Napoleon Total War Limited Edition

Product Details

Napoleon Total War Limited Edition From Sega Price: $29.99 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Ships from and sold by Amazon.com 18 new or used available from $24.58 Average customer review:

Product Description

Napoleon: Total War is the newest chapter in the critically acclaimed Total War series from The Creative Assembly. In a vividly detailed, war-torn world, players assume the role of Napoleon during his extraordinary rise to power or play as his enemies in an attempt to rewrite history. This epic RTS adventure follows Napoleon’s devastating path of conquest and victory through nearly two decades of warfare from the early Italian campaign to the Battle of Waterloo. Napoleon: Total War also marks the single biggest innovation in the history of the franchise with an integrated multiplayer campaign that allows two players to fight for control of the campaign map and the fate of Europe.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1362 in Video Games
• Brand: Sega
• Model: 85250
• Released on: 2010-02-23
• ESRB Rating: Rating Pending
• Platforms: Windows Vista, Windows XP
• Format: DVD-ROM
• Number of items: 1
• Dimensions: .40 pounds

Features

• Completely separate from Empire: Total War, Napoleon immerses players in a concentrated, gripping wartime experience with exciting battles, memorable characters and Total War?s award winning signature mix
• Players can alter the course of history in objective-based missions across Europe. How they manage their troops across both land and sea can change the outcome of the war
• For the first time, two players battle head-to-head online utilizing three new main campaign maps. A new avatar system, achievements, gameplay bonuses, uniform customization and voice communications enhance the multiplayer experience
• 15 exclusive in-game units with Napoleon Total War-The ?Elite Regiment? is a collection of five of the most Elite Forces of the Napoleonic Wars, from all the major European factions.
• The ?Heroes of the Napoleonic Wars? is a 10 unit pack that gathers the most superb infantry and cavalrymen who fought during the great Napoleonic battles. Includes line infantry and calvary units from Prussia, Austria, France, Russia and Great Britain

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Customer Reviews

What Empire Total War Should Have Been I am a big Empire: Total War (hereinafter referred to as ETW) fan, and a few months ago, was wondering whether to get Napoleon: Total War (NTW). $39.99 for an "expansion pack" seemed rather exorbitant. However, since I am a huge fan of Napoleonic history (I read David Chandler's "Campaigns of Napoleon" front to back) I decided to take the plunge and pre-order off of Steam. I would also like to address the oft discussed topic of Steam. This review will NOT solely discuss the criticisms of Steam; if you want to do that, start a topic in Amazon's discussion forums. This is a review of the game itself, not of the distribution system. That being said, I would like to add that I'm not sure why there is such furor over Steam. I've used it for the past four years, and never had a problem with it. Anyone who's played Counter-Strike, the Half-Life series, or Day of Defeat Source will agree that Steam is a very convenient content distribution system. I prefer not having to physically store my game CDs; Steam is a popular system, and I don't see Valve suddenly folding up shop over the foreseeable future. Back to the review, installation from Steam took a few hours and 20 GB to download. The game requires Steam, so even if you purchase the physical DVDs from Amazon, Steam will be required for activation. Happily, the game is rock solid so far, no crashes of any kind. For comparison, here are my system specs: Core i7 920 4 GB Ram Single Nvidia GTX 260, Core 216 I'm running all settings on ultra, with the exception of a few token details. HDR is turned off, because frankly, I never liked the look and it unnecessarily burdens my system. Video optimization seems particularly smooth, and whereas the Campaign map would lag in ETW, I see no such problems here. The differences between NTW and ETW are many, some slight, but even the smallest modifications make a big and improved difference in Napoleon: Total War. NTW is what ETW should've been. Here are the main differences, which I've summarized in 4 main categories. VISUALS (Campaign map, battles, soldiers) GAMEPLAY (Shorter turn time, Campaigns like Road to Independence) ORGANIZATION (Historical Battles, Campaigns) MULTI-PLAYER First, the VISUALS. NTW is vastly upgraded over ETW in terms of visuals. There are now more soldier types per unit, some sporting brown or blonde hair, others with muttonchops or none. When you adjust the settings to the maximum, yes, there really are 64 face models as Creative Assembly boasts. Each engagement is a thing of beauty, with brightly besmocked soldiers, shakos and tri-corner hats, bayonets glistening in the air. Revolutionary Infantry soldiers march into battle barefoot! Napoleon's Old Guard Grenadiers look particularly resplendent in the new game engine. With white tunics, bear-skin caps with red plumes, and imposing figures, the Old Guard is brought to life and every bit as accurate as the history books. Heck, you can even make out the individual threads on the red epaulettes of the Guard. Cannon shells leave explosions bursting in the air, and cannon-balls leave deep furrows in the ground. The camera view rocks from nearby blasts. A few new unit animations have been added, including a horse dragging a dead rider away, foot caught in the stirrup. Battles are amazing, to say the least. Now, muskets fire with greater flash and smoke. The Campaign map has also been upgraded, showing greater detail. There are also a plethora of short cinematic clips, which help to cement the 19th century feel as well as teach you a little Napoleonic history. Naval battles have also been improved, with clouds in the sky, and sun glinting off the ocean. The battle interface bar is sleeker, and the battle control menu from ETW has been replaced with a translucent menu. Soldier portraits are larger, and more intricate. Battle landscapes feature environmental effects which in turn have an effect on unit statistics. Battles feel faster and more magnificent. Units upgrade their veterancy in real-time as well, so you often survive a hard-fought battle with elite units. Next, the GAMEPLAY. The biggest overhaul is to the Single-Player Campaign. It builds on ETW's "Road to Independence", featuring three linear campaigns which closely follow periods in the Napoleonic Era, from his early years with the Republican armies in Italy/Austria, to the forays into Egypt, and then the European theater. I think this type of linear storyline makes sense, given the focus on Napoleon's life. Additionally, the tutorials are more detailed, with three tutorials (land, naval, campaign) also illustrating early events in Napoleon's life on Corsica, and his travel to mainland France and subsequent rise to success. One huge change on the Campaign map which I really appreciate is the ability to speed up unit marching, which used to drag the single player turn time. Turn time is now two weeks rather than ETW's six months. Additionally, the campaign maps themselves are much more focused. Weather now impacts your strategic planning, so march your armies carefully! Troops must be supported by supply lines, and even the grandest of armies can be crippled by desertion and sickness. Rakes have been replaced by spies (good decision!) and greater flexibility is given to gentlemen. Spies have the ability to build up spy networks as well, if enough time is spent in an enemy city. When capturing a city, occupying forces finally have the option to either loot and kill the inhabitants or peacefully occupy. This option was sorely missed in ETW, even though it was present in the Rome and Medieval series. In naval battles, ships now have the ability to make repairs at sea, and further health bars on added to show the hull strength on left and right sides of the ship. Naval battles with large numbers of ships were already hard enough for me to manage in ETW, so while the new health bars are a nice touch, I probably won't be able to monitor them unless engaged in one-on-one combat. For land combat, units' morale is shown in real-time with a morale meter by each unit, and generals may rally or inspire select units. Each general is based on a historical figure (another nice touch), and are irreplaceable, so conserve them carefully. Generals level up, but their veteran experience gives them a nice touch in NTW. Higher ranked generals can deploy their men after lower ranked generals have already deployed, thus increasing your tactical superiority. This presents a tremendous tactical edge; during one memorable battle against the computer AI, I was able to place my Grand Batterie of artillerie a pied and completely enfilade his entire left flank, crushing the infantry and routing them before contact. Depleted units also automatically replenish when in friendly territory. Lastly, on the battlefield, there are additional inset video screens that bring your attention to critical news flashes, like when your general is in danger of being killed, or when a particular unit is in danger of routing. I could've done without the inset screen; it sounds helpful in principle, but in reality, the inset screen is too small and too low-resolution to discern anything useful. Next, we have ORGANIZATION. As previously mentioned, NTW builds on the Road to Independence Campaign featured in ETW. NTW also has a greater number of historical battles, which I thought ETW was severely deficient in. To add some excitement (or consternation), the historical battles must be unlocked one by one, and some major battles are featured, such as Borodino, Austerlitz, and of course, Waterloo. I would've liked to see some additional major battles, such as the Peninsular confrontations, the giant bloody square at Wagram or Napoleon's return to brilliance with the Six Days Campaign in 1814, which featured tactically brilliant demonstrations with his Old Guard. Or event Murat's enormous 10,000 strong cavalry charge against the Russian center at Eylau, or General Senarmont's brilliant use of case-shot against the Russians at Friedland? Alas, we will have to wait for a fan-made mod to relive those battles, I'm afraid. The Grand Campaign aka Campaigns of the Coalition allows play as one of France's enemies; Great Britain, Austria, Prussia, and Russia. However, the campaigns end around 1813; why not 1815 with the surrender and capture of Paris following Napoleon's abdication and permanent exile to St. Helena? Lastly, the MULTIPLAYER has been heavily hyped. Since I was never interested in multiplayer for ETW, the same is true for NTW, and I'll just briefly mention some of the new additions, some of which are quite significant. Besides the usual Steam achievements and hyped uniform editor, friends can drop into campaign battles in the single player campaign! Some online review sites have said that the new multiplayer feature is the icing on the cake, but I'll let you find out for yourself. In summary, here are the pros and cons: PROS: - Vastly upgraded graphics - Gorgeous battles - Improved interface and playability - Napoleonic theme - Multi-player (if you're into that) - Stable build, no crashes - Shorter load times CONS: - Need to shell out more cash - No fife/marching music? - No additional unit formations, e.g. mixed order formation? - Sieges are best auto-resolved - Minor AI Quirks - Cannons shooting into the backs of own troops, !$#@% Just a brief note about the cons; I noticed they added a fife playing soldier to each infantry unit, however, he doesn't seem to play any particularly famous historical tune. I used to play a MicroProse Napoleonic game in the 1990s called Fields of Glory, and it featured some brilliant period music, including La Victoire est a Nous, British Grenadiers, and Yorckscher March. I didn't hear any historical marching music (although the fife guy was playing some sort of tune), but Creative Assembly did mention the possibility of marching music, so my fingers are crossed. The fife guy was also playing too quietly to be heard over the din of musketry and game music. Additionally, I would have liked to see some additional formations besides square, column, and line. Troops seem to form square faster though, and graphically, they aren't thrown about as much by charging cavalry. Now excuse me, I need to dig up Sergei Bondarchuk's 1970 masterpiece and re-watch it. Yes, NTW is that good, and I'm happy with the purchase. Now when will Total War: American Civil War and Total War: Franco-Prussian War be released? **EDIT** (02/27/2010): Yes, there is fife music. The game music needs to be turned off, set your infantry to walk (not double time), and zoom in on them. You'll see the fife-bearing soldier playing away. I don't recognize the tunes though, but hopefully they'll include Victoire est a Nous or La vieille Garde. What Empire Total War should ha--- oh wait, someone took this title Well I can't help it, that's exactly how to describe this game. It's a stand-alone, meaning you don't need Empire Total War to play it. However, if it weren't for Empire Total War's greater scope, in terms of a 200 turn campaign, more playable nations, and larger maps and starting in 1700, this could possibly replace Empire Total War. Aesthetically, this game is beautiful. The battle map UI has been changed dramatically from the standard RTW/M2TW/ETW standard to something different, with the map on the upper-right hand corner. But the units have gone back to the Medieval II Total War system of randomizing them, so rather than the identical clones of ETW, people have a wide variety of faces, complete with distinct features, mustaches, beards, etcetera, uniforms vary differently. At one point, I saw a man dressed in red alongside my Napoleon Bonaparte unit, and thought HE was Napoleon, so I understandably freaked out when he died in the first artillery barrage. He was the ONLY guy dressed in red, too. Reflecting the technology of the age, muskets have greater range, and shoot slightly faster. What I thought a rather odd change was that the UI cards (as in, the little pictures of the soldiers on the maps when you select them that show you what they look like and how many of them there are) are changed in style, in a way that is less like a pre-rendered CG creation, and more an actual in-game representation, all uniformly standing forward, which makes them look rather like childrens' toys. Perhaps this is good, but generals now have actual historical portraits for their UIs. This is something I've seen done on Mods, especially for Medieval II Total War, where pictures of characters like Baldwin IV or Salah ad-Din or Guy de Lusignon had pictures of the characters from the movie "Kingdom of Heaven" for them. It's definitely a better thing for me to have the historical portraits, as it better shows to me that these people truly existed, and makes me giddy to be able to wield Bonaparte and Marshal Ney and all the historical favorites directly. Save for the newer units and technological tactics, and the new functions of artillery where they leave craters where they strike, the battle gameplay is essentially unchanged. AI is still insane where enemy generals will charge head-on with the army five meters behind them, though more often than not, they will avoid this. The campaign map is beautiful, a definite improvement over the eyesore that the ETW campaign map was. Colors are less bold and disruptive, you can clearly see what territory is yours and what isn't, and the region where units can walk is now soft blue rather than neon green. This makes it difficult in some cases to see where an army's route ends when it starts mixing with snow hidden under fog of war, but the edges are smoother. Cities look better and everything in general just looks smoother, more muted, and more realistic. Even the lighting changes in the seasons, with winter months being slightly dimmer than summer months. The campaign map UI is more clean and organized, with important buttons all on the right side, leaving space open for the radar and unit/building screen and such. The luxury of not having to handle a 100 year timeframe means that the game has done something no other Total War game has had---reduced the amount of time between turns to an incredibly low timeperiod. Every turn passes 2 weeks in-game, so you have 26 turns per year. This not only does wonders for historical (and physical) accuracy, but lets you recreate the Napoleonic campaigns without having Napoleon die of old age before you've even started entering Russia. This compared to Empire Total War's American Revolution campaign, where I started in 1774 and ended up winning the war by 1798. The Campaign AI has, however, not improved too much. At the very least, enemies are less insane and more true to history, though that could be that historically, the nations opposing Napoleon WERE insane in their lust to drive Napoleon out of power. But the heavy use of triggers has guaranteed that certain things will result in definite changes. For example, taking Vienna will have the Austrian Empire immediately sue for peace and sign a peace treaty. As well, when you take settlements, you have the options of taking it peacefully or looting, with the screen showing you outright how much money you stand to gain immediately, long-term, and public order. Sometimes, you have the option to liberate settlements and create new minor factions that are vassals to you. I think Empire Total War could do this, but in my entire campaign, I was never able to liberate any settlements and bring certain factions back from the dead. Annoyances continue to be the computer's cheating and being capable of fielding multiple armies without going bankrupt, while your nation is twice as large and cannot even afford two major armies. One peculiar bit that enrages me is the tendency for Marshal Ney to constantly die in battles that are auto-resolved with him in it. He ALWAYS manages to die. Disappointing AI, poor challenge, but decent multiplayer experience. SINGLE PLAYER = 1 STAR
The
campaign AI (strategic) seems passive and the diplomacy is still a weak
spot for the AI. The AI nations do not know how to cooperately work
together to defeat the French and are easy to pick off piecemeal. This
is a smaller issue when you look at the tactical battle AI which is
incompetent (but slightly improved over the Empire BAI). The worst
issues are (1) Suicide generals that stupidly attack ahead of their
troops and cause a morale drop when they are killed, (2) Poor field
placement of artillery that needlessly exposes them to attack, (3) AI
does a poor job of maintaining line formation with indiviudal units
breaking line formation, (4) AI forms square formation based on cavalry
proximity not based on threat, (5) Cavalry predictably flank to attack
your artillery, (6) Sieges are HORRIBLE with the stupid batman grappling
hooks.

MULTI-PLAYER = 4 STARS
If you are buying Napoleon to
play Multiplayer or for its player drop in feature, this game is worth
serious consideration. Creative Assembly/SEGA has done a nice job of
adding a lot of features that make this game enjoy. Note this is really
only for the battles as there is no player vs player campaign game. If I
was to rank this game on Multiplayer alone, I'd give it 4 stars as I've
encountered a few glitches and crashes

GRAPHICS = 5 STARS
Stunning
visual graphics.

MUSIC = 3 STARS
Seems like most of the music
is a recyle of Empire's music. Its ok, but nothing great.

CONCLUSION:
Whether you like Napoleon or not is going to depend on your expectations and the type of gamer you are. I'm a wargamer by nature, play single player, and enjoy a decent challenge. Arguments about whether the AI will ever be able to beat a human are moot points with me as I play in a straight forward manner meeting the AI head on, in line formation, no flanking, and I do not deliberately single out the enemy general. Prior to Empire, the total war series AI (STW, RTW, MTW, MTW2)offered a respectable challenge to me. These eras were mostly hand-to-hand melee and not musket fire. The battle engine simply doesn't do a good job of handling line formation fire and manuever. The other features save it from a 1 star rating by me.