Total War Battles: KINGDOM

[Shelldrake]

Apparently free-to-play Total War Battles: KINGDOM is now in open beta. Anyone tried it yet?

[bob48]

It has a lot of very negative reviews on Steam.

[Zulu1966]

I downloaded it and gave it a look. Nice graphics but wasn't impressed otherwise. Mostly it seems like a cash cow. Wont be bothering with it again.

[Anguille]

is it for android? I really enjoyed the one with the shoguns.

[JasonPratt]

I can only suppose Creative Assembly's remaining dignity is the reason why this game isn't being marketed with a chesty woman breathing, "You can play with me now, my lord. Right there. Yes, there OH YES YES!!"  :P

I honestly don't understand this game (from what I've seen of it). Sure, I understand it's nice to have simplified strategy games, I play them, too, on occasion. And fine, CA and Sega are run by adults who are in the business to make money, if they want to make a pay-to-win game like this it's a free market, they have the right. I'm not sure it's moral not to be clear it's a pay-to-win game, but by now anyone considering buying the game on the strength of the "Total War" name will presumably recognize the descriptions to identify it as a crap ptw game.

But anyone who would be likely to buy this game on the strength of the "Total War" brand name will both recognize and despise the pay-to-win elements even if they're being obscured; and it isn't like the market isn't already saturated with simple ptw strategy games, even some with nice production values now. (And as some reviewers have noted, these production values are sometimes randomly borrowed and implemented from other Total War games in screwy ways!)

[Cyrano]

CA MAD!!

CA MAKE NICE TW GAMES FOR MANY YEARS AND NOT GET MUCH MONEY!!

STOOPID GUYS MAKE PHONE APP GAME WITH PRETTY GIRL AND THEY GET MUCH MONEY!!

HAHA...WE SMART AT CA!

WE MAKE GAME CALLED TW THAT FIGHT WITH GAME WITH PRETTY GIRL!!!!!!

HAHAHAHAHA!!

CA SMART!!

[Martok]

LOL Cyrano.  Thank you for my first laugh of the day.  ;D 
 

But anyone who would be likely to buy this game on the strength of the "Total War" brand name will both recognize and despise the pay-to-win elements even if they're being obscured; and it isn't like the market isn't already saturated with simple ptw strategy games, even some with nice production values now. (And as some reviewers have noted, these production values are sometimes randomly borrowed and implemented from other Total War games in screwy ways!)

Well said, Jason.  I have to wonder if branding this as a Total War title will actually hinder them more than help.