Empire: Total War

Went back to revisit Empire, a somewhat flawed gem. It's successors Napoleon and Shogun have surpassed it in every way except scope. (Gotta love that Grand Campaign)
When Empire first came out I was amazed by the graphics and my computer could barely handle the lowest settings, now I can crank everything up and things still look a little simple compared to Nappy and Shogun. Not unpleasant but visually games have just come so far in the last few years it's really been left behind.

Two Frenchmen practice wrestling holds

Charging up the hill

Low res textures

The captain attempts an escape

Cornered

The Dutch East India company vigorously defend their trade interests

Fascinating sword you've got there chap, mind if I take a closer look?

Overrun

Prussian grenadiers

Why are Prussia and Poland fighting in Afghanistan?

Because this is a Total War game!

Advancing over the hill

Beaut screenies !

Ohjah! Got to love this game!

Thanks, it's a good bit of fun!

Swedish artillery

No idea why, these two guys decided to detach from their unit and squat down in the middle of the crossfire.

CONAN THE SWEDE

Tricorns vs Berets

Spanish bugler

The guys in the second rank look pretty relaxed considering that a thousand angry Austrians are bearing down on them

Nice screens indeed


I too have recently gotten back into this game ... finally added in the DarthmoD and tried the American Civil War Mod both highly recommended

" Went back to revisit Empire, a somewhat flawed gem. It's successors Napoleon and Shogun have surpassed it in every way except scope. (Gotta love that Grand Campaign)"

Certainly not with Darthmod Ultimate Commander which makes Empire the game it should have been from the start ! Both Napoleon and Shogun have a much more limited scope indeed.

Thanks, I'll give Darthmod a look.

I'd highly recommend DarthMod, SDE. Once you try it, you'll never go back to vanilla ETW.

Here's some of my old ones using DM. Most of these were used in the official DarthMod promotional releases.

I second, third and fourth that...
It really ties the game together.

I fifth and sixth and seventh it, darthmod really upped the game from OK to good

Especially by reworking the atrocious stock AI

By the way I am also using Darthmod for Napoleon Total War, a complete revamp of how AI is fighting, no more easy victories !

If you're playing Napoleon with DM these are a must as well.

http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/3894724/Re_Sa_drog_de_frem_til_fjender#Post3894724

Big thanks everyone for the Darthmod suggestion, I only had enough time to do one 'test' before work but I can sum it up in one word. Awesome!

Bavaria and Saxony, yes the AI is improved but I still managed to outmaneuver them and attack their units from the rear and achieve a 'Heroic Victory' despite their high ground advantage. Maybe it's harder in the campaign?

I retract my earlier comments. Just got my arse handed to me on land and sea...

Really enjoying this now.

A few more

Caribbean cruise

Oasis

The rockets don't inflict many casualties but they really hurt morale

Smoking is a health hazard

Elephants? All this tea better bloody be worth it!

Charging the grenadiers

Disaster at sea

Marksman waiting to take his shot

Russian infantry

Swedish cavalry

Dutch India

Chasing down Marathis

Beautiful shots SDE

Nice pics !
Talking about mods, now that TW Rome 2 has received the big patch number 9 and that super mods are nearly finished (Divide et Impera) I jumped in yesterday. My six months rule for buying TW games was spot on !

I've been playing both Shogun 2 and Empire with the Darthmod due to this thread and loving it. I'm hoping that another mod fills the gap in future total war games as I find them unplayable without the AI improvements

That, and I'd like a new medieval era game with the modernized engine but that's a bit of a rehash.

Medieval 2 is my all time favourite and I still play it with Stainless Steel mod. I think on the contrary the Warscape engine would be a drawback.

Yeah, Medieval II still holds up well. Except for the clunky interface and awkward campaign. But the battles themselves are great. Never really modded Med II, my internet was too slow and unstable in those days to download anything over 80-100MB.

Chaos at the Battle of Poltava

"Never really modded Med II, my internet was too slow and unstable in those days to download anything over 80-100MB."

You can still do it now, the mods are still available at Total War Center.

Good point. Now I'm probably going to lose a whole weekend playing around, any suggestions? I think I heard Stainless Steel was good.

Edit: Seems I've gotten ahead of myself, almost one year ago I posted this...

http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/3757036/For_King_or_Country_The_Englis

Russia and the Commonwealth on a rainy day

I recently finished a grand campaign (finally)

Master of the Americas, India, and 100+ regions in the glorious British Empire.

I've always liked Empire. Graphics wise, I think it holds up well, I'll post up my screenies when I get a chance. I really enjoy the combat, India gave me a run for my money, and some of the later units are superb (Puckle guns and percussion cap arty)

Nice, I've only ever finished one campaign, played as Prussia and managed a near world conquest. Oddly America was the toughest theatre for me. Also had fun playing as the Natives, well until I ended up trying to fight a three front war against Spain-Britain-Iroquois...

As for graphics, I liked Napoleon's extra features such as cannonballs leaving holes in the ground but I hated how the lighting was always so gloomy, like some sort of goth music video. Give me bright sunny days please.

Lord Admiral Tightbritches - "It is imperative when directing ships in combat that one maintains a strict posture and avoids gazing upon the enemy at all costs"

I always thought it was a bit odd in the game how everyone runs around on the ships, climbing rigging, firing guns etc but the officers just stand perfectly still gazing out at nothing, even when the enemy is delivering a broadside.

Tightbritches was a good man. Shame he never managed to have any children.



Man, you're really zooming in on these ships, I never even noticed that there was any officers aboard them.

One of the highlights of my campaign was one warship in particular, the Dunbarton Castle. She was a 2nd rate ship of the line, and I used her in every theatre and she always seemed to be at the right place a the right time in many battles.

During one engagement, she was sitting next to an enemy ship, which blew up and took the Dunbarton castle out as well, along with a number of ships.

Years later, my first steamship happened to be named Dunbarton Castle in her memory

Little touches like this make me love PC gaming

The officers are actually pretty cool

Making sure everyone is in line

Through the looking glass

Bringing a knife to a gun fight


(Is it just me or are these troops some ugly bastards? Just look at their faces!)

Little something for the Americans, frigates flying 'Don't tread on me' naval jacks.


Prepare to be boarded!

How do you remove the UI for your screenshots?

There's a key to hide most of the UI, some parts like the map can be removed by clicking the little +/- sign in the corner.
But I'm just cropping the UI out of the pics.

We're gonna need a bigger boat...



Marines or cabaret dancers? You decide!