Is Total War: Pharaoh TOO SMALL for a Full Title?
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- Опубліковано 29 чер 2024
- No doubt, there are not a lot of main cultures, and not a lot of space on the map. On the other hand, is there value in restricting player expansion and exploring a period with depth rather than breadth? If it is well executed, the map is probably fantastic, and if poorly executed, it is just a saga game at a higher price. Let me know your thoughts in the comments!
Learn more about the factions of Total War: Pharaoh here:
• Total War: Pharaoh Lor...
Or deep dive into the Hittites here:
• Hittites - Ігри
Really, my main gribe is the lack of the Sumerian/Babylonian and Assyrian peoples. Having a game centered around the Bronze Age Collapse without Sumer is like if Gaul wasn't in Rome 2.
Well they've cut that for the DLC lmao
@@Based_Witch_HunterI was about to say. There is no way they would leave that out permenantly
Sumer was long gone by 1205 BC
Legit. Also what about ancient Greece? The mycenea
@@hamiltoncork5778 total war troy combines with total war pharaoh for example in warhammer
They need to add Assyria, Babylonia, and the greeks and maybe Ethiopia and that would be a good sized map. I really want this game to have success so we can get more historical games.
Having a Bronze age game without Assyria and Babylon is like rome 2 but theres no Carthage and Selucids. Why the heck is it not on the map?
If it was the same amount of cities as Rome 2 then yes it would be too small. There are far more regions and cities, then you add the system of forts you have to get through and i hope players will find this area is far bigger than it appears. Would be cool to see Mesopotamian factions tho
We will talk about the prospects for Ｍｅｓｏｐｏｔａｍｉａ DLC next episode. Make sure to subscribe! lol
Looking forward to paying an extra $20 for one additional Grand Campaign I could be interested in playing >>
It's not too small. Shogun takes place in only one country - Japan. Same how Three Kingdoms takes place in one country - China. Perspective is also important. In Empire France consists of Paris, and maybe one or two more cities. At the same time, Kingdoms DLC for Medieval 2 gave players four new campaigns and dozens of new units and mechanics. Shadow of Change... not so much for the price of half of full game.
"Mesopotamia" sounds like a good title for a DLC ;)
In all honesty, I have no problem with the map size of the Pharaoh. It seems quite fitting for the theme and epoch.
I hope for some Immortal Empires-style map with Troy, to add to the thematic game a classic Total War world domination mode by adding Greece, Krete and Western Anatolia.
UPDATE: Recently CA announced they will be adding Assyria, Babylon, Mycenae, and Troy to Total War Pharaoh in a free update later this year (2024).
Lmaoo, yall know whats happening, its us to either allow it or to force it to change. I, for one, will be making sure this is the first TW title i dnt own. And from gameplay numbers im not alone. Im tempted, but fuck no im not gonna let CA continue to pimp us out fam.
The Bronze Age Collapse was basically one of the first times when advanced "civilization" basically ceased to exist. Most of the major empires like the Hittites, the Mycenians and other abruptly and mysteriously collapsed. Major cities where destroyed and never resettled again. There where famines, earthquakes and the mysterious sea peoples raided and ransacked the region. Shoreline towns where abandoned and it's populations relocated on higher more defendable places. Egypt was the major power to survive into the iron Age, but was a shadow of it's self. This game will likely be like Attila, an apocalyptic end of civilization game.
I'd prefer the base game to include Mesopotamia and Greece (even though they're unplayable). And unlock them via DLC.
It's a more complete Bronze Age experience when they're included.
I hope they add those regions in the future.
Troy was not received well due to trying to please 2 different player bases and ended up pleasing neither.
Bronze age was full of civilizations (Babylonians, Assyrians, Minoans, Canaanites, Trojans, etc...). In this game they did only 2 miserable factions. I've never seen anything so lazy and limited in my whole life.
Eight. There’s eight factions and three playable cultures. And we already know that the Libyans, Nubians, Habiru, and Sea People’s will be represented
@@obscure-cultist1709 Yes, that's what I mean, any mediocre mod for RTW offers 3 times more factions and units (usually mods for RTW or medieval II offer 29 factions). Pharao is the most shameful TW minigame ever
Total war doesn't need faction diversity. The actual core mechanics need to be innovative again, at the very least good again.
Ill give a small example. Remember ladders in medieval 2, normal looking and functional things which units carried with their hands. Units could even run while holding them. Now every total was has the same massive ridiculous looking siege ladders. Its as if every faction has assyrian level siege machines. This is just laziness.
Why not both?
@@ShadowWolfRising Both would be great but not exactly confident in CA being able to do that.
I just want the games to be about positioning and not +5 percent bonuses😢
I personally like historical games with limited scope. As long as it is counterbalanced with more time and resources put into properly portraying the region and its history. More broad games with expansive maps like Medival 2 or Empire end up being quasi-historical. Especially regions like Central and Eastern Europe and the Balkans that usually end u being just an amalgamation of stereotypes mixed with pure fantasy.
When it comes to Total War Pharaoh it really reminds me of the good old Slitherine games like Chariots of War (the same setting as Pharaoh) or Spartan/Troy. Come to think of it, two of the last three historical Total War titles really felt like modern attempts at recreating those old games.
Considering that Shogun 2 remains one of the most critically acclaimed TL titles in history shows that focused experience, good setting, and solid game mechanics are far more important that this mythical "diversity" of units and factions.
You are exactly right. Broader almost always turns into a mess with important stuff skipped over or stereotyped. Remember the Egyptians in Rome TW who were basically a thousand years anachronistic? Depth like this gives more possibility for historicism. I think the #1 reason for all the complaining is everyone coming off TW Warhammer, which I really do quite like as well, but the scope on that is absolutely unprecedented, and we should neither want nor expect every title to be on that scale
@@entirelyalive I don’t think it’s the warhammer syndrome. Rather, the demographic that seems most upset is the historical purists. Who jealously look at how much the fantasy fans have been getting and are clamoring, “when’s our turn to get a title just for us?”
The recent titles allegedly meant for them (3K and Troy) are dismissed as fantasy in sheep’s clothing. So when they hear about this next historical title and see it’s a saga (allegedly…whether that label is appropriate is debatable) that’s very similar to Troy, a title they (historical purists) already rejected, they got mad/disappointed/etc.
*by warhammer syndrome, I mean the idea that whatever next game needs to match the same level of planet wide scale and unparalleled faction diversity found in the warhammer series. That is a separate problem.
This is historical purists feeling (whether it’s true is debatable) like yesterdays trash because every recent title has been fantasy or fantasy in disguise. No “true” pure historical setting like the first handful of titles.
@@sphaera2520 Are those "historical purists" in the room with us right now?
Seriously though, people who really care about historical accuracy and realism either moved to play Slitherine games( Field of Glory or Pike&Shot) or Paradox titles or they never played Total Wars in the first place. Or only played with a lot of mods.
It is usually the Warhammer fans that constantly talk about those supposed historical purists that are oh-so jealous and want to take the fun from them. Honestly sound to me like the hive mind created a strawman and now heroically fights against it.
@@entirelyalive Oh yeah, Egypt in Rome 1 was absolutely ridiculous.
You might be right about Warhammer, the scale of that series was huge.
Although I do hope CA will try to make a historical title with such scope trying to imitate Paradox.
They f'd up. Pharoah had the chance of being am awesome title, representing the entire bronze age world, but they decided to make a Saga size map.
I totally agree, the game itself is in my opinion really good, the new campaign mechanics are the most intricate of the TW series so far in my opinion. But the business model was not ok, they tried to sell it for 60 dollars and then sell the other half as a DLC. However you have to give props for CA for lowering the price-point of the upcoming DLC + the base game. By doing this they fixed the major problem in my opinion. Now since its a historical time setting unit diversity is not going to be huge as its pre-gunpowder warfare. The collapse is quite annoying to play, but invasions seem to stop after turn 140. I think the map size is similar to the realm of chaos map / give or take. In terms of total war rome this map may depict more countries it wasn't larger in terms of gameplay, in rome egypt was maybe 4 regions total, i think if u count all the sections of romes map and count the sections of the egyptian map its probably similar in size.
The price just doesn’t match the amount of content. No ifs, ands or buts.
You know, I think Sagas, as a concept was good, going back to the game's Shogun roots - with a a highly specific time period, limited culture set, highly specific goals, etc etc. What they failed at with that though is A) calling it Sagas, and thus creating a distinction between the continent-spanning titles and the more specific, regional, titles, B) using Sagas as an excuse to treat these games as "Budget TW" titles essentially. If they had just called Thrones and Troy full Total War titles, then accentuated the "back to its roots as a title with a tighter geographic constraint" and really leaned much more into it...several titles back, then I think that the response to Pharaoh wouldn't be what it is.
In isolation, Pharaoh is a lot of fun, but it suffers greatly from these missteps from the previous Saga titles that could have easily been avoided if CA's marketing was a little more aware of the long-term repercussions of their decisions. And this wasn't helped at all at an point by CA themselves, who leaned into the concept of a full-priced Sagas title to the point where they had nowhere to go but down in their handling of the situation.
Its not a full title. Its a troy expantion
The map is basically Napoleon TW's Egypt Campaign. 🤣
Feels like a very fleshed out DLC Campaign. Not a full game.
I mean, it looks like it will cover most of importany Bronze Age regions with the exception of Greece, so I can't complain. Aside from Upper and Lower Egypt, the Levant, Mesopotamia, Anatolia and Greece, there really weren't any regions in the world with any significance aside from maaaybe the Indus River Valley ... so yeah, as long as CA really makes what's in the game interesting, I'll be happy.
They could nip this in the bud if they just came out and confirmed whether they are going to do expansions that add other areas. like warhammer 2 and ; except as dlc rather than completely new titles. because as others have said, having it set durg the collapse of the bronze age without greece and mesopotamia is really dumb.
maybe its a smal map but we have to actually discover more , the sky is gone they used befor. now we need to walk to the edge to see its something there ? like hiding behind a fake wall or something ? maybe i am worng but that would be cool.
If I'm being generous, I'd say that that CA's Saga series hasn't done well in the past so they are putting very limited resources into this title to see if they can make it work after learning from previous saga titles. If it's popular, they'll expand the game more. I know Thrones of Britannia was supposed to get DLC but never did
As someone who dearly loves the Bronze Age and everything around it (including the Trojan War/the great Collapse), and despite loving how this game looks and feels (I loved playing Troy TW too), this intentionally underutilized scope of the game and map is the main reason I am not buying this game right now.
No families or dynasties that can be built up over generations (just invincible heroes and their armies it seems), a setting that covers just a few decades instead of the glorious centuries of Late Bronze Age, and most importantly - only 1/3 of the vibrant world of the Bronze Age Near East offered as gameplay.
That legendary hero style of gameplay was accepted by the community for Troy, because that game was built entirely around Iliad and the single generation "world-war" type situation in that story. It won't work in a realistic scenario that has more historical authenticity as its core focus.
Without peoples like Mesopotamians, Zagrosians, Semites and Aegeans (to group peoples for sake of keeping it short) and the numerous powerful civilizations they created for example, it just feels like a limited battle scenario between Egypt and Hittites with a few Sea Peoples thrown in (something akin to a minor campaign in Napoleon Total War, which were all free) instead of a full grand campaign Total War series was known for.
That intentional cutting down of scale and scope just left a bit of bad taste in my mouth. So much potential, never utilized.
I love the new innovations and returning features, and how it looks. But I'll only get this game on a sale few years down the line, when it has hopefully been expanded to cover the entire Near East.
Thanks for your video Oldest Stories! I think that future DLCs will expand the map, that's a matter of time. Just I hope that this limited area will be executed well enough to keep interest of playerbase. Without this factor, we cannot get Mesopotamian cultures, Elamites, Agaean Sea region - with Mycaenians, Arzawa and other Anatolians, tribes from Arabia (Hebrews, Arameans, proto-Arabs), barbarians from the north (Kaskans, Phrygians, Dorians), as well as African cultures - Libyans, Punt and Kushites in one game. CA will choose some of them, so they will deliver promised DLCs in Dynasty edition, but shortly after that this game will be abandoned and we will never get other AAA Bronze Age game :(
Maybe maybe not
It all comes down to execution, and from the dev diaries I am reasonably hopeful. They have been showing off quite a lot, which they probably would avoid if the whole thing was a buggy mess. But we will see lol.
At a glance it seems similar in size to TW: Shogun 2, which is still my favourite Total War game to this day, so I don't think the world map size will bother me. As for the rest.... I don't know. We'll have to wait and see, I guess.
I have to fully agree.
Without Mesopotamia it's the equivalent of Napoleon Ottoman and Med II Crusades.
They could have made it similar to Rome where it were faction based focused on one part of the whole but included the whole picture.
TWW3's map is literally the entire planet. Meanwhile historical players can't even get a whole continent anymore
Most of the history fans have been wanting two games. Medieval and a new empire total war. The bar hasn’t been raised to that level of total war for history fans since Rome 2.
I understand trying to be innovative and trying new eras but we’ve been asking for the same thing for a long time. These new innovations have all been let downs and countries don’t feel diverse or impactful as the old titles.The eras of medieval and empire provide plenty of diversity between countries. Just update my graphics/ gameplay/ throw in some new mechanics. If it’s not broken don’t fix it
"The amount of faction diversity could never match a world with magic, and dragons, and rat people, and multiple flavors of hell people and even... CHINESE PEOPLE" this took me by surprise lmao
Yeah wtf was that, lol?
this mapsize could work great with time intervals per week Id say
I'm just happy it's somewhat historical
Sizes are not just numbers of cities and regions, but diversities of factions, richness of geologically different regions, and dynamic changes happening on the map.
Warhammer/Med/Rome has the first, 3K/Atilla/Napoleon has the second, Shogun has the third. Pharoah so far does not look so good, more like Troy/ToB.
Don't worry there will be lots of faction I see there is already 4 faction dlcs
Oh great, who doesn't love paying 3x for ONE full game 😂😂
It is too unfamiliar. Most of us have pop culture and history references in the West to Samurai culture. European history and mythology are well-known in the Western world and ingrained in our culture. Most people's frame of reference for this title will be the Ten Commandments, Age of Mythology RTS, Pharoh City Builder, and the Mummy films. As for me, ancient Egypt is Pyramids, tombs, and mummies. It is farming the banks of the Nile. It is not about Conquests and war.
With that said, pending on how the aesthetics and infrastructure is, I may try the game. I want stunning cities with monolithic pyramids and temples. I want Nile crocodiles eating soldiers in the reeds. If we are going to to something so specific, I expect it to feel like stereo-typical ancient Egypt every step of the way.
I am just bummed no Babylon
Check out the DLC episode, I examine the odds of us getting Kassite Babylonia, among other nations.
Maybe you'll cover it in the next vid, but the map will dictate how those promised DLC faction packs go down. Surely the Assyrians are going to be one, perhaps the "Sea People's" as a nomadic faction... Seems messy on a map this small...
They could have changed the ressource icons to make them look less hellenic, I mean look at the stones lol
Will be the people of the sea in the campaign?
at launch, they show up as enemies. The hope is that they might be playable in a DLC pack someday.
Dude you really gotta increase the voice volume
I'm not a fan of the art style for Troy and Pharaoh. The arcade style is perfect for Warhammer, but it cheapens historical titles. The previous historical titles all had art styles that appeared semi-realistic or befitting of the time period.
Totally agree with your analysis. I had been waiting for a total war focused on the bronze age for a long time, and I like the focus they are giving to the game. Naturally, many of the doubts raised by this approach will only be resolved when we see the final product, let's hope that they are able to implement them in such a way that they do justice to this period that, in my opinion, is one of the most fascinating in history. ...
Shogun 2 not small, but in Pharaoh small? Wth. Okey
i hope they include Hittites, Babylonians and Mitanni people's to have a full Bronze Age game, that would be amazing and something a history buffs would appreciate. And the Sea people as some kind of Attila roaming band from the total war Attila.
Game needs a personal touch like first person mode
I wish they could add the Mycenaean Empire
the mycenaean had fallen few centuries before this game takes place
@@polatucos15 Nope. Pharaoh take place shortly before Merneptahs death (1203 BC). The Mycenaean palaces and big cities perished around/after 1200 BC; we don't have exact dates.
The best vanilla total war game was set in a far far far smaller setting: Shogun 2. Just another invalid criticism.
Honestly some Karens must have a great life if they can't find anything better to complain about.
they said this map had the same if not greater size than shogun, with more faction diversity so yeah, i belive the saga title where just a bad marketing thing for older games as now thats just "Saga=bad" in many peoples minds
I half think it comes from youtubers / tiktokkers desperate to make any controversial content possible. Then it feeds an ecosystem of complaint and counter complaint like this video here. Everyone's view count and ad revenue goes up, but nothing of substance is produced. Still, I don't mind joining in if it gets people excited for the actual history.
And some of the best regarded DLCs are the limited scope campaigns, such as Age of Charlemagne, Rise of the Republic, etc. The Kingdoms expansion of Medieval 2 and its campaigns are also considered some of the best.
@@entirelyalive yeah think so to although the lack of mesopotami a was a shot in the foot, but game still looks good and i will buy a week after realease
@@luisgonzalez_97 deffinatly, and i wish that the game succede, mabye we evengetr a rise of the assyrians campaign dlc in the future
turn the music down
total war needs to give up the story guided games and just start giving fans the time peiord and mechanics without the guided gameplay, i want to make my own story in the time period instead of following someone elses
I dont really care about map size. CA needs to make their battles good before I ever buy a Total War game again.
Edit: Copying Paradox Interactive on the campaign map, and CAs new stupid RPG elements aren't enough to mask their lame battles and stupid AI. And no historical fan wants dragons or any of that stupid "variety".
Your arguments like "you can't have that much diversity in history like in fantasy" that is really dull... RTW Bronze Age mod cover a larger territory with probably more unit variation, more flavour and taste with all the limitations of the old RTW. If a modern title cannot surpass an almost 20 year title (for fuck sake a mod a of a 20 year old game) then it deserves all the shit is getting.
If I have to play a Bronze Age TW which I would love to play it, it would have to cover the entire eastern Mediterranean to the Zagros mountains. I want all the main actors of the age, having the graphics and tech to making a gorgeous game I want all mayor and minor cultures of the time fleshed out. I want Egypt, the Hittites, an insane amount of Canaanite tribes, Amorrite cities, the Assirians, every Mycenean palaces, the Luwians, the Trojans, the Arzawans, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Elamites... I want them all including the sea peoples and I want some of the mentioned becoming Sea People after being vanquished and being part of the nomad menace. If Sega/CA or whoever doesn't have the ambition and balls for all this and more with all the money and resources they have then fuck them they don't deserve my money because they have to surpass what they already have done and what the community has done with mods.
I earn my money with lots of hardship and sweat I would only spend it in people who delivers and has the work ethic that understand that they have to achieve greater heights in every game and the TW games has become cheap and lazy with all the warhammer bs audience which are terribly casual and don't understand they are paying for an over price piece of garbage because they are casual players. The company doesn't have the proper work ethic nor creative vision for a title like Pharaoh and the audience has been spoiled with mediocrity for the last 10 years or more I don't expect to be surprise with any of these titles...
The problem is the map may be centered in the right sphere of influence e.g parts of anatolia, the levant and Egypt, but there are key areas missing. Where is ancient Greece and crete? Where is babylonia? Where is Cyprus? These factions and areas were key to the bronze age. They aren't there for two reasons, developer laziness and so that other factions can be sold later as dlc. I will not be buying this game and it is a glorified saga game in every sense. RIP historical total wars, we wont get another good one either at all or for years. The franchise is dead.
: )
Real life will always be more diverse than a fantasy setting, you should know better, also at the end there you are basically describing total war Attila with the whole not expanding bit and just surviving.
no, fantasy is by nature more diverse than real life as it takes all the elements of real life and tacks other shit on top
@@juwebles4352all fantasy is informed by history. And not all fantasy is high fantasy.
Yeah but Attila was set during the fall of the Romans, who historically covered most of Europe from the Mediterranean outwards. The complaints about Pharaoh’s map size are the equivalent of demanding that you could invade China and Sub-saharan Africa in Rome 2
@@obscure-cultist1709 i don't think asking for Babylon is ridiculous.
@@atari947 I do think it's kind of wasteful seeing as Pharaoh is themed around the Sea People invasions which had little to do with Babylon. They had their own problems
Reskinned troy not full priced game.
"Thrones of Britannia and Troy were criticized for dumbass fucking reasons and those should be entirely ignored."
Troy 2
I really hate the animations. Its very artifical, robotic and immersion breaking.
it doesnt matter because this game is not intresting already. Who likes half-naked warriors? Where's cavalery? Chariots is no seriously...
Maybe because by that time cavalry squads didn't existed at all. The only thing you had as horsemen only delivered messages, but still no mounted units.