Remember when you used to sit behind Heather L. in 6th grade History class and each day you took bets on whether the teacher would have sweaty armpit stains or not? Unless your name was Ryan K. you probably weren't doing exactly that, but I'm guessing that you remember just as much similar nonsense from those days than actual history that was taught to you. And now you wonder why you can't answer any trivia questions about who Saxony was aligned with during the 18th century. Care for a refresher on history so you can start winning arguments at your local watering hole? Better go out and grab the interactive teaching tool called Empire: Total War from Sega. Ok it's not focused on teaching per-say, the teaching of the 18th century comes as a nice result if you pay attention to the details in this immense game. A gigantic turned based strategy game (real time during battles) for the PC, Empire is a great mashed potato mixture of older strategy games such as Risk and Civilization. If you have sat at home and had a few bed days lazily watching the History Channel, you may recognize the older versions of Total War being utilized to reenact great historical battles of the world.
As seen by this in-game screenshot, the game in motion is as beautiful as a new bride walking down the aisle minus the flowers and cottony whiteness. The camera, while in battle, can be angled high in the sky to see formations and flanks shifting to zooming right down to the soldier's point of view to watch them load and blast grape shot at nearby sloops. Naval battles in particular are quite impressive as ships broadside one another having sails, masts, planks, and sailors become part of the watery wreckage.
Those eye catching things aside, the game plays out like you would expect any typical turned based strategy. After picking your favorite allegiance, the primary campaign starts in the year 1700 with the territories your country of choice owned. From there you begin to amass land and naval troops, pick new buildings for cities and capitals, research military, philosophical, or industrial upgrades, establish trade routes, adjust taxes, send spies on sabotage missions, rearrange heads of state, and conquer opposing faction territories to claim for your own. After exhausting all possibilities, you end your turn and a 6 month time period passes as all other factions do the same repeating the cycle until you reach the end year of your campaign.
One thing that's impressive is the AI's ability to do its best in replaying history out to how it truly happened. The "what if" choices make interesting results as the AI adapts to your decisions while simultaneously keeping as historically close to reality as possible. A separate campaign mode for the colonization of the US is also included called the Road to Independence for all those wishing to brush up on why Britain had such a hard time keeping tabs on those in the New Land.
The difficulty of the game seems much harder than previous Total War titles as the turtling and steamrolling is an almost non-existent strategy with high upkeep prices for each unit. A lot of political micromanagement is needed after completing philosophical upgrades and the people clamor for reform. Alliances and trade routes all come with their respective ex-girlfriend type baggage as the rest of the world is trying to accomplish the same thing as you.
The learning curve is about 5 - 10 hours depending on your past history with turned based strategies not to be confused with your past history with Stratego. There are a good amount of tutorials to step you through how to play the game but those things are for losers right? Once you get a good grasp on how to play the game, there is little that will piss off any player. Extra difficulty occurs dependent on the faction you chose at the start (large naval presence of northern European countries like Sweden vs almost exclusive land military presence with central Europe like Prussia) and may make for very different starting points and strategies but with one choice there are advantages and disadvantages abound.
Loading screens can get lengthy at times and Empire relishes in the latest technology by taking time to point out that it is "best played" with the newest i7 chip during initial loading screens. And it's just like a company to help remind the world how to spend all the disposable income we all have during this economic time.
Some pathing of your troops can be harrowing. On the map screen it may seem like only the most direct route can be chosen while the AI controlled troops will show you some type of tricky avoidance pathing. You will see the AI sidestepping right around forts and cities with troops in them making a sprint for your capital. Similarly in battles your troops will walk right in front of your artillery and take friendly fire causalities instead of walking behind them. After losing a general in battle to your own cannons you'll quickly learn what seems like a simple command can turn into a slap in the face and an embarrassment that your kids will never forget.
Great battles, graphics, sound, historical alignment, depth, and play make Total War: Empire an all-around strategy game into a benchmark of the first decade in the 21st century. With little to complain about, this game is worth the time it takes to complete just the "short campaign" and worth the extra time to replay it over and over trying out different sections of the world in the 18th century. I only wish that more people would be able to see games such as this and realize how great history class could of been as well as what most kids were probably daydreaming about in those 6th grade classes. Yup, you and Heather L., I mean the wars and what they must of been like.
Rating: 8.0 {on a scale of -10 to 10, a 5+ being a must play}
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