Rome II

[Bison]

The negative hype stems from the fact that hating certain games had become something of a cottage industry that feeds on itself. 

There is a lot of truth to this statement. 

It is what it is.  Enjoy or not.  I do, so that's all that matters to me.

[Gusington]

I have been working at sites like this for almost 12 years and every time a TW game is released the shenanigans begin. 'It sucks!' 'It's great!!' 'Your mother!!!' Etc. It gets exhausting.

[Achilles]

I have put a big old bunch of hours into Rome 2.  Even bought the Caeser in Gaul expansion.  I started playing TW back in original Shogun, so I have played this series from the start.   The tough part for me was that Shogun 2 was an excellent game.   I  just like the time period of ancient Rome better.   I do think that gameplay features and the options available in Rome 2 took a step back from Shogun 2 - especially the multiplayer.   Also, it was hard to live up to the pedigree of Rome TW which, lets face it,  was a revolutionary game when released. When that game came out it was such a leap forward.   Hell, there was a tv show in Britain using the engine.  There were tv shows that used the TW engine to do historical battles.  The same didn't happen for Rome 2.  It was not a big leap forward or anything really earth shattering for that matter. 

Worse, the fan base expected greatness and with the buggy release of Empire fresh in their minds, open rebellion ensued when the game did not pass muster on release. 

The patches have have helped, but the game has not lived up to its potential.   For me that's ok.  I still like the game.   I just don't love it.

[Gusington]

There were a ton of haters for Rome I too!

[Sir Slash]

In a recent field battle as Suebi against the Averni, the Averni fielded 2 armies against my one. I set my forces up to defend, expecting the AI to come at me one at a time just like they always do and I was totally surprised and horrified to see the first force wait for the second to join it before closing on my now out numbered defenders. And this was vanilla. I won the battle but just barely and only after 30+ min. struggle and 3/4 of my army lost. The AI doesn't need to get any better to make me happy.

[tgb]

Every single TW release has been called a disaster.

Not Shogun 2, iirc.  In fact, most people hailed it at release as CA "finally getting it right".  A lot of the "hatred" directed at Rome II at release was frustration that is was perceived as a major step backwards.

Go back and look at the Tom Chick and Angry Joe reviews for Shogun 2 at release - 180 degrees different.

[agathosdaimon]

In a recent field battle as Suebi against the Averni, the Averni fielded 2 armies against my one. I set my forces up to defend, expecting the AI to come at me one at a time just like they always do and I was totally surprised and horrified to see the first force wait for the second to join it before closing on my now out numbered defenders. And this was vanilla. I won the battle but just barely and only after 30+ min. struggle and 3/4 of my army lost. The AI doesn't need to get any better to make me happy.

that sounds reasonably good - is this with the patches now? i have been on the fence with rome 2 - but the caesar in gaul campaign really interests me - in particular because the turn scale has been changed to something i find much more preferable rather than a year per turn

[Grim.Reaper]

In a recent field battle as Suebi against the Averni, the Averni fielded 2 armies against my one. I set my forces up to defend, expecting the AI to come at me one at a time just like they always do and I was totally surprised and horrified to see the first force wait for the second to join it before closing on my now out numbered defenders. And this was vanilla. I won the battle but just barely and only after 30+ min. struggle and 3/4 of my army lost. The AI doesn't need to get any better to make me happy.

that sounds reasonably good - is this with the patches now? i have been on the fence with rome 2 - but the caesar in gaul campaign really interests me - in particular because the turn scale has been changed to something i find much more preferable rather than a year per turn

Just FYI...through greenmangaming and the use of their 25% coupon, you can get Caesar for $11 right now...thinking of picking up myself today.

I have to admit I pre-purchased Rome 2 as soon as it was available for pre-order.  The Roman time period strongly interests me and I enjoyed Rome 1.  However, after the initial release, with most forums and reviewers speaking so poorly of the game and even the developer admitting it to a degree, my energy to play the game really went away.  They said they were going to be patching frequently so I thought best to wait until those slow down or go away from coming out so fast.  So far I have only messed with the historical/custom battles, haven't even attempted a campaign yet.  Even with this, I am very hopeful that I will still enjoy it when the timing is right.

I really think Rome 2 and all games in the TW series get so much attention and feedback for one simple reason......these games are played by a TON of people!  This shows regardless of all the complaining, people are still buying it all the time.  Even if Sega loses a few customers, it likely hardly makes even a dent in their total sales of the product.  With so many people playing the game, I think it shows that everyone has a different perception on the game and a handful people have a strong voice which brings down the forums with bad tastes.

I truly believe if the internet/forums didn't exist, people would buy the game and happily play it without complaints...they would think it is the most awesome thing since slice bread!  But when you pull people together in common places to pick it apart, just becomes part of the culture to be negative.

Some day I am going to test this theory when a new game comes out....going to go into a media blackout and not read reviews/forums and see what happens.  Just not sure I am strong enough:)

[Grim.Reaper]

And if it is so bad, why is it usually rank high in the numbers playing it....right now, it is the 13th most played game on steam right now....pretty good for one of the worst games in 2013:)

http://store.steampowered.com/stats/

[agathosdaimon]

yeah definitely true with our reading everyones opinions and experiences can just snowball a negative vibe thats hard to go against , and even on good games like CMANO or Harpoon even - with these games, i thought right away that they were and awesome but then all the mentions of bugs in Harpoon puts me off playing it and when someone points out something like some SOSUS not performing accurately or something in CMANO i am then like oh no, the game still needs work but in fact it doesnt, it is perfect already and is just receiving enhancements. so yeah, forums are great but i guess it then means alot of critcisms and critiques being compounded - i am glad i have gone against the criticism on some games, like Empires in Arms for example as its a splendid complex and very well running game i find with alot of historically accurate options and overall atmosphere

[Grim.Reaper]

yeah definitely true with our reading everyones opinions and experiences can just snowball a negative vibe thats hard to go against , and even on good games like CMANO or Harpoon even - with these games, i thought right away that they were and awesome but then all the mentions of bugs in Harpoon puts me off playing it and when someone points out something like some SOSUS not performing accurately or something in CMANO i am then like oh no, the game still needs work but in fact it doesnt, it is perfect already and is just receiving enhancements. so yeah, forums are great but i guess it then means alot of critcisms and critiques being compounded - i am glad i have gone against the criticism on some games, like Empires in Arms for example as its a splendid complex and very well running game i find with alot of historically accurate options and overall atmosphere

That is the funny part...half the issues that are ever discussed about games are way over my head and I likely would have never even notice...but when someone mentions it, my mind goes off and says "No way I am playing this until they fix widget ABC".....even though I likely never use widget abc and don't even know what it is:)

[Gusington]

^Me too. Additionally a lot of issues that users (and sometimes professional reviewers) bring up I have not seen on my system.

As far as Shogun 2, I agree it is the pinnacle of the series - the best assembled, most polished of all the TW games. It would be very difficult for Chick or Angry Joe or any professional reviewer to tear it apart as it stands on its own, and strongly.

But there are still haters, even for Shogun 2. Here's the Metacritic page for Shogun 2:

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/total-war-shogun-2

Very strong at 90% in professional reviews. As far as users, very strong there too, but there are still haters to be seen at around 35.

Here's the Metacritic page for Rome II:

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/total-war-rome-ii

Not bad, with professional reviews at 76%. But the user ratings - horrendous! 1000+ horrible reviews.

There will always be TW haters, even if CA develop a godlike AI and graphics that would make DaVinci step back and say 'whoa.'

[MengJiao]

The negative hype stems from the fact that hating certain games had become something of a cottage industry that feeds on itself. 

There is a lot of truth to this statement. 

It is what it is.  Enjoy or not.  I do, so that's all that matters to me.

  Puzzling over this kind of thing some more leads me to wonder if there's not a kind of paradox lurking in the nature of games themselves such that
the better the game is as a set of images of a natural world, the more the game brings up questions about the nature of gaming and simulation.  We see this in flight sims where rl pilots say that sim planes are harder to fly than real planes (but now this is accepted as inevitable in some places).  We see this in the CMxx series (eg. Darosh's remarks about the uncanny valley) and I think it happens to some degree with Rome II.

   Playing Rome II is the first time in a TW game that I really wanted the game to focus on a smaller area and time frame -- precisely because the game was working so well that more focus seemed more interesting.

[Martok]

Also, it was hard to live up to the pedigree of Rome TW which, lets face it,  was a revolutionary game when released. When that game came out it was such a leap forward.   

<Makes strangled noise>

Every single TW release has been called a disaster.

Not Shogun 2, iirc.  In fact, most people hailed it at release as CA "finally getting it right".  A lot of the "hatred" directed at Rome II at release was frustration that is was perceived as a major step backwards.

Go back and look at the Tom Chick and Angry Joe reviews for Shogun 2 at release - 180 degrees different.

I concur with your assessment, tgb.  More than anything else, I think Rome II suffers from the simple fact that, at release, it wasn't as good (especially from a technical standpoint) as Shogun 2 was.  If STW2 had been similarly less than "perfect" when it came out, I strongly suspect the fanbase would have treated RTW2 far more charitably. 

[Arctic Blast]

Seriously, why are you guys obsessing about this? Other people don't like it...who cares? Play the game, have fun.