjoy playing the campaings with my friends. I'm always excited for changes in the map and new factions added. That being said, I prefer Troy over Pharaoh, even with the new changes. XD
Empire had the best tech tree of any total war. Because you also had downfalls with those techs. Same with buildings. Want that factory and all the money it gives you? Cool. But your workers are gonna be upset at the bad conditions. Wanna introduce ideologies that might help your nation? Sure but it'll increase clamor for reform. There's a real give and take that Empire had that no other total war does.
Fall of the samurai had it in the way of modernisation and even attila has it where some buildings make money but reduce public order or increases religious intolerance stop yapping empire fanboi
@@helly7385 Oh please. Modernization did diddly squat to upset your population. I don't think there was ever a time I actually worried about researching something in FotS. Empire did it best. You can call me a fanboy but at the end of the day it's the Shogun fans who always screech their lungs out almost as much as the ME2 fans if someone doesn't think it was gods gift to man. Heck you yourself are the one throwing a fit just because someone said they like a certain aspect better on Empire. So how about you stop YOUR yapping Shogun simp.
@@helly7385 Oh PLEASE. Shogun fans are almost as bad as medieval fans if someone doesn't stroke off to the idea that their game is gods gift to man. You yourself are all upset just because I happen to like the way Empire did it better, yet you call me the fanboy. In Shogun modernization did almost nothing to actually make the game difficult. I never had to worry about it and by the end of a campaign you'd always have most or all techs unlocked and that'd be that. Empire? Wrong religion could be devastating, colleges could be devastating, public order could be crazy depending on your government. So yeah. I think empire did it better, because in empire you'd often have to rework the entire economy and building setup of a region to hold it effectively. I think that's better. Sue me.
@@helly7385 Oh PLEASE. Shogun fans are almost as bad as medieval fans if someone doesn't stroke off to the idea that their game is gods gift to man. You yourself are all upset just because I happen to like the way Empire did it better, yet you call me the fanboy. In Shogun modernization did almost nothing to actually make the game difficult. I never had to worry about it and by the end of a campaign you'd always have most or all techs unlocked and that'd be that. Empire? Wrong religion could be devastating, colleges could be devastating, public order could be crazy depending on your government. So yeah. I think empire did it better, because in empire you'd often have to rework the entire economy and building setup of a region to hold it effectively. I think that's better.
@@helly7385 @helly7385 Oh PLEASE. Shogun fans are almost as bad as medieval fans if someone doesn't stroke at the idea that their game is gods gift to man. You yourself are all upset just because I happen to like the way Empire did it better, yet you call me the fanboy. In Shogun modernization did almost nothing to actually make the game difficult. I never had to worry about it and by the end of a campaign you'd always have most or all techs unlocked and that'd be that. Empire? Wrong religion could be devastating, colleges could be devastating, public order could be crazy depending on your government. So yeah. I think empire did it better, because in empire you'd often have to rework the entire economy and building setup of a region to hold it effectively. I think that's better.
I disagree with your point in the campaing. They have always been important for Total War. You are right it isn't the focal point and that the battles sell more and are more iconic to the series, but the battles without a good campaing wouldn't be Total War. Old classics like Rome and Medieval II had iconic campaings which are some of the most marking features of those games, with amazing mechanics and which generated amazing stories and gave battles and armies much more meaning. Empire still followed with an impressive campaing (despite some huge shortcomings like one province France). Napoleon was probably one of the weaker campaings, and although I like Shogun campaings they certainly aren't as iconic as Medieval and Rome were. I think that pressuring for a focus on better campaings and making them more interesting, bigger and more complex maps and similar things are a good thing (though that doesn't mean just having more settings for the campaing). I think a good example of that can be seen in mods, divide et impera for Rome 2 created probably one of the best Total War campaings around. I do agree with all your criticism regarding the campaing, I just don't think that it should be seen and unimportant to the franchise or as secondary. If it was treated as it was in older titles the campaing could be far more amazing than it currently is.
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 battles are absolute dogshit, fully agree there, and of course the campaing is limited by the base game, but the use of population is great and evey military campaing feels a lot more interesting, you don't just steamroll the map in 20 turns and become unbeatable because conquests go at a slower pace which for me makes them far more meaningful. Total War should invest in good campaing mechanics and make them memorable, I think DEI isn't pefect, but it brings a lot of elements which could easily be implemented in vanilla in a better way and actually would create a more interesting campaing experience
I was watching thinking how ugly and cluttered the Pharoah UI is and then the video switched to Shogun 2 and it's sooooo much easier on the eyes. 1:18 compared to 2:48 I feel like it's partially because I've actually played Shogun 2 so I know the UI, but I've never had trouble with other TW's prior to Shogun 2 that I have not played.
Tried Dynasties for a while, but something felt… wrong. Then it occured to me: to many meaningless mechanics that felt like a chore. The battles are also to fast, and it is to hard to see what is happening. Also subbed, nice video.
You can turn down lethality to slow down battles. And also those meaningless mechanics can be ignored. For me whose a Paradox player, those mechanics are cool
By meaningless mechanics you probably mean court? You don’t have to participate in civil war and can mostly ignore it. Just bribe somebody for bonuses every once in a while.
@Dishonorable_Daimyo As always you had lost me by taking a stance that the OG developers of TW didn't had, Campaign was always to be as major as the battles for TW, you going against Mike's design comes off really bad. It really damages any valid criticism you might create because you are going against facts and reality. As the old TW narrator would say "This is a shameful display".
total war was and still is marketed as a real time battle game with the majority of marketing material -- trailers which get the most exposure by far -- being dedicated to the battles. Siege of Carthage, introduction of Grand Cathay, the "Siege Rework", just to give you the most prominent examples.
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 But as much as this is what matters to YOU (and probably many others) it doesn't change what TW is at it's core. The vision for TW was always to feature a proper Campaign and Battle interaction - one feeding the other - a 50/50 split. I agree that a TW with bad battles is not worth playing (Troy's units waiting to be charged at + bad collision) but same goes for bad campaign which is for many fans is as crucial (not simulating populations so there is no consequences for the battle in the campaign, spawning armies, or other script based shallow systems are all hated within the community just as much). I am writing this comments not out of hate but again, positive criticism for you to avoid damaging yourself. You are taking an active position which is factually wrong. TW's downfall is because both the campaign and the battles suffer, Pharaoh on release was bad in campaign aspect (the area that you are less aware of) just as much as it had issues with pathfinding or repeating battle maps. Even if Pharaoh had now amazing battles but it still had campaign experience that kept immortal characters, spam recruitment, easy replenishment and zero consequences for loses in the field, I wouldn't play it and so will many others.
I will not agree about setting. I was reading books about Napoleon since 4. But I didn't play Napoleon very much and I think it is not a good game, much better than horrible Rome 2 however. And I don't agree paradox games are much deeper in 4x strategy, it is a huge mirage. They are easy and dumb af, I played paradox since 2004 and not much for quite a lot already because they become worse and worse even when getting new features and countless number of mechanics. Shogun 2 is boring af, FoTS was way better I mostly played this when it was out, but it becomes boring as well after you play couple of times. Pharaoh is way better. You are just a shogun boy that's obvious for me. And I like greeks and even if Troy had HUGE flaws and I didn't even had any dlc apart from free game+amazons, I enjoyed it non the less than FotS
I was running through AI army slop in pharaoh from nearly the word go. The game is pretty 1 dimensional and the complexity is an illusion because of how bad the interfacing is. Crap game that doesn't justify its existence when games that are more than a decade old already did what its trying to do.
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 Then play those games lmao and do not say bullshit. I didn't even try to play shogun one for example and will not. It is a complete stupidity to claim this game has no innovation. Thrones of Britannia, Troy and especially Pharaoh are full of new stuff, even if it is based on previous ideas, but one prefer to choose to play few battles and then complain. A lot of people will enjoy this game. You saying it doesn't justify its existence is like saying most people should not exist, because there are always a lot people who is better in many ways.
@@kirilld6206 "If you don't like the game, don't play it" is an absolutely moronic thing to say to a youtuber who's channel is built around critiquing games. That's why I come here. DD values many of the same things that I do in strategy games. I was seriously considering getting pharaoh, but I wanted to inform myself first. Do you not understand how reviews work?
@@Lobster_Lars I understand that this guy has no idea about both history and this game but not all do, they may be deceived while a too optimistic approach is not necessarily bad, for example, I never followed news about Attila after Rome 2 lackluster but watched few videos after launch and bought it, without pre-order dlc however I had to buy much later. Even though I was even more interested in this time period than in 18-19 century and I liked Rome BI a lot. If I would watch some ' high-IQ critic' like this instead of that dumb guy who has couple of millions subs now, in 2015 he had 20 times less maybe. He was and is maybe way less IQ but he was more useful!
@@Lobster_Lars Considering Pharaoh, if you didn't buy it yet, I must say its completely different from what you see on youtube even if you will watch in 4k for many hours, even if you had exp with Pharaoh like me I had 600 hrs PhD feels different from it a lot and from videos. Yes it has flaws but has much nice things, I just got range units with less than 1 sec reload speed can you imagine, this is crazy. Some exploits and stacking bonuses can make game boring, I never use morale debuffs for example as they stack hard and enemy can just flee all the time. But overall not looking at those exploits game is so good to be honest, it is not at all Troy even it looks like it.
If you take a look at some of the forums for Pharaoh, you'll see that there are a good few players with an extensive knowledge of the Bronze age. Also you comparing Total War to games like CIV is pretty meaningless as they are entirely different games. Shogun 2 was a great game granted, but comparing it to Pharaoh is like comparing Shogun 2 to the original, which for its time was another great game. Obviously Shogun 2 is better than Shogun 1. As for the campaign not adding anything, nothing could be further from the truth. It adds a context to the battles and great immersion. It seems perhaps that you don't like Pharaoh because the game beat you on legendary mode! And perhaps the campaign with all the other elements involved is too much for you? It is hard to believe that anyone can call Pharaoh a bad game.
"Also you comparing Total War to games like CIV is pretty meaningless as they are entirely different games." No thats exactly the point, people are fawning over meaningless campaign additions while battles are still largely the same one dimensional trite affair that they have been for more than a decade. That's why I get the sense they would be better off playing any of the other 4X games. Also I quit the game when I realized I was running over AI armies effortlessly with a copy paste army composition where I stacked armor buffs from repeated victories. I don't fking care about BIG NUMBER OF FACTIONS, it tells me nothing about the quality of the game. You need to respect yourself more by having actual standards rather than eating slop that they are reskinning for the 10th time. "It is hard to believe that anyone can call Pharaoh a bad game." I did. What's your point? If this is supposed to be some appeal to popularity = good then 1) that's a fallacy that i've debunked many times on this channel 2) even with the release of dynasties it has about 6.5k daily peak which is *less than total war three kingdoms a game abandoned openly by CA*
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 You're entitled to your opinion of course. Sounds like you got bored with the battles and the campaign does nothing for you. In my opinion Pharaoh is a much better game than Shogun 2. Also, just because the player numbers are low doesn't really reflect the quality of the game. Pharaoh was damned by many youtubers - perhaps yourself included(?) - before it had ever even been released. Seems to me that most people who have actually played the game for longer than a couple of hours actually like the game. I certainly do.
Shogun 2 FOTS - Imagine a realm divide where you saved up lots of Koku and lots of settlements playing tall and only attacking 2 factions. Once realm divide kicks in, you can win in one turn by bribing everyone to shogunate or imperial side. OK now below...
Pharaoh "Civil War" - This new end game mechanic. You basically know exactly which factions will be involved in the civil war. So you carefully choose their 2-3 enemies to help them and increase diplomatic relations. Build up resources and keep aside dump settlements you don't intend to develop as bargaining tools. Now manually trigger civil war, then give them gold and settlements to have non-aggression pacts. Hit end turn 12 times and you're Pharaoh. Whilst you're hitting end turn 12 times the game still thinks Civil War is in progress, but not really since you've made non-aggression pacts with civil war participants, so nothing happens.
Civil War with no casualties. UN Peace keeping exercise achieved.
Maybe that was intended alternative method or maybe CA forgot to lock in factions involved in Civil War into War status for duration of this mechanic.
That is considered ultimately victory. Well funny thing it does convey Sun Tzu reference "To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill"
This is the best comment.
Fun fact by the way, the game advertises full audio on chinese and german, but none of the new like most prominently Aegeaen/Mesopotamian factions have this, so the game is half chinese/german and half english for people playing on those languages.
Also, obligatory I hate the new hitpoint system comment.
New hitpoint system? Have they done a different system this game or are you referring to what's been around since Rome 2?
@@KentuckyFriedJohansson Yes, I mean the one from Rome 2 onwards.
@@reichspepe1587 Aha gotcha, havent played anything after Rome 2 for a long while so was unsure if a new system was added. Thanks for the elaboration!
Also hate the newer hp system.🤌🤌🤌
I also wanted german audio for greeks and was surprised. And it is not even possible to use cyrillic in a bulgarian game to name cities or armies. LOL.
An update here; I wrote the support about what was going on here. No response. Oh wait, that's wrong. They responded by just changing the supported audio to english on Steam. What utter and complete ... !
One thing I do miss from the older total wars that you mentioned, was how they get you interested in the period. Having historical events pop up some years during the campaign (e.g. events around stoicism in RTW, enlightenment in ETW). They might not have effected the actual decisions you make but they were nice and got me into the period a lot.
Total war got a whole generation of people into history, i dont think that would have been so if the games were bad..
historical events can affect gameplay too, like the mongols showing up or gunpowder being invented or the marian reforms
It’s bronze age before collapse, what historical events you want?
@shmekelfreckles8157 idk man, if they were fine adding mythological creatures to Troy after marketing it as "truth behind the myth" then maybe they don't really care about historical accuracy after all
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 so pretty much invent the events? We have sea peoples invasion, civil wars and civilization collapse. Maybe having some extra things would’ve been interesting, like invention of steel or something.
Rome 2 is the most influential Total War game of all time. Think about that
All of the features of prior Total War games were removed or iterated upon aside from the obvious basics. The battles, the campaign, the agents, the traits system, the province system, economy management, recruitment system etc were changed from Total War to Total War, making each game a different experience, each game with its own particularity and flavor beyond the historical dressing. It wasn't always perfect, but it showed that the devs were willing to take risks with the fundamentals and were willing to push the limits of the genre.
Then this mangled corpse called Rome 2 shows up, and the game that nearly ran the franchise into the ground gets to be the fucking template for every game after. It's been over 10 years and nearly every bad feature still carries over into the modern total wars, like some hereditary disease that future generations are cursed to bear. We still have to deal with the awful province system, the 6/4 building slots cities, generals being tied to armies, the hitpoint system and the prevalence of unit quality over tactics which cripples the battles, the awful engine (a gift from Empire, another gem of the franchise) and worst of all, the DLC whoring (began in Emplre, but truly became its own ugly beast in Rome 2). Atilla was their last decent post Rome 2 game, but sadly it was absolutely crippled by the features carried over from Rome 2. Unbelievable how they just doubled down instead of going back to Shogun 2 which had critical and fan success.
And ever since Rome 2 they have shifted the focus towards creating even more streamlined campaign experiences, filled with incredible mechanics such as pressing button to gain temporary 5% modifiers. But there's a lot historical salad behind it, so you can truly immerse yourself in the experience. I watched all their promotional materials for Dynasties, and most of the stuff was about the campaign and how they added even more Paradox style depth to the campaign, and only a 7 minute video was dedicated to the battles, which just consisted of "well guys, we get you liked Rome 1/Medieval 2/Shogun 2 combat so here's a cheap knock off of that system". The CA execs are just completely delusional, living in a reality where they actually think Paradox is their main competitor (which, to be fair, is a self fulfilling prophecy at this rate, if they keep paradoxifying their games they will ultimately get taken over by them since Paradox just has much more experience and acumen at developing these kinds of games).
Total War now is just a cheap larping simulator, and partially I get the appeal, larping is fun. I myself do enjoy acting out my fantasy of being a general commanding armies on the battlefield, and everyone became a fan because this was the only series that allowed for large scale tactical combat in real time. But I simply cannot give up my sense of disbelief when the game stands in my way in so many ways. I am not allowed to meaningfully carry out my fantasy, to do things the way I want. Everything is being built for mass appeal, for the casual guy who doesn't spend more than 10 hours overall, or for the ultra historical nerd who geeks out at whether the Thracian Nobles use the correct shield heraldry because they read it on a wikipedia article (I mean, these things are nice to have, but are secondary to gameplay), but is otherwise content to live within the confines CA lay out. For those people, Pharaoh is a huge success. Wide as an ocean, deep as a puddle...
And I just want to add that even when in it comes to the artistic/style department, these games have gone a long way down. Losing Jeff van Dyck has been a huge blow as his soundtrack breathed actual life into the game, whether the calming, introspective music of the campaign map or the riveting, blood pumping themes of the battle map. The UI has become extremely generic, unintuitive and inelegant - what they did to Rome Remastered is an actual travesty, a war crime against UX. The sounds of battle are dull and plastified, the models look like wax figures, units shouting is performative with no soul but in to it. The whole experience is like watching the highschool theater troupe trying to re-enact the battle of Cannae. How do people actually larp to this shit, what the hell man?
I resigned myself to the idea that there will never be a good total war game again. A few years back I would have been hyped, I would have pre-ordered any edition, I was prepared to spread my cheeks and accept the ramming, if that meant we will get Medieval 3. Now I'm just jaded, I really don't care... I know already it will be yet another sterilized Rome 2 knockoff, a cashgrab, hyperfocused on copying Paradox style spreadsheeting gameplay, quite likely to be cut into pieces and sold a few times like the Warhammer games were. I can already see a Medieval 3 with HRE as a pre-order bonus, 4 factions at start - England, France, The Byzantines and the Principality of Fuck off land (because now we have to be very in-depth and historically accurate), but have only Europe and a bit of Anatolia. Then they'll start selling DLCs to unlock more factions presently existing on the campaign map, and finally they will release a new game, Medieval 3.2 with North Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia, with its own suite of DLCs and of course an Immortal Empires campaign. This is the future, it's either going to be milquetoast releases like Troy, ToB or Pharaoh or it will be big, bombastic but ultimately unambitious and chopped off games that you will need to throw hundreds of dollars to get the proper experience. Though I think they might not even attempt Medieval 3 out of fear of being exposed - expectations would be extremely high and a lot of the old fans would return for such a title. Better to stay under their radar and keep shitting out mediocre games.
Fuck this shit. Sorry for the wall of text but I had to RANT. It's been 10 years of absolute bitter disappointment that was bottled up inside me, and now I just released it. Fuck Rome 2. Fuck CA. Fuck corporate greed.
dont worry, a very insightful read and i dont feel i can really add anything, other than the fact that you can argue that the whole RPG general stat stacking thing had its roots in shogun 2 with stuff like stand and fight
It feels funny that games like pharaoh and warhammer 3 try to add replayability with unique rosters and arbitrary mechanics that are just glorified minigames (le fill a bar to get some units, get currency to upgrade something).
Old games didn't have that, hell, some factions in shogun 2 and all in shogun 1 have almost identical rosters, but CA focused on providing a great base gameplay foundation that resulted in high replayability that just came from different start positions or strategies you could use. They didn't have to make it so Oda will get 6 long yari ashigaru units if they spend 500 honour points in the heavenly foundry, they just had to make it so Oda started in an interesting place, had some surface level bonuses - repeated this for every clan and voila, we got an extremely good and replayable game.
it's even more depressing when the warhammer lore already provides a strong basis on faction differentiation and yet none of that gets reflected, they have all these bloated rosters with fanciful unit descriptions that let you IMAGINE what a great game this could have been, meanwhile all factions raise funds in the same way and recruit armies in the same way
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 yeah dude but there are like dragons flying around and epic giant men smashing dwarves to the ground :) Youre just a hater...
So Dynasties is a huge comeback because it has an expanded map with more factions. Got it.
Thanks for doing this review.
the thing is, total war already nailed real time historical battles decades ago. they SHOULD be adding depth to the campaign. it's not a zero sum problem where adding depth to one part removes depth from the other.
they have actively removed key features of real time battles for no good reason. removing these previously existing features takes more effort than just retaining them.
they are deliberate design decisions by shitty designers. look at mods for RTW, M2TW, etc. they always try to add campaign depth, building on the incredible real time battles the old games offer. this is all the total war series had to do.
Would play if they bring back leaderless armies. But this is suppose to be the last update. Warhammer 3 needs lethality and leaderless armies as well as garrison recruitment and it would be up there with the best, they mentioned multiple dlcs so there is a possibilty for them to make it happen.
CA has a really poor track record when it comes to carrying over additions. I won't count on whatever pharaoh does returning in the next instalment
Respect it but don't agree , i think dynasties is a huge comeback
Only took them more than a decade to walk back 2 steps in the right direction
Not holding my breath
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 Better late than ever . Some people shall never be satisfied, i guess.
You can tell CA Sofia wanted to make a good game but in the end, just couldn’t end up achieving that
Agree, it shines through that they tried… but it is just more of the same that doesn’t work. It is beautiful though.
I enjoy Pharoah Dynasties for what it is solid 7/10 but CA really have to abandon Rome 2 engine for future games and develop something better that's the only option for big noticeable improvement.... But besides that I think that the best combat balance in Rome 2 engine was achieved by people who made Devide et Impera mod for Rome 2 everything there feels better balanced than any other newer game...
bro they are underapid bulgarians. UNDERPAID BULGARIANS. Expecting a good game from underpaid people who dont have a tradition of designing video games is insanity. I stayed far away from this game and will continue to do so.
Thanks for the review. I can't play beyond Shogun 2/Fots.
I think you hit on some good points regarding the campagin and the battles .. modern campaigns feel very bloated with information to the extent that you spend alot of time reading than actually playing..
However I think that TW should naturally improve its campaign aspects due to the arrival of 4x competitors in CK and other 4x strategies. Also .. campaign is the one aspect that makes you want to spend more hours on the game.
Battles still needs to be an important aspect .. one addition to total war should be an unreliable autoresolve toggle were it forces you to think before autoresolving.
I miss payed replenishment or a retraining mechanisim as it also makes you want to play your battles to minim8se casualities.
Passive unit replenishment is a convenience but takes the strategic element of micromanaging your armies.
I agree with completely except for the part about finding the campaign customization bothersome, to bring depth to the campaign map and how you can interact with it i like how i can have access to change up some of the buffs and modifiers or turn of lethality 😂 etc. Now do they do any of this well...not compared to the other games you mentioned.
The battles are this games strength(we don't disagree here tho lol) but even that is starting to faulter.
I still don’t understand why warhammer moved away from the tech tree research and shifted into the growth model. Like it makes the tech tree only a stat buff
They probably wanted to get away from having a single research path that’s objectively the best, dunno
They could have put a modest effort into actually balancing things instead of just gutting them.
Chopping off your hands to save you from arthritis.
It went from a game i didnt bother buying to being ok in my book. I vonsuder that a big improvement. Wish it was like this from the start and that they had time to improve things more over the last year instead
it's funny how you can guess what the person like in TW when hearing the reviews. I heard the review / history videos of a big bronze age history fan and he was complaining that cavalry existed in the game because it didn't exist back then. The one thing I agree with in your review is the technology and you made me realize that it would be cool to "unlock" cavalry by beelining the cavalry tech... less incremental buffs and more "civilization" kinda tech. The other thing that just hit me hearing your review is that I've been playing since the beginning of the franchise and clearly we are not looking for the same things at all in the game... it must be so complicated to please all those people at the same time.... and also about the battles... for me the AI always sucked quite a bit so I don't see your point because I really have the memory of the AI being clueless since day 1 lol. Like... once you play enough to understand how to cheese it it's like you pull the curtain and for me at least I don't take it that seriously on a tactical level at all. All strategy games lean quite hard on buffs to make the AI competitive and yes, it is frustrating. The one time I saw otherwise was a mod for civ 5 I think that was really good. Most of the time AI don't use the game mechanics much and just give you an illusion of using it (like in CIV where there's a religious victory but after 2000 hours I never seen any come even close to winning it lollll)
Pretty sure AoE2 DE coded their AI to behave more like top level players, i dont expect AI opponents to be as good as humans but they can be competent
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 I know civilization franchise and TW better, I was refering to them. I don't like RTS as much. But listening to the video I see why you would like it.
While I have no interest in Pharaoh and haven't played FOTS, I do think some of your arguments are flawed or missing the point. For instance, technologies unlocking units and abilities isn't that great. I know this from the 1000+ hours I've put into Attila, where most tech unlock a unit or unit upgrade or a building with new units. The problem is that the player is going to figure out over 1 or 2 playthrough which units, buildings, and abilities are best, and then go for those every time while maxing research speed along the way. This is how I play Attila every time. Technology ends up being exactly the sort of boring busywork that you describe the stat bonus tech trees as.
The battles have always been the main marketing and selling point of the series. I think the big milestone for marketing was the Siege of Carthage trailer for Rome 2. Once CA realized their marketing department could cobble together some gameplay footage and present a completely broken, unfinished mess of a game as a beautiful masterpiece and sell a million copies solely on that false basis, they had their marketing model for all time. Every Warhammer DLC is unveiled via a battle gameplay trailer that is essentially a 2 minute summary of the Siege of Carthage trailer: slow build up, big dramatic set piece reveal, zoom out & fade to black with release date.
Ultimately the main criticism of this series, and one that is missing from this video, is the AI. Total War's AI is the supreme limiting factor that will always hold the series back from greatness. They can't make the battles long and varied with deep movement and flanking mechanics because the AI is too stupid to know how to use them. They can't make a Crusader Kings level campaign with a hundred mechanics to manage because the AI is too stupid to use them. Just look at Pharaoh, the AI ignores the entire resource system - they always have resources available to trade even when they have no way of obtaining them, because the AI is too stupid to manage 5 resources so they simply have infinite of all 5.
And in Warhammer, DLC is often sold on the basis of factions with hugely overpowered campaign mechanics that let them destroy factions at the click of a button or power up certain units to the point of invincibility - but the AI often does not have access to these mechanics, either because it is too stupid to use them, or the mechanics are so overpowered that even developers recognize they would not be fun to play against.
Total War will never advance into greatness because it is mostly a game about fighting AI that is bad at the game. The simpler historical games are, the less variety they have, the fewer unit types they have, the simpler the maps and cities layouts, the better the AI will function. Thus, the games are always designed in these ways.
Shogun 2/ Fots campaign AI was more than capable of holding its own against the player, and it had fewer cheats than previous games (and sequels)
While it was bad in battle the fact that it would field large consolidated armies and actuality pool its forces together made the game somewhat worth playing.
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 Seems like most of what I've seen of FOTS is gunlines and artillery evaporating larger AI forces with few losses.
One of the great weaknesses of the Total War AI is that it doesn't link the campaign to the battles at all; the AI doesn't understand that actions on the campaign map effect the coming battles. For instance, the battle AI in Attila is actually quite good. They know how to flank with cavalry, harass with ranged, they will focus down units with low missile resist over those with high resist. However, the Attila campaign AI is some of the worst in the series. It's not unusual for the AI to still be fielding armies of 19 tier 0 levies 150 turns into the game. At that point, even the best battle AI in existence that never makes a mistake can't pose a challenge due to poor campaign decision making.
AI in games like FOTS or Napoleon or Warhammer has the same problem: it doesn't know how to make a balanced army that can challenge the player. It doesn't understand that the units it recruits will effect the battles it fights, it just recruits because it can. The AI doesn't field balanced armies, it doesn't think about needing a gun line and infantry and cavalry to cover them. Much of the reason why the Hun AI in Attila is such an unholy terror is because its armies are all auto-generated from 2 pre-made templates, so they are always a challenge.
I wonder why the AI in these games hasn't been made to use standard templates for building its cities and armies. Make a few templates for each tier of unit and building and have the AI always select those templates. It will made things more predictable, but also tougher, and the AI can be designed around the use of these template armies which would make it easier to improve.
Based
Its crazy to me that this has a 90% rating on Steam when it is literally the *bare minimum* that should be accepted by the fan base..
I say that, because the game should have been *better* than this with even more features on release when you compare it to older titles. But the franchise has fallen so low that simply making the game somewhat enjoyable and reintroducing features from previous entries that THEY cut, which you of course have to pay even more for, is seen as a God Tier update.
I truly don't think I will ever get another Total War game, as aside from graphics, they have nothing to offer when compared to entries from more than a decade ago.
Graphically and artistically they havent gotten better either
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 hmm.. Ya know, you're right. Resolution alone does not make it "better". Good point.
I'd recommend it, I've been going back to it quite a lot since the update.
Lmao cavalry were almost non existent or as experimental scouts during this era, stop complaining how flaccid their charges were. Would you want yari ashigaru with ak47s? These two around 400 years apart
muh historical accuracy inbred mouth-breather who spends more time checking to see if his units have the right color sandals than he does playing the game
i found one of the 12 people who enjoys pharaoh
We need a mod of this
Would still be an unironically better game than anything they coughed up in a decade
they mightve been almost non existent or experimental but that doesnt justify how unfun they are to use. For example, muskets/handcannons werent common in medieval 2's time period, but they hit hard as fuck and have great feedback.
I'm a more casual player, though I got a lot of hours in multiple Total-War titles. I've never touched multiplayer-battles, but enjoy playing the campaings with my friends. I'm always excited for changes in the map and new factions added. That being said, I prefer Troy over Pharaoh, even with the new changes. XD
Empire had the best tech tree of any total war. Because you also had downfalls with those techs. Same with buildings. Want that factory and all the money it gives you? Cool. But your workers are gonna be upset at the bad conditions. Wanna introduce ideologies that might help your nation? Sure but it'll increase clamor for reform.
There's a real give and take that Empire had that no other total war does.
Fall of the samurai had it in the way of modernisation and even attila has it where some buildings make money but reduce public order or increases religious intolerance stop yapping empire fanboi
@@helly7385
Oh please. Modernization did diddly squat to upset your population. I don't think there was ever a time I actually worried about researching something in FotS. Empire did it best. You can call me a fanboy but at the end of the day it's the Shogun fans who always screech their lungs out almost as much as the ME2 fans if someone doesn't think it was gods gift to man.
Heck you yourself are the one throwing a fit just because someone said they like a certain aspect better on Empire. So how about you stop YOUR yapping Shogun simp.
@@helly7385
Oh PLEASE. Shogun fans are almost as bad as medieval fans if someone doesn't stroke off to the idea that their game is gods gift to man. You yourself are all upset just because I happen to like the way Empire did it better, yet you call me the fanboy.
In Shogun modernization did almost nothing to actually make the game difficult. I never had to worry about it and by the end of a campaign you'd always have most or all techs unlocked and that'd be that. Empire? Wrong religion could be devastating, colleges could be devastating, public order could be crazy depending on your government. So yeah. I think empire did it better, because in empire you'd often have to rework the entire economy and building setup of a region to hold it effectively. I think that's better. Sue me.
@@helly7385
Oh PLEASE. Shogun fans are almost as bad as medieval fans if someone doesn't stroke off to the idea that their game is gods gift to man. You yourself are all upset just because I happen to like the way Empire did it better, yet you call me the fanboy.
In Shogun modernization did almost nothing to actually make the game difficult. I never had to worry about it and by the end of a campaign you'd always have most or all techs unlocked and that'd be that. Empire? Wrong religion could be devastating, colleges could be devastating, public order could be crazy depending on your government. So yeah. I think empire did it better, because in empire you'd often have to rework the entire economy and building setup of a region to hold it effectively. I think that's better.
@@helly7385 @helly7385
Oh PLEASE. Shogun fans are almost as bad as medieval fans if someone doesn't stroke at the idea that their game is gods gift to man. You yourself are all upset just because I happen to like the way Empire did it better, yet you call me the fanboy.
In Shogun modernization did almost nothing to actually make the game difficult. I never had to worry about it and by the end of a campaign you'd always have most or all techs unlocked and that'd be that. Empire? Wrong religion could be devastating, colleges could be devastating, public order could be crazy depending on your government. So yeah. I think empire did it better, because in empire you'd often have to rework the entire economy and building setup of a region to hold it effectively. I think that's better.
I disagree with your point in the campaing. They have always been important for Total War. You are right it isn't the focal point and that the battles sell more and are more iconic to the series, but the battles without a good campaing wouldn't be Total War. Old classics like Rome and Medieval II had iconic campaings which are some of the most marking features of those games, with amazing mechanics and which generated amazing stories and gave battles and armies much more meaning. Empire still followed with an impressive campaing (despite some huge shortcomings like one province France). Napoleon was probably one of the weaker campaings, and although I like Shogun campaings they certainly aren't as iconic as Medieval and Rome were. I think that pressuring for a focus on better campaings and making them more interesting, bigger and more complex maps and similar things are a good thing (though that doesn't mean just having more settings for the campaing). I think a good example of that can be seen in mods, divide et impera for Rome 2 created probably one of the best Total War campaings around.
I do agree with all your criticism regarding the campaing, I just don't think that it should be seen and unimportant to the franchise or as secondary. If it was treated as it was in older titles the campaing could be far more amazing than it currently is.
You lost me at DEI, convoluted bloated mess and the battles are still dogshit as well.
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 battles are absolute dogshit, fully agree there, and of course the campaing is limited by the base game, but the use of population is great and evey military campaing feels a lot more interesting, you don't just steamroll the map in 20 turns and become unbeatable because conquests go at a slower pace which for me makes them far more meaningful.
Total War should invest in good campaing mechanics and make them memorable, I think DEI isn't pefect, but it brings a lot of elements which could easily be implemented in vanilla in a better way and actually would create a more interesting campaing experience
I was watching thinking how ugly and cluttered the Pharoah UI is and then the video switched to Shogun 2 and it's sooooo much easier on the eyes. 1:18 compared to 2:48
I feel like it's partially because I've actually played Shogun 2 so I know the UI, but I've never had trouble with other TW's prior to Shogun 2 that I have not played.
14 minutes and only 41 views, bro fell off
nearly got me there
i knew you liked it
Tried Dynasties for a while, but something felt… wrong. Then it occured to me: to many meaningless mechanics that felt like a chore. The battles are also to fast, and it is to hard to see what is happening.
Also subbed, nice video.
Battles are fast? Did you ever play Attila? With wisigoths on legendary battle difficulty for example?
I thought the battle was at a perfect pace tbh tho i still prefer shogun 2 but having a blast with pharaoh dynasties atm
You can turn down lethality to slow down battles. And also those meaningless mechanics can be ignored. For me whose a Paradox player, those mechanics are cool
By meaningless mechanics you probably mean court? You don’t have to participate in civil war and can mostly ignore it. Just bribe somebody for bonuses every once in a while.
so true
I literally hate CA when they praise return cavalry/camel even family tree (dynasty) as a new feature.
@Dishonorable_Daimyo As always you had lost me by taking a stance that the OG developers of TW didn't had, Campaign was always to be as major as the battles for TW, you going against Mike's design comes off really bad. It really damages any valid criticism you might create because you are going against facts and reality. As the old TW narrator would say "This is a shameful display".
total war was and still is marketed as a real time battle game with the majority of marketing material -- trailers which get the most exposure by far -- being dedicated to the battles.
Siege of Carthage, introduction of Grand Cathay, the "Siege Rework", just to give you the most prominent examples.
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 But as much as this is what matters to YOU (and probably many others) it doesn't change what TW is at it's core. The vision for TW was always to feature a proper Campaign and Battle interaction - one feeding the other - a 50/50 split.
I agree that a TW with bad battles is not worth playing (Troy's units waiting to be charged at + bad collision) but same goes for bad campaign which is for many fans is as crucial (not simulating populations so there is no consequences for the battle in the campaign, spawning armies, or other script based shallow systems are all hated within the community just as much).
I am writing this comments not out of hate but again, positive criticism for you to avoid damaging yourself. You are taking an active position which is factually wrong.
TW's downfall is because both the campaign and the battles suffer, Pharaoh on release was bad in campaign aspect (the area that you are less aware of) just as much as it had issues with pathfinding or repeating battle maps. Even if Pharaoh had now amazing battles but it still had campaign experience that kept immortal characters, spam recruitment, easy replenishment and zero consequences for loses in the field, I wouldn't play it and so will many others.
Got to say i agree, things are not what they used to be. I did buy it and give it a go yesterday but refunded. Pity.
👏🙂
We get it, u love showgun 2 and it's massive expansion in fall of samurai.
yea. your point?
I will not agree about setting. I was reading books about Napoleon since 4. But I didn't play Napoleon very much and I think it is not a good game, much better than horrible Rome 2 however. And I don't agree paradox games are much deeper in 4x strategy, it is a huge mirage. They are easy and dumb af, I played paradox since 2004 and not much for quite a lot already because they become worse and worse even when getting new features and countless number of mechanics. Shogun 2 is boring af, FoTS was way better I mostly played this when it was out, but it becomes boring as well after you play couple of times. Pharaoh is way better. You are just a shogun boy that's obvious for me. And I like greeks and even if Troy had HUGE flaws and I didn't even had any dlc apart from free game+amazons, I enjoyed it non the less than FotS
I was running through AI army slop in pharaoh from nearly the word go. The game is pretty 1 dimensional and the complexity is an illusion because of how bad the interfacing is.
Crap game that doesn't justify its existence when games that are more than a decade old already did what its trying to do.
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 Then play those games lmao and do not say bullshit. I didn't even try to play shogun one for example and will not. It is a complete stupidity to claim this game has no innovation. Thrones of Britannia, Troy and especially Pharaoh are full of new stuff, even if it is based on previous ideas, but one prefer to choose to play few battles and then complain. A lot of people will enjoy this game. You saying it doesn't justify its existence is like saying most people should not exist, because there are always a lot people who is better in many ways.
@@kirilld6206 "If you don't like the game, don't play it" is an absolutely moronic thing to say to a youtuber who's channel is built around critiquing games.
That's why I come here. DD values many of the same things that I do in strategy games.
I was seriously considering getting pharaoh, but I wanted to inform myself first. Do you not understand how reviews work?
@@Lobster_Lars I understand that this guy has no idea about both history and this game but not all do, they may be deceived while a too optimistic approach is not necessarily bad, for example, I never followed news about Attila after Rome 2 lackluster but watched few videos after launch and bought it, without pre-order dlc however I had to buy much later. Even though I was even more interested in this time period than in 18-19 century and I liked Rome BI a lot. If I would watch some ' high-IQ critic' like this instead of that dumb guy who has couple of millions subs now, in 2015 he had 20 times less maybe. He was and is maybe way less IQ but he was more useful!
@@Lobster_Lars Considering Pharaoh, if you didn't buy it yet, I must say its completely different from what you see on youtube even if you will watch in 4k for many hours, even if you had exp with Pharaoh like me I had 600 hrs PhD feels different from it a lot and from videos. Yes it has flaws but has much nice things, I just got range units with less than 1 sec reload speed can you imagine, this is crazy. Some exploits and stacking bonuses can make game boring, I never use morale debuffs for example as they stack hard and enemy can just flee all the time. But overall not looking at those exploits game is so good to be honest, it is not at all Troy even it looks like it.
If you take a look at some of the forums for Pharaoh, you'll see that there are a good few players with an extensive knowledge of the Bronze age. Also you comparing Total War to games like CIV is pretty meaningless as they are entirely different games. Shogun 2 was a great game granted, but comparing it to Pharaoh is like comparing Shogun 2 to the original, which for its time was another great game. Obviously Shogun 2 is better than Shogun 1. As for the campaign not adding anything, nothing could be further from the truth. It adds a context to the battles and great immersion. It seems perhaps that you don't like Pharaoh because the game beat you on legendary mode! And perhaps the campaign with all the other elements involved is too much for you? It is hard to believe that anyone can call Pharaoh a bad game.
"Also you comparing Total War to games like CIV is pretty meaningless as they are entirely different games."
No thats exactly the point, people are fawning over meaningless campaign additions while battles are still largely the same one dimensional trite affair that they have been for more than a decade. That's why I get the sense they would be better off playing any of the other 4X games.
Also I quit the game when I realized I was running over AI armies effortlessly with a copy paste army composition where I stacked armor buffs from repeated victories.
I don't fking care about BIG NUMBER OF FACTIONS, it tells me nothing about the quality of the game. You need to respect yourself more by having actual standards rather than eating slop that they are reskinning for the 10th time.
"It is hard to believe that anyone can call Pharaoh a bad game."
I did. What's your point? If this is supposed to be some appeal to popularity = good then 1) that's a fallacy that i've debunked many times on this channel 2) even with the release of dynasties it has about 6.5k daily peak which is *less than total war three kingdoms a game abandoned openly by CA*
@@dishonorable_daimyo1498 You're entitled to your opinion of course. Sounds like you got bored with the battles and the campaign does nothing for you. In my opinion Pharaoh is a much better game than Shogun 2. Also, just because the player numbers are low doesn't really reflect the quality of the game. Pharaoh was damned by many youtubers - perhaps yourself included(?) - before it had ever even been released. Seems to me that most people who have actually played the game for longer than a couple of hours actually like the game. I certainly do.
Blah blah blah blah blah, pharaoh is amazing, deal with it.
Another inbred mouthbreather
Ur mom was late pulling out of your dad and that's why
I still not buy these abomination, not until the cancellation of 3K
3K was cancelled a long time ago
@@GamingPenguin4545 long time ago and we deserve forget about it?
@@Daiciyomon_4594 you said until the cancellation