Quote Originally Posted by Duke Dude View Post
It just doesn't feel like a Total War game. First off I state the pros:

- I love the addition of army traditions. It adds a great new personal aspect to your veteran full stack that's just full of your veterans .

- The new GC map and the way cities expand are awesome!

Cons:

- The Multiplayer is shocking, absolutely shocking. After Shogun 2 I can't believe they stripped if of everything, I am really disappointed with this.

- The limitation to how many army stacks you're allowed to own at one time. What if I want to fight on multiple fronts? It's still do-able but the limitation irks me.

- Politics and the senate just don't feel as fleshed out in the original Rome. I always felt like I was being watched and I dare not piss off the senate until I was strong enough to face the other families. I just don't get that here.

- I haven't played it in a few weeks, but the AI is shocking as well, but this may have been fixed by now. The AI even on Hard and Legendary feels so passive.

- The Greek States being DLC?! I pre-ordered so I'm cool there but good God, how can you make them DLC?? Rome is not just Rome it's Greece as well! Bah

- The inclusion of flags during battles, meh, boils down to no strategy, just a zerg rush! I remember some battles in Medieval II taking as long a 20mins to complete, now they just feel so rushed .

- The family tree also sucks balls! There's nothing personal there, no traits, no way to customize then even a little. Medieval II and Shogun 2 were awesome here.

There's plenty of nitpicks I have like the UI, certain op trade routes erc... But meh, those are just small and can be fixed and balanced.

I'm hardcore Total War fan, so I'm not bashing the series at all. I was just looking so forward to a Rome 2! I begged CA on the official forums since Empire to do a Rome 2 , I was just let down with what we got in the end.

For a budget that was 30% bigger than any other previous TW they've created, it sure felt sub-par and lesser than Medieval II and Shogun 2
I have to agree with some of what you said: especially the family tree/politics system. That was a complete fail over simplification. It literally makes no difference for me if a general dies as you can literally just replace him for free and is just another name.

The AI has been drastically improved. I played 100+ turns with Rome on Hard and it was mostly a walk in the park (The Civil War was an absolute joke - 15 full stacked armies popped up and sticked together - thus I avoided them for as long as possible while bringing my own armies, but eventually they basically all starved to death from attrition due to the AI being so passive and not trying to take settlements from me besides 1 or 2)

I just started a new campaign on Legendary with Pontus and am enjoying it a lot more, have even lost a a few battles where on hard it wasnt even a challenge.

In terms of the UI, I actually like the new setup - its streamlined without taking away features imo
The multiplayer is very basic...however I do enjoy jumping into the quick battles sometimes

Give it a try again sometime, hopefully you will find some joy in it!