Imperator is worth it on sale, but not full price IMO. Its a pretty standard Paradox game, with the game play being kind of a mix between two of their other games: Europa Universalis IV and Crusader Kings 2. It ended its development right when it was getting good, so its an incomplete experience in a lot of ways with only a few nations fully fleshed out (tho you can play as anyone)

Total war is all about the real time tactical battles, with a pretty streamlined turn based world map layer to give context to the battles. Rome Remastered is a remaster of a game from the early 2000's and feels like it. Rome 2 is a more modern game (but still old, came out in 2013 i think) with more depth on campaign layer than its predecessor. I have love/hate relationship with the game, get it on sale

With all three games, modding scene is what elevates them from kinda good to actually good. But, they all three fall short of being "great" IMO

Personally I liked rome total war (the remaster is not much different and kinda pricey for that) and totally disliked rtw2, especially the amount of AI cheating.
With its concentration on tactical battles, I guess it makes a certain sense that the AI-bonus in rtw2 seems to be more geared towards the player fighting all the battles themselves (and kinda balancing it out that way), but since I am not really a fan of fighting every battle myself, I found the game annoying, especially the fact that there are a lot of settlements you can't fortify and the AI being rather aggressive, so it turned into playing whackamole with AI stacks of a size I couldn't pay despite having a way better developed economy then them.

Now while those two are at least comparable: Strong focus on tactical battles and the strategic aspects while not totally barebones clearly taking the backseat.
Imperator is pretty different then the TW games. No tactical battles the main focus lies on the strategical layer and empire-building.
If you have played other PDX-games you have at least an idea.
The game was apparently horrible at launch. Can't really attest to that personally, since I only played it after its big rework. Nowadays the core game mechanics are pretty solid, even though they will take a bit to grasp (pretty much like any other pdx game too^^), but after that they aren't overly complex since IMP hasn't gotten the usual pdx dlc-dump adding in 100.000 new and detail mechanics.
The downside is that after getting to a certain size pretty all the empires play kinda samey (before that its a pretty big difference, if you play a greek polis fighting to supremacy and survival, a big diadochi state throwing around its military and diplomatic might from the start, rome wich can if played not totally wrong steamroll the world, or a tribe at the fringe of the world)
Having only a single starting time is another downside, even though starting later might make rome even more OP^^ But actually some scenarios starting earlier would have been nice.

Originally posted by manniepants:

Imperator is worth it on sale, but not full price IMO. Its a pretty standard Paradox game, with the game play being kind of a mix between two of their other games: Europa Universalis IV and Crusader Kings 2. It ended its development right when it was getting good, so its an incomplete experience in a lot of ways with only a few nations fully fleshed out (tho you can play as anyone)

Total war is all about the real time tactical battles, with a pretty streamlined turn based world map layer to give context to the battles. Rome Remastered is a remaster of a game from the early 2000's and feels like it. Rome 2 is a more modern game (but still old, came out in 2013 i think) with more depth on campaign layer than its predecessor. I have love/hate relationship with the game, get it on sale

With all three games, modding scene is what elevates them from kinda good to actually good. But, they all three fall short of being "great" IMO

And which strategy game then would you consider great both for modern audiences as well for those seeking something more old-school?

Originally posted by galadon3:

Personally I liked rome total war (the remaster is not much different and kinda pricey for that) and totally disliked rtw2, especially the amount of AI cheating.
With its concentration on tactical battles, I guess it makes a certain sense that the AI-bonus in rtw2 seems to be more geared towards the player fighting all the battles themselves (and kinda balancing it out that way), but since I am not really a fan of fighting every battle myself, I found the game annoying, especially the fact that there are a lot of settlements you can't fortify and the AI being rather aggressive, so it turned into playing whackamole with AI stacks of a size I couldn't pay despite having a way better developed economy then them.

Now while those two are at least comparable: Strong focus on tactical battles and the strategic aspects while not totally barebones clearly taking the backseat.
Imperator is pretty different then the TW games. No tactical battles the main focus lies on the strategical layer and empire-building.
If you have played other PDX-games you have at least an idea.
The game was apparently horrible at launch. Can't really attest to that personally, since I only played it after its big rework. Nowadays the core game mechanics are pretty solid, even though they will take a bit to grasp (pretty much like any other pdx game too^^), but after that they aren't overly complex since IMP hasn't gotten the usual pdx dlc-dump adding in 100.000 new and detail mechanics.
The downside is that after getting to a certain size pretty all the empires play kinda samey (before that its a pretty big difference, if you play a greek polis fighting to supremacy and survival, a big diadochi state throwing around its military and diplomatic might from the start, rome wich can if played not totally wrong steamroll the world, or a tribe at the fringe of the world)
Having only a single starting time is another downside, even though starting later might make rome even more OP^^ But actually some scenarios starting earlier would have been nice.

So I take it that you wouldn't recommend Imperator then.

Then how about Age of Empires: Definitive Edition?

And I suppose none of you would really recommend any of the Total War Rome games I mentioned, given that they too are said to have issues that don't necessarily make them stellar games.

Originally posted by manniepants:

Imperator is worth it on sale, but not full price IMO. Its a pretty standard Paradox game, with the game play being kind of a mix between two of their other games: Europa Universalis IV and Crusader Kings 2. It ended its development right when it was getting good, so its an incomplete experience in a lot of ways with only a few nations fully fleshed out (tho you can play as anyone)

Total war is all about the real time tactical battles, with a pretty streamlined turn based world map layer to give context to the battles. Rome Remastered is a remaster of a game from the early 2000's and feels like it. Rome 2 is a more modern game (but still old, came out in 2013 i think) with more depth on campaign layer than its predecessor. I have love/hate relationship with the game, get it on sale

With all three games, modding scene is what elevates them from kinda good to actually good. But, they all three fall short of being "great" IMO

I'm glad to see someone else thinks that Total War Rome 2 is considered an old game by now, given the advancements that have been made over the past years in technology.

And yet, CA has the gall to continue charging a ludicrous amount of money for the base game, let alone for the DLCs that have to be bought separately for a complete gaming experience.....even when the game is at a discount during a massive Steam Sale.


Why bother, when the game isn't even brand new anymore?

Originally posted by galadon3:

Personally I liked rome total war (the remaster is not much different and kinda pricey for that) and totally disliked rtw2, especially the amount of AI cheating.
With its concentration on tactical battles, I guess it makes a certain sense that the AI-bonus in rtw2 seems to be more geared towards the player fighting all the battles themselves (and kinda balancing it out that way), but since I am not really a fan of fighting every battle myself, I found the game annoying, especially the fact that there are a lot of settlements you can't fortify and the AI being rather aggressive, so it turned into playing whackamole with AI stacks of a size I couldn't pay despite having a way better developed economy then them.

Now while those two are at least comparable: Strong focus on tactical battles and the strategic aspects while not totally barebones clearly taking the backseat.
Imperator is pretty different then the TW games. No tactical battles the main focus lies on the strategical layer and empire-building.
If you have played other PDX-games you have at least an idea.
The game was apparently horrible at launch. Can't really attest to that personally, since I only played it after its big rework. Nowadays the core game mechanics are pretty solid, even though they will take a bit to grasp (pretty much like any other pdx game too^^), but after that they aren't overly complex since IMP hasn't gotten the usual pdx dlc-dump adding in 100.000 new and detail mechanics.
The downside is that after getting to a certain size pretty all the empires play kinda samey (before that its a pretty big difference, if you play a greek polis fighting to supremacy and survival, a big diadochi state throwing around its military and diplomatic might from the start, rome wich can if played not totally wrong steamroll the world, or a tribe at the fringe of the world)
Having only a single starting time is another downside, even though starting later might make rome even more OP^^ But actually some scenarios starting earlier would have been nice.

Hang on. Am I correct in assuming that out of the two Total War Rome games, you would recommend Total War Rome: Remastered? Because I had similar thoughts at first given how Total War Rome 2 involves a lot of DLCS that have to be purchased separately for the complete gaming experience, and frankly that is kind of scummy when one considers Total War Rome: Remastered, which already comes with two DLCs along with the base game itself.

Sometimes I get the impression that game developers these days are getting lazy when it comes to releasing games and additional content; surely it isn't too much trouble to fit all the DLCs that have been released over the past years into the base game and release it as a fully-fledged game for a reasonable price, or?

Instead, one gets the "Emperor Edition" of Total War Rome 2, with the name of this edition already being misleading, considering that you get the base game and only one DLC.

I would call that false advertising.

They're lazy because people are impatient. There're plenty of indies that take their time even though I don't have any game in mind for strategy games. I still think Civ6 is great without its DLCs, but the Gathering Storm one is implementing a well reworked old game mechanics, climate. But turn based game are easier to balance than real time ones usually.

As for the game mentionned, there's no real-time combat in IR, so the strategy is more oriented toward kingdom and population management. So I recommend it.
Now, to me, I still recommend Caesar 2, it's still a good (but now pretty simple) city builder with province management and a flawed real-time combat. But it's still fun with an interesting difficulty curve. You need to don't mind good old games.

I personally have nothing against older strategy games....so long as they run well on modern hardware.

However, I'm still kind of interested in giving Total War: Rome Remastered a shot, as I've heard that tons of mods exist that can perhaps enhance the game-play experience.

I cannot think of any other strategy game where this sort of thing is possible.

Originally posted by Jean-Maurice Nya:

They're lazy because people are impatient. There're plenty of indies that take their time even though I don't have any game in mind for strategy games. I still think Civ6 is great without its DLCs, but the Gathering Storm one is implementing a well reworked old game mechanics, climate. But turn based game are easier to balance than real time ones usually.

As for the game mentionned, there's no real-time combat in IR, so the strategy is more oriented toward kingdom and population management. So I recommend it.
Now, to me, I still recommend Caesar 2, it's still a good (but now pretty simple) city builder with province management and a flawed real-time combat. But it's still fun with an interesting difficulty curve. You need to don't mind good old games.

I suppose you're right. If consumers were to wait just a little longer for a proper game to come out, then there wouldn't be the need to release something half-baked and followed by tons of DLCs that are meant to pad out the base game, not necessarily improve upon it.

Though I guess the consumers cannot be blamed for everything. The publishers of games are just as much at fault, as it seems that the majority are too driven by greed to simply give game developers sufficient time to work their magic.

I myself am somewhat of an advocate for older games, hence why I don't find myself drawn as much to Total War Rome 2 (even though it isn't that new anymore) as I am to its predecessor, Total War Rome.

Total War Rome 2 strikes me as superficial, bloated and too edgy.

I would not go back to Total War Rome 1.
If you like painting the worldmap in the colour of your country is there a reason why you don't look into Europa Universalis 4 instead of IR ?
If you like commanding your own troops in a interesting world is there a reason you don't look into Warhammer Total War 2 or 3 instead of Total War Rome 2?
These would be more popular similar games.
Depending what you want out of it you can have fun with IR or TWR2.