Total War: Rome II
Total War: Rome 2 is an upcoming game by the Creative Assembly announced in July 2012. It is due for release in 2013.
Contents
General Information
Rome 2 Total War, like its predecessor, will be set in Classical Antiquity. The campaign will allow the player to take control of the Roman Republic and, if they choose, transform it into an empire.
Campaign Map
The game is set to have a larger campaign map than Rome: Total War, and apart from encompassing the extent of the Roman Empire and its environs, will feature new territories stretching further to the eastern edge of the map.
The diplomacy system will be revamped with a better artificial intelligence, so players can also plan their way to power diplomatically. Creative Assembly acknowledges the various anomalies in previous games, where the AI could perform strange or even suicidal actions, such as small factions declaring war on the whole Roman Empire. This will be looked into in the sequel, and the AI is said to be more "intelligent" and cunning as ever. The choices of the player will influence the AI's attitude toward him or her.
Engine
A new graphics engine will power the visuals of the game, encompassing a new lighting system, particles that cast and receive shadows,and new unit cameras that will allow players to focus on individual soldiers in a unit on the battlefield, which in itself may contain thousands of combatants at a time. Creative Assembly has stated that they wish to bring out the more human side of the war this way, with soldiers reacting with horror as their comrades get killed around them, and officers inspiring their men with brief heroic speeches before siege towers make contact with the walls of the enemy city. This will be realized using facial animations for individual units, adding a deeper layer of humanity and realism to the battles, that will allow the player to connect more easily with their armies and its troops. Along with new animations, lead designer James Russell stated in an interview that combat in Rome 2 was to be a "complete meatgrinder", as opposed to individual unit combat animations in Shogun 2. Furthermore, the campaign map will be rendered with the battle map engine. This allows for a much more thorough and accurate terrain cell system, with cells as small as one pixel per meter on the battle map possible.
Gameplay
As with Total War: Shogun 2, the player will be prompted with several decisions. The Creative Assembly is expanding on this mechanic, with each decision leading the player down a path which leads to a consequence the player must deal with. These decisions will then affect the way the campaign plays out, such as turning the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire. Additionally, rather than solely assigning traits to generals and family members as with previous Total War games, the player can now assign traits to legions as they become hard-bitten veterans through their years of combat experience and conquest. Players can also customize legions by choosing their weapon loadout. This probably means that players will still be able to determine the composition of individual cohorts, even though they will be building entire legions at a time unlike in previous Total War titles where the player had to build all units of an army separately.
Navies will also play an even more important role in Total War: Rome II than in its predecessor. Creative Assembly plans to introduce mixed naval and land combat for land battles and city sieges for the first time in the company's history. This will reflect the naval strategies of the classical era, where coastal cities were conquered and destroyed in great invasions of infantry disembarking from warships. Amphibious attacks are one of the few new concepts that will be available in Rome 2 Total War. Legions can now attack the enemy's ground forces and cities, while naval units provide supporting fire or ram each other far away in the seas. Navies can also conquer poorly guarded coastal cities by themselves. Creative Assembly also plans to make naval units bigger in size, so instead of building one ship per construction, a player can have a formidable navy in shorter time.
Creative Assembly also seeks to capture the uniqueness of different cultures and fighting forces in the ancient times. Jack Lusted, the Creative Assembly's lead unit designer, has stated that instead of the single 'Rebel' faction of the original Rome: Total War there will be a large number of smaller factions, including one for each of the Greek city states. The different factions will have diverse play-styles. A tribe of British barbarians will look and feel completely different from that of a disciplined Roman legion. For example,different agents and technologies will also be implemented for different factions. After all, an inland barbarian tribe would never be able to research the technology for polyremes and other naval weapons of war or have much hope of manufacturing advanced ballistae, etc.
Playable Factions
So far eight playable factions have been confirmed.
- The Roman Republic Total War Wiki Description
- The Republic of Carthage Total War Wiki Description
- Macedon Total War Wiki Description
- Iceni Total War Wiki Description
- Arverni (Gaul) Total War Wiki Description
- Suebi (Germanic) Total War Wiki Description
- Parthia Total War Wiki Description
- To be Announced
