Something that grinded my gears with Shogun 2, was that everything felt so homogeneous. Every faction's units looked identical to mine, every city looked identical to mine, every everything looked identical to mine. Yes, every everything. It made sense thematically, Japan is, well, Japan. There's not going to be much significant cultural difference to find. But even so, it just felt too samey, compared to previous iterations in the series, where each faction felt unique in so many ways.
Well, Rome 2 aims to bring that unique feel back. As a new entry into the Total War Wiki shows, the various capital cities around the ancient world will look very different from each other. This not only makes thematic sense, but also helps bring forth some of the new gameplay mechanics that Rome 2 features, such as amphibian assaults, where you'll be able to fight with ships and infantry all in the same battle. Neat!
September 3 really can't come soon enough at this point.
Posted 17-08-2013, 15:22
Yeah I loved how the different factions and their cities were so unique in Rome 1. It gave me more of an incentive to be friends/enemies with them. The gauls were a constant pest, and I made it my crusade to have them eradicated. In Shogun 2, you had to go by the name and the color of their banner to see the "difference", and it made it hard to care, or feel connected with the various factions.
Only about two weeks now!
Posted 17-08-2013, 01:41
This is great news. Variety is one of the major weaknesses of Shogun 2, pretty much every siege looks the same (as you said it does indeed make sense thematically, but in terms of playing it...not so much).
Everything I heard about Rome II gets me a bit more excited. It is going to be so nice going back to the more grand scale and variety that these games can accomplish.
Posted 16-08-2013, 17:44
Copy and pasting stuff shows laziness, good to hear they're not being lazy about this one.