Empire: Total War demo on Steam - it's a slice of win-cake

Post by **FatherJack** » February 26th, 2009, 21:31

friznit wrote:And I've been playing the Star Wars mod for Mount & Blade, since you were wondering

I grabbed M&B this week, with the Star Wars mod being a contibuting factor. I'll give it a go over the weekend.

amblin · Post by **amblin** » February 26th, 2009, 23:50

Nicketal · Post by **Nicketal** » March 8th, 2009, 14:41

Has anyone got the full game yet?

I have and its broken to all fuckery.

I know all games have some release day gitters but this is inexcusable imo.

Not just graphical cockups but stupid bugs and flaws that should have been picked up in testing but worst of all general crashes that make it unplayable.

Mine runs like a dream graphics-wise, I can play it on high without any hiccups or slowdown, its just bad programing that should never have been released.

I know they are releasing a patch this coming week that should fix it but still, I really dont think its right that they can release a broken product.

amblin · Post by **amblin** » March 9th, 2009, 9:17

Post by **FatherJack** » March 9th, 2009, 10:55

Apart from it taking ages to download and one out of video memory error, I've had no problems with the Steam release so far. No glitches or anything. The videos look a bit crummy, but that's just the way they're encoded I guess.

Nicketal · Post by **Nicketal** » March 9th, 2009, 12:20

I had a problem with the Steam servers the first time I tried installing then put the code in wrong the second and third time so assumed it had cocked up and had a hissy fit before realising I was a tit.

Still, the actual game is frustratingly borked for me. The main problem for me is the random AI turn crashes where it just sends you back to desktop during AI turns, often meaning you cant play the campaign past that point. This was a problem in the older TW games so it seems really stupid that it made it to Empire.

Plus no shortage of stupid little bugs which on their own would be forgiveable. For example you can choose the amount of soldiers the game puts in a unit to help with framerates, good idea in theory except it only works one way so if you set it to low and the game makes each unit have about 40 men in it and then you set it to high again your previous games will only have 40 men in it when it is supposed to have 160.

All that said, brilliant game when it works, its just a kick in the balls that its bugged. What frustrates me most is how Creative Assembly are boasting about their commited patch schedule. I can appreciate that its impossible to release an unbugged game in realistic terms, but dont release a broken title and then try turn the fact that you intend to fix it into good PR

friznit · Post by **friznit** » March 9th, 2009, 12:58

I've been getting random CTD's as well, which is very frustrating when they happen mid battle. I've got into the habit of hitting quick save before almost every move - thankfully it saves very fast.

Complex units such as artillery and dragoons get stuck sometimes and won't respond, and ships can get hopelessly stuck on each other and bounce around like pinballs. I'm also disappointed at the lack of variety in the land maps and the towns...oh dear, just a bunch of random buildings plonked on Generic Land Map #1. What happened to the wonderful towns we had in MTW?

Other than that, awesome winsauce.

Mr. Johnson · Post by **Mr. Johnson** » March 9th, 2009, 15:49

I had some artifacts when playing the tutorial, but after manually ramping up my fan speed it seems to be fixed, but now I seem to get a horrible framerate...
The game itself seems great, but it looks like it's a fair bit more complicated then MTWII, and that scares me a little...

Mr. Johnson · Post by **Mr. Johnson** » March 9th, 2009, 17:53

So far, this I like:
-The Dutch speak Dutch, which is weird but a funny surprise nonetheless.
-Sea battles are fucking awesome.
-The new form of battle requires getting used to, as it's no longer just rushing, but I seem to be doing okay at it.
-Did I mention the awesome sea battles?

what I don't like, at all.
-Fucking French keep attacking my Luxembourg, get your own you poncy wankers.
-Horrible, horrible framerate of death and plague, but I have to squint to view at any other resolution, turning graphics down isn't being very useful.
-Makes my card overheat, causing artifacts, ramping up my fan speed helps, but it's very noisy.
-The French.

Post by **deject** » March 9th, 2009, 17:55

Mr. Johnson wrote:-Horrible, horrible framerate of death and plague, but I have to squint to view at any other resolution, turning graphics down isn't being very useful.
-Makes my card overheat, causing artifacts, ramping up my fan speed helps, but it's very noisy.

these two are probably related, just FYI.

Post by **Dr. kitteny berk** » March 9th, 2009, 17:56

Might be worth checking you're not forcing high AA/AF in your graphics drivers too, that'll usually eat more performance than you'd like.

Mr. Johnson · Post by **Mr. Johnson** » March 9th, 2009, 18:02

They're on application controlled (and I always turn AA off in-game), but it seems like alot of people have this problem, so I'm going to re-install some older drivers to see what that does.

Nicketal · Post by **Nicketal** » March 10th, 2009, 23:58

So the first patch came out today..

It fixed the AI turn crash on my main save that had been stopping me playing. Great, ok. Ive started a new campaign since then though, and am further ahead than I was, so I guess Ill keep going with that, safe in the knowledge that it wont crash out during another AI turn.

But no, they've some how managed to toss it up so that it fixed the AI crash on my old save, but is now doing it on a campaign that was working fine until now.

If anyone is considering buying this game I seriously recommend avoiding it. It is very enjoyable but it is NOT a finished game. We shouldnt have to pay £30 odd to beta test.

Post by **FatherJack** » March 11th, 2009, 2:07

I guess all bets are off with savegames when they release a new patch, rather STALKER-like. Rather dismaying as a Steam-delivered owner, as it's not always apparent when patches have been applied, with no option to back-rev should one have experienced no major problems.

I'm really only getting started with the game and playing it in fits and starts - this series I really take my time with and it can be literally years before I get anywhere. It's got updates pending, so is unplayable until they're downloaded, which is a bit annoying. Steam kind of makes assumptions based on the multiplayer model of its core games, which aren't always appropriate for ones which people like myself play offline exclusively.