Shogun: Total War 2 Catch All thread

I got burned badly on Empire. I'll wait for a few days after everyone gives their impressions, especially of the AI.

Certis wrote:

From what I'm gathering, no matter who you start as you'll have one enemy right away and once you beat him, you'll likely have a nearby "ally" declare war. I had the exact same scenario play out with my green dudes on normal as well. Same epic defense battle too! Fun, but apparently the early game is a bit scripted.

That is the classic Total War formula. Always keep you fighting, diplomacy be damned.

Dezlen wrote:

I got burned badly on Empire. I'll wait for a few days after everyone gives their impressions, especially of the AI.

Personally, I liked Empire - I enjoyed the Era and the combat. As always with a TW game it has its foibles. This latest iteration is a refinement of the game that started it all and shines with attention to detail and character. The AI is challenging on Normal and damn well vicious at harder levels. Calvary is still good against archers, but will get slaughtered by the Yari Ashigaru (Foot Spear). The AI is very good at catching you out of place if you arent careful and formations can be very important, but are a tad unwieldy with large armies. The new hero units are cool. Diplomacy is hit or miss, but you have to use it to buy yourself some time to grow. Overall, I am really enjoying the game. Highly recommend the Campaign tutorial even if you are a TW Veteran.

I'm not sure I've ever used the default army formations. I always break my army down into autonomous groups of 2-3 and manage them manually.

I finally got a chance to try the full game on my laptop (m11x) this morning. The game runs amazingly well. It seems to run better than the demo did and is very playable. I'm starting a separate game from my desktop game. That way I can try a different faction out.

Okay, just bought it, can't wait to get home and play. I hate Steam for making me buy this game in retail where it is 40% cheaper. Welcome to (some of) Europe, eh.

Who wants to try some MP? I've only played few MP matches in Total War games over all those years so I'll probably get spanked

I warmly welcome the return of the general's pre-battle inspirational speech!

TrashiDawa wrote:

I warmly welcome the return of the general's pre-battle inspirational speech!

I've skipped all of the iterations after Medieval 2 so I had no idea they did away with that. That was one of the best parts of Rome and ME2, especially when you had a general with some of the more entertaining traits like Alcoholic, Foul Mouth, Boring Speaker, Paranoid, or the best one of all; Insane. If any of my generals ever went crazy I would use them for as many battles as possible just to hear the crazy non-sense they would say.

"They may have moon people on their side, but we have lovely hats!"
"Send everything men! I want the pink elephants and green pixies to attack first!"

Vega wrote:
TrashiDawa wrote:

I warmly welcome the return of the general's pre-battle inspirational speech!

I've skipped all of the iterations after Medieval 2 so I had no idea they did away with that. That was one of the best parts of Rome and ME2, especially when you had a general with some of the more entertaining traits like Alcoholic, Foul Mouth, Boring Speaker, Paranoid, or the best one of all; Insane. If any of my generals ever went crazy I would use them for as many battles as possible just to hear the crazy non-sense they would say.

"They may have moon people on their side, but we have lovely hats!"
"Send everything men! I want the pink elephants and green pixies to attack first!"

Those were the best. Love the speeches.

Seems to me that the battles have become substantially more arcadey. It's much, much harder to execute flanking and manoeuvre on the fly now which makes the game weaker as a whole. Even though I'm not really a fan of napoleonic games I'm finding Empire to be the high water mark.

Maq wrote:

Seems to me that the battles have become substantially more arcadey. It's much, much harder to execute flanking and manoeuvre on the fly now which makes the game weaker as a whole. Even though I'm not really a fan of napoleonic games I'm finding Empire to be the high water mark.

Napoleon certainly had much more tactical depth in battles. Campaign is certainly improved, though. Now hard can be... well, hard, which finally makes that part of game compelling. In no time I found myself struggling for life, AI plays more aggressively now. I stayed till 3am last night in "one more turn" mode, thing that never happens to me in TW before.

Maq wrote:

Seems to me that the battles have become substantially more arcadey. It's much, much harder to execute flanking and manoeuvre on the fly now which makes the game weaker as a whole. Even though I'm not really a fan of napoleonic games I'm finding Empire to be the high water mark.

Dunno...I performed two flanking actions last night and I didn't really consider them "hard". I just sent my calvary around right of the enemy's main advance and charged their bow units. Took out quite a bit before those units had to retreat. The units that I did attack turned to face me though, so they saw me coming. In previous versions of TW, they would not turn to face the charge at all.

The tactical combat does move a bit faster than previous games but so far I'm liking the change and haven't had any issues with flanking. Also the spear wall and guard commands are new additions that add a little micro managing depth to the combat.

Overall I'm really impressed by the game, I was a little concerned about the factions and unit types being too homogeneous but once you start playing it becomes a strength because you can give your faction a direction of your own rather than being somewhat confined by historical parameters and outcomes in the previous Total War games.

In a major blow to the resolve of cynical strategy gamers everywhere, Tom Chick, of ragging on Empire and inventing the Chick Parabola to describe it fame, said that he thinks Shogun 2 is pretty good.

Based on that and your guys' opinions I'm tentatively upgrading this to "first decent Steam sale" territory.

Gunner wrote:

In a major blow to the resolve of cynical strategy gamers everywhere, Tom Chick, of ragging on Empire and inventing the Chick Parabola to describe it fame, said that he thinks Shogun 2 is pretty good.

Based on that and your guys' opinions I'm tentatively upgrading this to "first decent Steam sale" territory.

Thanks for that link, it has an awesome explanation of the horo that saved me some research time!

TrashiDawa wrote:
Gunner wrote:

In a major blow to the resolve of cynical strategy gamers everywhere, Tom Chick, of ragging on Empire and inventing the Chick Parabola to describe it fame, said that he thinks Shogun 2 is pretty good.

Based on that and your guys' opinions I'm tentatively upgrading this to "first decent Steam sale" territory.

Thanks for that link, it has an awesome explanation of the horo that saved me some research time!

Holy crap. I was wondering what those were. That is amazing.

Vega wrote:

"They may have moon people on their side, but we have lovely hats!"
"Send everything men! I want the pink elephants and green pixies to attack first!"

Ha, that's awesome. I've never used an insane General in battle, AFAIK. My guys usually go crazy from being governors of boring provincial cities.

finally got mine installed. Been playing some one the custom battles...dont know which I like more... Napoleon or this...both seem to have ups and downs...

ZellbrigeN26 wrote:

both seem to have ups and downs...

What are the different ups and downs? Would be interested to hear your POV.

I bought it. And played it. It is awesome. CA finally did most of it right. Finally.

It helps that the AI isn't complete sh*t this time.

Caddrel wrote:
ZellbrigeN26 wrote:

both seem to have ups and downs...

What are the different ups and downs? Would be interested to hear your POV.

from my POV, the sea battles are realistic, but not nearly as enjoyable as in Napoleon..which is a shame, because I had gotten to be like Lord Nelson in sea battles. The campaign seems to run smoother and is enjoyable, but the step back in warfare for the tactical battles has me shook up a little. The units seem more specialized and then you add in the fact that they arent quite as responsive as Napoleon. The AI is better rounded and the difficulty levels are what you'd want them to be. Units seem to break quicker than usual, but that might just be me. The graphics are nice and the pep talks are fun. I like how the AI will attack across water now. Japan is just a huge Island, so it makes it interesting to try to defend everything. The sieges are a lot better than the old forts in napoleon and empire...just had to blast a few holes in the old sieges and that was that. I would def suggest getting this game when it goes on sale, but I will prob revisit napoleon every now and then.
I agree with Spy, the era was fun, and the game (after some updates) was fun. I am however curious to see how the multiplayer campaign works in this one.

I bought it, played the demo, loved it. There's only one reason I'm not neck deep in Shogun 2, and that's Dragon Age 2. After seeing all this great press for Shogun 2, my heart leaps a little bit for the potential of Rome 2 (You know it's going to happen).

On a side note, I have to call to task some of these reviewers who gave Empire a fantastic score, only to bash the game in their review of Shogun 2. Don't change your mind now. You said you love Empire, stick by your review. I'm not talking about different reviewers under the same site, I'm talking about the same reviewer for different games. It annoys.

Hey guys! I'm really considering giving this one a go. However, my system might not be up to par (Core 2 Duo @ 3.00 Ghz, 4 GB RAM, 4850 512 RAM). I'm thinking of upgrading my GPU soon to a 5850, but nothing else.

I know there's a demo, but I've been reading that the game has already been optimized. Did any of you felt much of a difference between the demo and the final game? Is the CPU much of a bottleneck?

oMonarca wrote:

Hey guys! I'm really considering giving this one a go. However, my system might not be up to par (Core 2 Duo @ 3.00 Ghz, 4 GB RAM, 4850 512 RAM). I'm thinking of upgrading my GPU soon to a 5850, but nothing else.

I know there's a demo, but I've been reading that the game has already been optimized. Did any of you felt much of a difference? Is the CPU much of a bottleneck?

Definitely try the demo. It should be available through Steam. I was really surprised how well the game runs on my M11x laptop. You may be just fine running it on that 4850 at low settings.

Edit: I did forget to mention that the actual game seems to be better optimized than the demo. If you can run the demo fine, then you should be all set to play the actual game.

oMonarca wrote:

Hey guys! I'm really considering giving this one a go. However, my system might not be up to par (Core 2 Duo @ 3.00 Ghz, 4 GB RAM, 4850 512 RAM). I'm thinking of upgrading my GPU soon to a 5850, but nothing else.

I know there's a demo, but I've been reading that the game has already been optimized. Did any of you felt much of a difference between the demo and the final game? Is the CPU much of a bottleneck?

No. I'm running OC'd [email protected] and it can handle bigger battles (4000-5000 units on battlefield) pretty comfortably.

Maq wrote:

Seems to me that the battles have become substantially more arcadey. It's much, much harder to execute flanking and manoeuvre on the fly now which makes the game weaker as a whole. Even though I'm not really a fan of napoleonic games I'm finding Empire to be the high water mark.

I think the speed actually makes things a good deal less arcadey. Some of the previous Total War games were an exercise in maneuvering your troops just so in order to execute flank after flank. In Shogun 2, once your troops are committed, it's very difficult to reposition them, which I think is an improvement.

Well...I've put about 20 hours into this game and I don't think I've gone past 60 turns in a single campaign. I'm playing on Normal and have barely played any TW games since the oiginal Shogun. I have Empire:TW but never really sunk time into it.

I *loved* the original Shogun TW and this is a wonderful remake of it. THe game has a beautiful atmosphere that just relaxes me and immerses me. This game just oozes style and for that I am willing to forgive some of it's flaws.

This game is hard! I've restarted the same easy clan 3 or 4 times now and each campaign has taught me a little more. The AI is really tough but I've yet to feel the game is unfair.

Commanding the RT battles is....odd. Playing so much Starcraft 2 has really done me a disservice when it comes to slower paced RTS games like DOW and now TW. Microing bowmen isn't exactly the same as kiting with marines.

I've played a few multiplayer games and gotten owned each time by someone who sat there and never moved their army. Is this standard in TW multiplayer? It doesn't seem fair. If someone just sits there then my army gets tore up trying to get into position to attack. I anticipated a match where people would be trying to flank and hiding units in trees and feinting and all that jazz but instead I find a bunch of people massing ranged units and crushing my army morale before the battle even starts because they never move from their opening formation. Kind of lame if you ask me.

I'm in the GWJ clan. I'm the guy who's losing all the games lol. I suck at it pretty badly but I'm going to keep playing anyway because I like the game. If the losses bother you guys just let me know and I'll start my own clan named after the newest trait my avatar received: Dishonorable Coward.

You know you're doing it wrong when the first notable thing that happens with your online avatar is being told to commit seppuku lol.

I think the Dishonorable Coward is bugged because I heard that you supposed to get it if you keep on disconnecting from battles but I got it after my second loss, and saw bunch of other people I played have it already too.

But damn, in that game I lost was a really nice lucky shot. He opponent had some siege equipment and hit my general in his second volley. My army routed pretty quickly after that. But anyway I do not think the losses count against the clan but I am not sure, I do not think that whole thing is not explained that well.

Thought I'd post some video links for Shogun 2:

Maybe my favorite CGI game trailer ever:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EQWc...

HeirofCarthage is doing a series of commentated campaign videos that start here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_aCN...

I didn't know we had a clan. Must have missed that.