Shogun: 2 Total War - Demo and release imminent

[Reliant121]

Well, the demo version of the new Total War game was released on the 22nd February and the game is due on 15th of march.

Anyone tried it? I've downloaded it and so far the impressions look good:

-The strategic map has been very highly streamlined. Instead of the mess of resources, farms, schools etc all over the map you each region has special resources which are developed in a small sub menu when you select a province's capital. For example, the demo campaign puts you in command of the Chokosabe clan of southern Shikoku. The home region, Tosa, is well known for its farming resources and so has well developed farms. One of the nearby provinces, Awa, has a very advanced stables and so allow you to produce very effective cavalry. Development of structures is simplified as well. Plus, it's all laid out in a close in, 3D style. Its not a massively major change, but aesthetically I find it quite helpful.

-Naval battles have returned to their Auto-resolve form, as far as I can tell. Personally, I don't feel it is a major difference as naval battles were always a pain in the ass anyway. But it has lost out part of the games dynamic.

-Assaults on cities has changed a fair bit. Instead of simply scaling the defences and deploying your troops into a centralized control zone, you must gain control of several levels of each stronghold. The stronghold may have many different levels of defences, with arrow towers and strong gates which you must breach. Siege weaponry can knock gates in, but troops such as infanty or specialised troops like battlefield Ninja can sneak in and gain control of defences or gate towers to allow your troops entry. I personally like the new developed system.



All in all, I feel Shogun is evolutionary rather than revolutionary.

EDIT: Naval battles ARE in there just not in the demo that I've found so far. Doesn't appear that much has changed, apart from obviously the style and the battle tactics.

[Deepcrush]

I've put about three hours into the demo. Shifted the graphics from low to high and played around with the unit scale. Even on small units and low graphics it still looks good and on the high settings I was impressed with how smooth the game play ran.

The main control system has also been reworked. While in ETW there were thousands of smaller sites outside of your main cities to manage. SGTW2 has put all of that under auto-manage. If you take the region then you get the goods and you can select the "Region" upgrade. You don't have to pick what building to put where. Just click on the button and the game takes care of it for you. While this isn't really a good thing for people like me who like to micromanage everything, it does however make the game much more accessible to the average gamer.

What I like the most so far is that sieges are finally back in the defenders camp. In METW and ETW, defending your cities was just a matter of hoping your enemy forgot their cannons. Because if they didn't then no matter what you did they were going to mess you up. Artillery had unlimited ammo which is just STUPID. SGTW2 took that away and in fact artillery has a very small supply of ammo. 10-20 rounds.

Overall I'm very pleased with the game thus far and I hope they continue with it in this fashion.

[Deepcrush]

So I completed the Demo and I'm honestly still pleased with how everything worked out. Even with the more watered down management system, it was fun to fiddle with my armies. Start off with cheaper units to fill the ranks, over time add more effective units in and at some point just remove all the cheap units and replace with all elites.

Game review. Added some terms for relevance but mind the spelling.

Land Units - Broken into three*three basic levels so I'll start with the warriors then cover the weapons.
- Ashigaru (militia/men at arms), Samurai (Samurai), Hero units (generals and special units) by melee, cav and ranged. These handle nicely in their places. Ashigaru providing numbers but one v one no match for Samurai in either combat or morale. Their standard armor is leather (2) but some go as high as early mail (4). Samurai are the first units you'll have that have any real fashion of armor that would be counted as standard. All Samurai units except No-Dachi have to start patch-plate (5) armor which is early plated armor with small plate sections but goes up to (9) which is is full plate armor with mail links and even able to withstand musket fire to a degree. Cavalry has been reworked a bit in that a successfull charge means a crushing impact vs a failed charge meaning the cav getting stuck in a melee they most likely will lose. This is a good change up from ETW where even successful charges meant little unless used against militia.

- With weapons there is a rock paper scissors deal going on which takes a bit of explaining.
*Bow units are most effective at range and from side or rear while hardly useful from the front unless against Ashigaru. If charged by anything other then other bowmen, just expect that bow unit to be lost. Matchlock units are much the same as bows but they are just as effective no matter where they hit the target. A nice touch was that if you fire on low armor units, the rounds have a habit of going through the front rank and hitting the rank behind them. This means that when charged by Ashigaru, matchlock units can break the enemy morale in the volley then stand in the melee long enough for the Ashigaru to break and run. This means that when attacking matchlock units, you have to use Samurai or cav as Ashigaru will just get eaten up and gain you nothing. A an army of matchlocks with bows behind will turn any Ashigaru army into a pile of corpses. However this same force against a Samurai/Cav army will be wrecked rather quickly. The best tactic for charging Matchlock units is to narrow your ranks so that the opening volley hits a smaller profile. While more focused, the rounds won't punch through the front rank of Samurai thus saving most of the unit. Then just before you order charge you can widen your unit for maximum impact projection.

*Melee, be it Katana, Dachi, Yari or Naginata are of course best up close. But there's a trick to it all! Much like in RTW, long arms block shorter arms from effective charges but are better once the melee has begun. However, the Yari is better against cav, the Katana and Dachi better against bowmen and other melee, the Naginata... well I don't know to be honest... I never needed them so I didn't really test them out. I think they are maybe meant for anti-armor or as a middle ground between the Yari and Katana/Dachi. Its possible that with the demo they just having finished with some of the units, I just don't know. On the plus side, the Yari spearwall wrecks cav and the Dachi have an insane charge beat only by the top line cav.

*Cavalry... Okay this has gone back to working much like the cav of RTW. Yari cav has good charge but weak melee, katana cav has weak charge but good melee and bow cav has weak charge/melee but has ARROWS... I know, you didn't see that coming.

Thats all for the now, I'll post up a better review later or just ask questions. I know there are a few TW players on DITL.

[BigJKU316]

I have been trying to get into Empire TW and Napoleon TW recently and just can't. I loved Rome TW and the original ME:TW games. I just find the interface for Empire to be kind of clunky as far as the strategic map. I think the combat is handled resonably well though I just don't think artillery works like it should at all. You can't have enough of it to impact a battle and still have enough infantry to just not get swamped under most of the time.

[Deepcrush]

I have to disagree with the artillery part. I normally take 5 units of artillery (always mortars once I develop them) and place them on my center or just behind my center. Canister fire is perfect for shattering enemy charges followed with a counter charge or just musket volley will more often then not send your enemy running for the hills. Another thing to remember is that artillery of the age wasn't the end all that it can be today. Most of the shots tended to miss their targets and on a melee could be more dangerous to your own forces. Timing of when to fire and where has to be handled with extreme care so that you don't waste your shot.

I think with the problem with the map on ETW was it was to big for most people to handle and still have fun. STW2 solved that by having everything for a region accessible in the main city.

[BigJKU316]

I did not mind the size of the map, I just have somewhat limited time and wanted to progress through turns as rapidly as I could in Rome, which did not seem possible.

Have honestly not played with moarters much. I played more battles on the Napoleon version just because I like using the Greenjackets so much.

[Deepcrush]

I did not mind the size of the map, I just have somewhat limited time and wanted to progress through turns as rapidly as I could in Rome, which did not seem possible.

In RTW, just as in STW2, all regions are controlled by a single capital and everything involving that capital can be controlled from the capital. The map size in ETW is added to allow each region to have numerous subsections that have to be controlled piece by piece. Its about micromanagement, some folks love it and some hate it.

Have honestly not played with moarters much. I played more battles on the Napoleon version just because I like using the Greenjackets so much.

You should give them a try and you might be surprise how useful mortars can be with explosive shells.

[BigJKU316]

I did not mind the size of the map, I just have somewhat limited time and wanted to progress through turns as rapidly as I could in Rome, which did not seem possible.

In RTW, just as in STW2, all regions are controlled by a single capital and everything involving that capital can be controlled from the capital. The map size in ETW is added to allow each region to have numerous subsections that have to be controlled piece by piece. Its about micromanagement, some folks love it and some hate it.

Have honestly not played with moarters much. I played more battles on the Napoleon version just because I like using the Greenjackets so much.

You should give them a try and you might be surprise how useful mortars can be with explosive shells.

I would love the micro-management if I had time to do it right. Just don't have hours and hours to deveote to it right now sadly. I think it is probably a very good game as all the TW games have generally been.

[LaughingCheese]

PSA: For those interested, Steam is having an epic sale on the Total War franchise.


A Total War Pack including:

Empire: Total War

Medieval II Total War

Napolean

Shogun 2


I guess thats not all the games but nice deal if you ask me. Tempting but I'm saving for other things, like tablets!

[Deepcrush]

Not bad, the whole RTW kit is only 9.99 so people still buy that like crazy.

[LaughingCheese]

Oops, realized I forgot to post a link, but I'm sure you know where to go.


http://store.steampowered.com/sub/7564/

[Deepcrush]

I'm surprised how popular the series still is. Strategy gaming never seemed to popular to me but talking with people in my DODS server last night I was informed by several server members that they wouldn't be in game the day that Shogun 2 comes out.