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===Campaign Map===
 
===Campaign Map===
The campaign is just a free form game where you control one of 12 lucky nations on an exact replica of the known entire world. And the map is simply fucking huge! Its so huge that your computer might suffer excessive lag when moving the camera around the world. The world is divided into theaters (not the places you watch plays or movies), which are further divided territories which are in turn have one city and many towns in each. The difference between a town and a city is that the former you can only build one building on and you can't recruit a single unit while the latter allows you to recruit any unit you can recruit and can build from 2 to 5 buildings. One neat feature on the campaign is the ability to change your government. To do so you have to piss off one of the two kinds of people in your home province. If you pissed them off enough they'll revolt against your current leaders and you'll be given the option to fight with or against them. If the revolt wins you get to change your government; if the revolt is crushed like some annoying bug crawling on your favorite carpet the opposite occurs. It's possible to have a revolution that changes only your faction leader while maintaining your current government type, which is the only way of getting rid of leaders in a monarchy. There are three types of government. One allows you to act more like God on earth while oppressing the majority of your country's population. Another type is one where you give the people so much freedom that you have almost no control in the affairs of state. The third type is a combination of both but with toned down features of the previously mentioned governments. You also get to control a group of guys called gentlemen. These wigged men are to be used as a form of entertainment by dueling with a gentleman from another faction. When they duel a short but very hilarious clip appears which allows you to see what happened in the duel. Gentlemen also make your nation more technologically advanced when they are forced to live in schools. Another kind of agent you get to control is a rake (not the thing you use to collect leaves that have fallen onto your yard during fall). Rakes are the guys you use to eliminate anyone who you don't like for whatever reason. Well not everyone actually; unlike previous Total War games you can't eliminate rival faction leaders by assassination - faction leaders are practically immune from assassination. As with previous Total War games you also can't assassinate someone within your own faction, no matter how annoying that character may be. Rakes can also be used as peeping toms to know what's in an enemy city, town, or army or what traits some characters have. Diplomats have been removed from the game, due to micromanagement reasons, and have been replaced by a static diplomacy screen which allows you to do diplomatic actions to your neighbors - from giving gifts to making peace with an annoying foe who has not attacked for almost 50 years. The removal of diplomats though has made it impossible to bribe characters into working for your faction. For the first time in the series, you can finally recruit generals in cities. Retraining units are much easier now, since all you need to do is just to select all depleted units in an army and click the "reinforce button" on the interface; you don't need to be in a settlement to do this. You can also recruit units from generals - a general with a recruit order will order the nearest settlement/s with a sufficient building level to produce the required unit/s. If a faction loses all of its territories in the theater where its capital was originally located, it is as good as dead. Its overseas colonies though will rejoice the fall of their distant overlords and that they are going to experience what it's like to rule under their own banner.
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The campaign map is one of the first noted changes in this game. It expands the European centric focus of the first Total War series (the exception is the Shogun: Total War and the Americas Campaign in Medieval 2: Total War Kingdoms Expansion), and this expansion covers simultaneously, the European theatre (which also includes the North African coast and parts of the Middle East), the Indian subcontinent, and the Eastern half of North America, Central America, Northern South America and the Carribean islands, with trading theatres on the Eastern South American coast, West African Coast, Ivory Coast, and Pacific Islands. This expansion is one of the most uncontroversial ones within this game.
 +
 
 +
The new campaign map offers new possible strategies to the player, being it with local expansion or the foundation of colonies in diverse theaters of action. Aside that the economic complexity is also affected by this major change, with the addition of new feature called Trade nodes.
 +
 
 +
The trade nodes add immersion to the game, by allowing the player to acquire and trade resources via merchant ships at specific theaters in the map, those are: South America, West Africa, East Africa and Indonesia. This simulates the enormous growth in trade that is a hallmark of the scope period of the game, with bustling sails reaching far corners of the world with the purpose of trading/colonizing. These theaters offer a great economic boost to whoever controls them, with rich resources like ivory, spice and sugar.
 +
 
 +
This add to a much neglected part of the Total War series, the need to maintain the dominion of the seas. The pirates now pose a great threat, leading to what was a bustling economy to a ruined empire in a few turns. Another major component to the now need for a great armada is that the trade routes which appeared in previous games are interactive, leading to options of not only blockading the ports put to hinder the enemy economy through state piracy giving you the goods that were flowing through that route.
 +
 
 +
The resources inside the provinces have now a closer resemblance to Rome: Total War than it had to Medieval 2: Total War, since the latter needs a merchant for the exploitation of the resources, similarities aside this is an expansion on the concept of the province system for that the building who is responsible for the harvesting is not centralized in a capital, but it is spread in the territory itself. This change is more visible in the new town system.
 +
 
 +
This new town system involves a capital and several subsidiary towns, thus removing some of the importance of the capital and spreading along the whole province. The new slave towns are born from the growth of the population in several villages that are already defined in number different to which territory. Those towns can be configured in four basic towns: schools (used for research of new technologies), manufacturing plants (factories that have several types: textile, smelters and pottery the choice is not up to the player, churches and entertainment buildings.
 +
 
 +
This add to military strategy as well since that the control of those towns is responsible not only for the income, but for the general happiness of the province, thus raiding towns is a useful tactics and preferred by the AI.
 +
 
 +
===Technology===
 +
 
 +
A game based in the century of lights can't cast aside the revolution that happened in several fields of the human knowledge and perception. Empire: Total War brings to the table a new form of supremacy, the technology. The 18th century was marked by several changes to the humanity as a whole, bringing to light several concepts that marked and constructed the post modern world. The tech tree is divided in three major branches, being those: Military, Economics, Governance.
 +
 
 +
This is one of the most relevant aspects of the game, leading to an empire being weaker than the other considerably just because one has the technological edge over the other. The research also lead to the changes in the way the population behaves and perceives the government, an absolute monarchy is going to have much trouble to sustain itself in the late stages of the campaign, due to the public unrest several technologies generate.
  
 
===Factions===
 
===Factions===

Revision as of 16:23, 21 March 2013

Total War Series
Total War Series main article

Total War: Pharaoh

Total War Saga: Troy

Total War: Three Kingdoms - Portal

Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia

Total War: Warhammer - Portal

Total War: Attila

Total War: Rome II - Portal

Total War: Shogun 2 - Portal

Napoleon: Total War

Empire: Total War

Medieval II: Total War - Portal

Rome: Total War & Remastered Portal

Medieval: Total War

Shogun: Total War


Overview

Empire: Total War (abbreviated ETW, E:TW, or whatever) is the fifth game in the critically acclaimed Total War series (you know, the series which can show more than 10,000 troops on your screen without any problem?). Developed by CA ("Con artists? Absolutely") ("Creative ASSembly"), it was an ambitious project set to accurately recreate the warfare of the 18th century in a computer (and only in a computer). While it was an instant hit amongst critics, the game divided the fans of the Total War series. One group became so frustrated at the mountain of bugs the game had that they are unable to do anything else other than bashing the game and fighting its supporters on the web like a group of people who have been ruled by a tyrant for more than a hundred years; they also burned 25,000 copies of the game at a rally in front of CA's main headquarters on May 10. Another are a group of fanboys who are oblivious to the game's defects and are defending the game to the death with any means necessary. Despite the outraged fans, who were denounced by some extreme supporters as "insane", "emotional", "overtly critical" and a whole lot more of insults for "warning" would-be buyers about the game's "true" quality, the game became the #1 best selling game of March 2009. It is generally considered by anyone with a brain and/or who played any of the previous Total War games to be the worst game in the series the best game in the series the worst game in the series the best game in the series a game in the series.

General Information

There were several innovative changes in this title since the start of the Total War series.

Campaign Map

The campaign map is one of the first noted changes in this game. It expands the European centric focus of the first Total War series (the exception is the Shogun: Total War and the Americas Campaign in Medieval 2: Total War Kingdoms Expansion), and this expansion covers simultaneously, the European theatre (which also includes the North African coast and parts of the Middle East), the Indian subcontinent, and the Eastern half of North America, Central America, Northern South America and the Carribean islands, with trading theatres on the Eastern South American coast, West African Coast, Ivory Coast, and Pacific Islands. This expansion is one of the most uncontroversial ones within this game.

The new campaign map offers new possible strategies to the player, being it with local expansion or the foundation of colonies in diverse theaters of action. Aside that the economic complexity is also affected by this major change, with the addition of new feature called Trade nodes.

The trade nodes add immersion to the game, by allowing the player to acquire and trade resources via merchant ships at specific theaters in the map, those are: South America, West Africa, East Africa and Indonesia. This simulates the enormous growth in trade that is a hallmark of the scope period of the game, with bustling sails reaching far corners of the world with the purpose of trading/colonizing. These theaters offer a great economic boost to whoever controls them, with rich resources like ivory, spice and sugar.

This add to a much neglected part of the Total War series, the need to maintain the dominion of the seas. The pirates now pose a great threat, leading to what was a bustling economy to a ruined empire in a few turns. Another major component to the now need for a great armada is that the trade routes which appeared in previous games are interactive, leading to options of not only blockading the ports put to hinder the enemy economy through state piracy giving you the goods that were flowing through that route.

The resources inside the provinces have now a closer resemblance to Rome: Total War than it had to Medieval 2: Total War, since the latter needs a merchant for the exploitation of the resources, similarities aside this is an expansion on the concept of the province system for that the building who is responsible for the harvesting is not centralized in a capital, but it is spread in the territory itself. This change is more visible in the new town system.

This new town system involves a capital and several subsidiary towns, thus removing some of the importance of the capital and spreading along the whole province. The new slave towns are born from the growth of the population in several villages that are already defined in number different to which territory. Those towns can be configured in four basic towns: schools (used for research of new technologies), manufacturing plants (factories that have several types: textile, smelters and pottery the choice is not up to the player, churches and entertainment buildings.

This add to military strategy as well since that the control of those towns is responsible not only for the income, but for the general happiness of the province, thus raiding towns is a useful tactics and preferred by the AI.

Technology

A game based in the century of lights can't cast aside the revolution that happened in several fields of the human knowledge and perception. Empire: Total War brings to the table a new form of supremacy, the technology. The 18th century was marked by several changes to the humanity as a whole, bringing to light several concepts that marked and constructed the post modern world. The tech tree is divided in three major branches, being those: Military, Economics, Governance.

This is one of the most relevant aspects of the game, leading to an empire being weaker than the other considerably just because one has the technological edge over the other. The research also lead to the changes in the way the population behaves and perceives the government, an absolute monarchy is going to have much trouble to sustain itself in the late stages of the campaign, due to the public unrest several technologies generate.

Factions

-See main article: Empire: Total War Factions

More than fifty factions are included in the game, 36 of which are playable. The other factions cannot be unlocked and have to be modded into the game. The eleven playable factions from the the beginning are:

Playable Factions

Warpath Factions

Unplayable Factions

Starting Protectorates

Emerging

Battlefield Gameplay

The introduction of the naval warfare was a major addition to the series. This new and unexplored battlefield was plagued with problems at the game launch. Pathfinding errors made navigation difficult and real world strategies used by admirals from the past didn't work correctly. Land battles suffered from AI problems as well, which resulted in a commander to inevitably win a battle unless faced with overwhelming opposition. Patch 1.6 has helped to alleviate these launch issues.

Multiplayer

ETW multiplayer was supposed to be revolutionary with the addition of a brand new feature, the multiplayer online campaign. Aside that we can also highlight that with the integration with steam the game could get a ladder system, giving players the motivation to pursue constant online battles.

The Multiplayer online campaign only reached beta phase, and thus is not integrated into the game. Although it was fully implemented in the Napoleon: Total War. This move was done since that the Hot Seat feature would be discarded in this title.

Although it is still in beta, its possible to conduct a campaign with other players, this requires a registration

System Requirements

Minimum System Requirements
Supported OS: Windows® XP Service Pack 2 or Windows Vista™ or Windows 7™
Processor: 2.4 GHz Intel® Pentium® or greater or AMD® Athlon® equivalent CPU, with SSE2 instruction
Memory: 1 GB RAM (XP,) 2 GB RAM (Vista™)
Graphics: 100% DirectX 9.0c compatible hardware accelerated video card with shader version 2.0 support, 256 MB video memory
Display: Minimum screen resolution of 1024 x 768 pixels
Sound: Directx9.0c compatible sound card
Hard Drive: 15 GB free hard disk space formatted as NTFS
Peripherals: Windows compatible mouse and keyboard
Recommended Requirements
Supported OS: Windows® XP Service Pack 2 or Windows Vista™ or Windows 7™
Processor: 2.4 GHz Intel® Core 2 Duo® or greater or AMD® Athlon64® equivalent CPU, with SSE2 instruction
Memory: 3 GB RAM (XP,) 4 GB RAM (Vista™)
Graphics: 100% DirectX 9.0c compatible hardware accelerated video card with shader version 3.0 support, 512 MB video memory
Display: Minimum screen resolution of 1280 x 1024 pixels
Sound: Directx9.0c compatible sound card
Hard Drive: 15 GB free hard disk space formatted as NTFS
Peripherals: Windows compatible mouse and keyboard

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