The Hype around this game

[Sledge]

I love the historical TW games: Rome 1, Rome 2, Medieval 2, Shogun 2, even Thrones of Britannia. I've had Attila for the longest time, but just recently started to get into the game.

Firstly, the game definitely has character - the music, art/design, maps and even the mechanics really excel at painting a doomsday setting. That said there are some huge issues with this game, issues which make me question just why so much praise was heaped on this game by the historical community.

1) The game barely freaking works. Upon fresh install, everything seemed to be fine; ~100 turns into a campaign I start getting random crashes, sometimes even during the game launch. UI glitches with unit cards or dialogue boxes not being fully visualized. Just general performance during games - Rome 2 w/ DeI runs much better than this game.

2) Everyone talks highly of the mechanics, especially in comparison to Rome 2. While there are some interesting features added (horde mechanics, faction/dynasty management, governors), some of this stuff just seems unfinished. Playing the Last Roman Campaign, I cant for the life of me figure out how control, dominion and power interplay with each other. I win battles with my generals and make political appointments, but all 3 metrics seems to stay at roughly 50%, with a gradual decline from there. There just doesnt seem to be any logic to how these mechanics were designed or, if there is, its not well explained at all.

3) The combat is decent in some regards, but absolutely arcadey in other aspects. I do like the increased emphasis on flanking and morale shock tactics (something that was lacking in vanilla Rome 2), but this game still suffers from the OP syndrome - some units are just plain and simple OP and will cut through your own troops or take ages to kill. General bodyguards (mounted) will take a charge from my spearmen and will take many minutes to route - the immersion-breaking unit stat modifiers still seems to be alive in well in this game.

4) This game definitely borrowed some voice acting and assets from Rome 2. Not a huge deal, but it does detract from the argument that Attila is in a league of its own.

I really want to get into this game, but the 1st issue (frequent crashes) is really killing the experience for me.

[Sledge]

Game crashing might be an issue of playing in an area with poor internet and Alienware Command Center overlay. With overlay off and steam in offline mode, the game seems to run, though I am still encountering runtime errors in a campaign that I put a lot of time into.

Regarding game play (both campaign and tactical) - I'm not saying it's bad per se, but I am saying that there is a lot of hype around what is an otherwise okay game. The tactical battles are just over way too fast IMHO. And yes, I understand that Roman infantry had degraded noticeably by the time of Attila and that cavalry had higher weight on the battlefield, but that doesnt make up for the lack of historical authenticity in stationary cavalry tanking a blob of infantry. And I understand the campaign mechanics of Attila (Rome 2 DeI has far more nuanced/complex mechanics IMHO); I'm just saying that there isn't a whole lot of synergy in their implementation.

Overall, the game is decent, but I think it is far from the all-time great that may historical players consider it to be.

[Sledge]

Also, the agent spam in this game is absolutely insane. Playing on normal, I'll literally see AI factions send swarms of agents to degrade units and remove campaign movement for my armies. I've literally had armies get stranded for several turns, allowing nearby enemy armies to harass and destroy them.

[XTAKK]

Originally posted by Sledge.M:

Also, the agent spam in this game is absolutely insane. Playing on normal, I'll literally see AI factions send swarms of agents to degrade units and remove campaign movement for my armies. I've literally had armies get stranded for several turns, allowing nearby enemy armies to harass and destroy them.

Wow I wish the AI would be smarter like this in all total wars. Using agents correctly to harass and pin your armies in place so they can take decisive victories is great tactics.

[Sledge]

Originally posted by XTAKK:

Originally posted by Sledge.M:

Also, the agent spam in this game is absolutely insane. Playing on normal, I'll literally see AI factions send swarms of agents to degrade units and remove campaign movement for my armies. I've literally had armies get stranded for several turns, allowing nearby enemy armies to harass and destroy them.

Wow I wish the AI would be smarter like this in all total wars. Using agents correctly to harass and pin your armies in place so they can take decisive victories is great tactics.

Yes, but when the AI factions can literally spawn high-level agents, one after another, it gets a bit frustrating. The RNG on your own agent's success means that your own agents will fail quite often. It all just indicates anti-player bias in the game overall. That's not fun, just boring and frustrating.

[Hark]

Originally posted by Sledge.M:

Originally posted by XTAKK:

Wow I wish the AI would be smarter like this in all total wars. Using agents correctly to harass and pin your armies in place so they can take decisive victories is great tactics.

Yes, but when the AI factions can literally spawn high-level agents, one after another, it gets a bit frustrating. The RNG on your own agent's success means that your own agents will fail quite often. It all just indicates anti-player bias in the game overall. That's not fun, just boring and frustrating.

No, they "literally" cannot. Agent amount is capped by Imperium.

[Sledge]

Originally posted by Hark:

Originally posted by Sledge.M:

Yes, but when the AI factions can literally spawn high-level agents, one after another, it gets a bit frustrating. The RNG on your own agent's success means that your own agents will fail quite often. It all just indicates anti-player bias in the game overall. That's not fun, just boring and frustrating.

No, they "literally" cannot. Agent amount is capped by Imperium.

I see a bunch of high level agents make the same attempt on my generals/armies only 3-4 turns after killing previous ones. The AI agent spam in this game is undeniable.

[Sledge]

Also, the the arrow towers collapsing and killing nearby troops is just unbelievably gamey and stupid. Who within CA thought that would be a good idea?

I've literally had more of my troops die from collapsing towers than I've had from actual combat against the defenders. It's to the point where I prefer to auto-resolve siege battles in order to avoid the foolishness of these sieges.

[Happy ChowChow]

Originally posted by Sledge.M:

I love the historical TW games: Rome 1, Rome 2, Medieval 2, Shogun 2, even Thrones of Britannia. I've had Attila for the longest time, but just recently started to get into the game.

Firstly, the game definitely has character - the music, art/design, maps and even the mechanics really excel at painting a doomsday setting. That said there are some huge issues with this game, issues which make me question just why so much praise was heaped on this game by the historical community.

1) The game barely freaking works. Upon fresh install, everything seemed to be fine; ~100 turns into a campaign I start getting random crashes, sometimes even during the game launch. UI glitches with unit cards or dialogue boxes not being fully visualized. Just general performance during games - Rome 2 w/ DeI runs much better than this game.

2) Everyone talks highly of the mechanics, especially in comparison to Rome 2. While there are some interesting features added (horde mechanics, faction/dynasty management, governors), some of this stuff just seems unfinished. Playing the Last Roman Campaign, I cant for the life of me figure out how control, dominion and power interplay with each other. I win battles with my generals and make political appointments, but all 3 metrics seems to stay at roughly 50%, with a gradual decline from there. There just doesnt seem to be any logic to how these mechanics were designed or, if there is, its not well explained at all.

3) The combat is decent in some regards, but absolutely arcadey in other aspects. I do like the increased emphasis on flanking and morale shock tactics (something that was lacking in vanilla Rome 2), but this game still suffers from the OP syndrome - some units are just plain and simple OP and will cut through your own troops or take ages to kill. General bodyguards (mounted) will take a charge from my spearmen and will take many minutes to route - the immersion-breaking unit stat modifiers still seems to be alive in well in this game.

4) This game definitely borrowed some voice acting and assets from Rome 2. Not a huge deal, but it does detract from the argument that Attila is in a league of its own.

I really want to get into this game, but the 1st issue (frequent crashes) is really killing the experience for me.

Sorry your game's not playable / unstable. Looks like it's a case by case issue. My experiences have been so different than yours, that Attila is among my favorite of the titles. I have a potato, with 400+ hours with maybe one crash in the time I've played it. I haven't been bombarded by agent spam. I've had a lot of luck in most of my campaigns with the game feeling balanced and challenging. Definitely agree Rome 2 runs better, but for the most part, for me, Attila runs similar to Napoleon or Shogun 2.

[Daedrius]

Hope you get it running. It's the best Total War game in my opinion and if you get the bundle it's basically 3 games in one. Attila, Age of Charlemagne and the Last Roman.