Total War: Pharaoh Post Mortem

[@Lockerus]

Isn’t a Pharaoh postmortem just a mummification?

[@emetanti]

They couldnt afford the bandages to wrap the Pharaoh up due to lack of sales, please understand.

[@LegendofTotalWar]

mummification assumes it will be taken care of after its death

[@kedronmallia939]

​​@@LegendofTotalWarlegend you wordsmith-dog haha

[@Jakster840]

@@LegendofTotalWar "Wow what do you say after that one? Brutal, savage, rekt."

[@Lockerus]

@@LegendofTotalWaryou got me there. Destined to be eaten by the British elite in a few thousand years I guess.

[@ZahryD]

Three Kingdoms launch: 193k players Pharaoh launch: 5k players. Sega: "Well kids probably dont want to play Total War games anymore".

[@evilpilott]

just wait they send another threat letter likes of W3 DLC, saying that "people should buy this game and it's paramount for their support on historical titles and if not there will be no more historical titles to be made"

[@coupdegrace2767]

Why SEGA tho? It's just an investment for them, whereas CA actually dropped the ball yet again.

[@srdjan455]

And they aren't wrong.

[@boomknight1015]

I came back to three kingdoms after the latest bs dlc from warhammer 3 and it's actually pretty good.

[@Jono793]

People love the historical games! Medieval II, Rome I and II, Shogun II are all super popular, even a now, years after they launched. The difference is, it's got to be a popular historical period, which fits into the mould of a big ol' strategy game! Ancient Egypt is a fascinating civilization,and a lot of fun to learn about. But, it's just not got the same place in the popular imagination as Classical Rome, Medieval Europe, or even Sengoku-era Japan! Commanding iconic units like legionary cohorts, knights and samuri has a lot more appeal than commanding whatever troops the kingdoms of the nile were pressing into service.

[@SwabianClancy]

"Please give us Medieval 3 or Empire 2." "Here you have Pharaoh!" "Please give us Medieval 3 or Empire 2." "We don't know why it didn't sell..." "Please give us Medieval 3 or Empire 2." "I guess people don't want historical TW anymore."

[@danielalejandrocerecedodig6237]

at this point it makes me think maybe i dont want to touch Medieval 3...maybe they ruin it

[@TiGGowich]

this is too accurate

[@ikaerus_1941]

Even Total War: Napoleon 2 would sell like hotcakes right now seeing that the new Napoleon film is coming out in the coming weeks

[@DyonisX]

Shogun 3

[@scottishblacklab]

i have a feeling even if they made medieval 3 people would still complain

[@ash12181987]

I remember when the dung beetle trailer came out, and I said: "Idk if rolling a pile of shit up hill is the best marketing for the game" and some guy rushed to say: "EXCUSE ME, But Dung beetles are a very important part of Egyptian History, shows how much YOU know about that" I wonder if that guy enjoyed his game.

[@etienne8110]

Accurate description of the game though 😅 No false avertissement here, it was a pile of shit rolling downhill.

[@hannibalburgers477]

Dung Beetle was the Sisyphus actually, reference to how CA keep doing the same shit

[@al-muwaffaq341]

Lol was it on Reddit? Guys on the total war subreddit get on their knees for CA.

[@KhaneLives-ec1hk]

I'm gnot a gnelf

[@sokar_rostau]

I'm a huge Ancient Egypt fanboy and while I thought it was clever on several levels I immediately questioned who signed off on a marketing campaign that focuses on pushing shit uphill. I've been playing Total War since I bought ME1 when ME2 was released and I'm a great big Egypt nerd that has wanted a decent game, of any kind, in the setting for years. I am the bullseye of CA's target market for this game, so why was the announcement trailer the peak of my hype? I honestly don't know. I should be sitting here slaughtering Canaanites and Hittites for the glory of the Aten with one hand, while furiously masturbating with the other. Instead, this is the second or third video I've watched since release, and I'm waiting for Pharaoh to go on sale because I'm not paying that ludicrous price for a game that somehow managed to completely fail to gain my interest.

[@Aethgeir]

I've been wanting a medieval 3 game for years, but I'm no longer confident in CAs ability to do it well.

[@IceniTotalWar]

I'm now 100% confident they can, can mess it up that is.

[@yesnahchansey]

In order to capture what was fun about Medieval 2, they'd need a new engine (or to go back to the old one, which is obviously not an option) so unless the medieval 3 you want is a reskin of rome 2 the same way med 2 was a reskin of rome 1 (not a bad thing btw) pray they never make it.

[@TheScottishBaker]

Absolutely agree with this, I'm just sticking to SS6.4. Yes there are limitations but the core game will always be excellent

[@MalakianM2S]

I heard another youtuber saying that Med 3 is never going to happen because the amount and the savagery of the backlash CA would receive trying to sell historical nations as DLC packs, it wouldn't make no sense and really shine a light on their shameless greed.

[@sergiodiaz2725]

Have to agree, and tbh at this point they deserve to fail. Not that I’d like them to, but they deserve it.

[@MattZaharias]

I’m going to say it again, the beetle rolling the ball of shit at the very beginning of the intro for Pharaoh was a secret cry for help from the franchise.

[@tollspiller2043]

and even if that would be the case, what "help" could even be done. We got amazing games, but I honestly don't really expect much more

[@Turrent]

Literally pushing shit at us

[@LOLERXP]

It was the graphics department crying for help.

[@ordo_draigo_assault_ham]

Think about it like this: It takes way more than one dude to put in a cry for help like this. Half the staff has to be in on it. Unfortunately, their bosses are greedy and the employees will have to leave and create something without corpo interference.

[@ericbyo9472]

@@LOLERXP It's always the art team that does the best work and gets let down. Just think of all the great assets and backdrops with so much effort put in that you have seen in shit ass games that nobody plays.

[@ZubiForce]

Last night Medieval 2 had more players than Paharoh, astonishing really.

[@Kvothe1994]

Im playing divide and conquer (lotr) mod for med2 everyday

[@PiterburgCowboy]

Of course, the game was made when CA wasn't all about milking fans and made them pay to play a faction that should have been an option to begin with, introducing blatant meta breaking factions to ruin Online play for some titles, or to paying for a "bloodpatch"....

[@DaDude2011]

My heart goes out to those still playing divide and conquer. Now that’s a fantastic mod development. The man who helped lead the mod has his own channel which I think he finally stopped uploading to maybe a year ago. I recall his last video reviews of the rings of power.

[@omurlll2708]

@@DaDude2011yeah he withdrew as lead developer and said he’d leave his YT as an archive and such

[@maximusd26]

@@Kvothe1994 based

[@ece2178]

was half expecting him to say "legend of total war here and today we are rating your disaster launch"

[@firemblemful]

Underrated comment

[@Eskeletor_210]

Flashbacks to angry Joe’s Rome 2

[@totalwar1793]

@@Eskeletor_210 Et tu Joe… YOU DONE FUCKED IT UP!!! One of my fav reviews

[@warnerpaau3706]

Legend of total war here and today we are saving your disaster game launch...

[@colehazlitt1495]

@@Eskeletor_210 rome 2 is pretty good now. solid game

[@LandmarkRL]

Im baffled at the decisions that lead to Three Kingdoms being laid off whilst Pharaoh is given the green light

[@RyanJosepher]

Ikr?

[@Probably_Behind_You_Now]

Next CA video: The Future of Total War Pharaoh

[@Fang.1]

I'm still sad about that. Three Kingdoms was *fun*. Flawed, but really fun.

[@TheRealBrotherLance]

I'm sure dlc sales slowed so they moved on.

[@Wha2les]

​@@Probably_Behind_You_Nowneeds to sound more positive hahaha... Before being crucified...

[@shockmesane4158]

The strangest thing to me is that CA is regularly prioritizing games the community is not asking for and ignoring the ones they are asking for. It isn't a great strategy.

[@MrCEO-1]

For real wtf are they doing…

[@SnorriTheLlama]

There are a couple reasons for this, but general logic seems to be: Larger game IPs are trying to de-risk their business models, by having an annual release schedule so that their cash flows are less lumpy than 3+ years development time and so they are less dependent on the success or failure of any one game. This necessitates multiple development studios to work on different projects to meet a regular release schedule. The main studio will work on the largest and most prestigious titles, and the other studios will fill in the release cycle. Each studio will want to use their last game as the base platform on which they build the next game. Otherwise costs massively increase when the whole system/engine/mechanics have a complete overhaul. These overhauls may be necessary but you will have to build a business case for it, working out how many future games you will build on the back of this and what the earning potential could be. For a single game, it might not be worth it. It could be worth it for a series of games, but it might be harder to get the funding approval from board level if you have recently lost a significant amount of money on another project, like Hyena. Basically Sega is a risk averse corporate, not small studio that might have less to lose and be willing to take more risks. This is probably due atleast in part to Sega’s history, which has not been easy in the 2000s-present. Source: Llama School of Corporate Finance

[@lowe_sa2976]

@@SnorriTheLlama lol All of these smart words when it's just the incompetence of devs and.. people who are too stupid to understand their stupid who live on this goddamn planet Like 99% of people will eat shit and drink piss if you make them bc they have no intelligence

[@SnorriTheLlama]

@@asicveg This is just what happens when an owner manager reaches retirement and has to work out what happens to their business. In terms of succession plans for selling their business, they basically have three options: 1) Sale to trade - usually should be able to pay the most as will better understand the market and have potential business synergies. Also might be able to accept poor management in the business if the buyer has people that can fill these skill gaps once the founder leaves. 2) Financial buyers - probably the next best payer and includes private equity and evergreen funds. They require a strong management team to run the business and grow it, usually in exchange for some of the equity. This won’t be suitable for an owner managed business with poor management outside of the owner, unless they are willing to work out a management solution post-sale, which would likely need a longer transition period, with more consideration contingent on future performance instead of cash upfront. Financial buyers also won’t have synergy benefits that allow them to pay more. 3) Vendor funded deal - sale to management (or another party) in the form of a loan note issued by the company to the vendor. Again, this requires a good management team in place to take on the business, and the vendor doesn’t get any consideration paid until the business can generate cash to pay off the loan note. Again due to the requirements for a good management team in place, this may not always be a suitable option.

[@badhabits1965]

CA's main priority is letting us know that they hate us. Making money is a secondary priority. Like if they can make money pissing on us, then great, but the main purpose was just to piss on us.

[@MrAnthraxes]

Game: Bombs because of massive overpricing CA: "Well Nobody likes historical titles anymore I guess"

[@Faelivri]

Overpricing and echo of what is currently going with WH3. People lost trust in CA and it will take a very long time to build it back.

[@sousa9682]

Also lack of interest, the time period and gameplay is not appealing to me in the slightest. Give me empire 2 or Medieval 3 dammit!!!

[@steffent.6477]

To be fair it's hard to impress people after they got used to magic, dragons and other fantasy elements^^

[@nvmtt]

@@steffent.6477 mate, if even MEDIEVAL 2 has a higher player count, then you have to have actively f*ck*d up the project to make it look that bad.

[@steffent.6477]

@@nvmtt M2 is only alive because of the mod support.

[@0NoName9]

I figured Pharaoh wouldn't be a smash hit, but I didn't expect it to be the very definition of dead on arrival. That poll you made a while ago didn't lie after all. Personally, the price alone killed any shred of interest I might have had in it. Not a chance in hell I'd pay the price of Baldur's Gate 3 for that.

[@gapinzonr]

CA has been getting away with charging way too much and some whales enable that, I'm not glad the game is DoA but I'm glad they are seeing that just bringing whatever game at an absurd price point is not gonna work anymore

[@RiskOfBaer]

It's just re-skin of Troy, another game that is already not very popular. The writing was on the wall and I am certain even the devs knew this is not going nowhere. Well, more proof CA is completely and utterly creatively bankrupt at the moment. They are unable of creating anything new that surpasses... no, not even surpasses, MATCHES the quality of things they've made in the past. And we're not even talking about the best things they've made, they can't even match what was used to be considered mediocre. They have no talent or passion left, they are pretty much a dead company and I don't see how they can recover from.

[@thebrokenmask8304]

It actually 10 more bucks than bg3 😂😂😂 can you imagine that?

[@rodh1404]

BG3 is cheaper. MUCH cheaper if you factor in Pharaoh's DLC. And while BG3 is built on the experience and engine of D:OS2, you can see where the money was spent. I can't really see that with Pharaoh, which is essentially a reskin+patch for Troy. Legend's right - this kind of low effort game for a high effort price really needs to die.

[@pewpin1039]

Holy shit, i didn't even see that. I thought it was a 40eur~ game or something. Yea holy shit no way anyone in their right mind should pay 60eur for this pile of sadness.

[@jj0904]

Hey legend you also forgot to mention that Thrones of Britania had 22k players at launch which makes this launch seem even more disastrous.

[@obi-wan3916]

TOB had a successful shill operation and critics like LOTW were brutally suppressed by the community/CA as legend described himself in this video. Things have changed now thankfully.

[@maximum9977]

@@obi-wan3916 CA fans spend all copium to that point

[@ThatGuy-bz2in]

I actually kinda liked thrones. But like legend said, I am a fan of the time frame, so I guess I was just the target audience lol

[@Tsintch7568]

Well people like vikings

[@joshuacottton6985]

Thrones was also £26 if you pre ordered, £30 on release which is half of what Pharoah costs

[@atomicgandhi8718]

Core problem with Troy and Pharaoh is that infantry cannot actually bog down other infantry, you can literally run through a unit to get to some archers.

[@winzyl9546]

Been like that since empire. Its because of the emphasis on the "cool" 1v1 battle. A unit will only engage in 1v1 even if it is surrounded by many units, that unit also cannot die unless it gets killed in 1v1, meanwhile other units are not engaged in their own 1v1 so they push through the masses if you right click enough. In rome 1 everybody fights everybody, you will see 2v1 or 10v1. Thats when I think TW lost its soul. Formations exist in pre-modern warfare in order for men to combine their power and defense into a unit greater than the individual. By making it essentially just 1v1 you lose the point of the formation, the formation is not a unit of combined men anymore, but simply a group of individuals waiting their turn to fight a 1v1. They made formations for the sake of having formations, for the sake of having formations in "battles", instead of having a real tactical purpose.

[@pompeythegreat297]

It has many problems, like immortal leaders????

[@AavorSkyrender]

That's only a problem to certain people, I personally will take fleshed out immortal leaders over uninteresting random generic nobodies anytime. Three kingdoms was utterly boring when it was just generic lord going at generic lord. I much prefer the modern take on leaders and actually having leaders that last for an entire campaign. @@pompeythegreat297

[@stashe9106]

pull through is very risky though, in multiplayer its frowned upon and if the enemy knows what to do, you would take more casualties than do dmg.

[@AavorSkyrender]

Oh pulling through isn't risky, its suicide. I have yet to seen any infantry unit pull through without being wiped out almost completely even against levies. I saw a unit of Medjay swordsmen lose to archers because I had tried to pull them through to reach other archers. Now, Troy at launch was a different story but combat in Troy at launch was just a broken disaster lol.@@stashe9106

[@mchonkler7225]

Charging $60 for a limited scope reskin of R2TW was a genius idea.

[@urahi830]

yeah there are mods out there with more content but sure let's charge full price

[@unclevamp]

they still charging that for rome 2 and some dlc is still 20 sooo not sure why everyones all pissed at that

[@micahbonewell5994]

This a reskin of troy, not Rome 2, it is a very different game from Rome 2

[@yourmaid4982]

SEGA always does so, shogun 2 is still full price (at least in my region)

[@IceniTotalWar]

CA management justifying once again why they make the big bucks ( pounds 😁) . Failing upwards has never been more profitable !

[@theroguenob]

Genuinely didn't even know Pharoah released

[@Maxowen]

same

[@method138]

same, i remember some leak mentioning it might be an egypt game and now its suddenly released in secret

[@Woollenlotus81]

Same

[@teddywoods6463]

The only reason I cared it released was it forced an update on all the total war games I had installed.

[@PaganMinn]

same!!! i remember when a total war game launching was a fucking event. from the first shogun to rome 1 to medieval 2 (med 2 being my favorite) and now its like another call of duty releasing clones of the same game with a different paint job.

[@vallergergo737]

12:35 You also gotta keep in mind that Medieval 2 first released outside of Steam. Meaning that for that and Rome I there is more than likely a significant % of the playerbase that play them on their original copies, not the digital version. So in light of that Medieval 2 is arguably doing better than Pharaoh...

[@mdokuch96]

Also I can guarantee you that not everyone is even using a legit copy at this point. Game is old so there are real chances that people just download the pirate copy in order to not pay twice for the product they once bought.

[@Edzter]

@@mdokuch96 bro I had a rome total war disc, then I gave it away, then I pirated it twice on 2 different computers, then I bought it on steam lol.

[@mgs85]

@@mdokuch96 If they still have any access whatsoever to their CD keys, like I had, you could add them that way into steam and they're legit. Imagine there's a smaller portion of the population of MW2 players that don't have their CD keys whatsoever. How many people owned it from Direct2Drive for example.

[@gray007nl]

I think with the amount of time that has passed and given that the vast majority of modern computers don't even have CD drives anymore, that's probably a very small portion basically negligible portion.

[@mitchyboyzz]

@@mdokuch96aye. My disks are downstairs. And I don’t feel like walking

[@Pemmont107]

My only real problem with Pharaoh is the pricing. I'd happily pay £25 for what you get, but £50? Not a chance in hell. Shadows of change also left a very bitter taste in my mouth, which affected how I viewed Pharaoh.

[@donkey9113]

With a little effort of looking around you can get it for less than 35€ I did it and don’t regret it It’s a fun game

[@NillyTheKid]

Yeah same I'd love to play a bronze age total war, had some fun with troy for that too but not for that price

[@miraclemaker1418]

Where did you buy it, g2a?

[@nvmtt]

@@donkey9113 the problem with that is, many places in the third world do not have means to effortlessly pay in platforms other than steam and epic games. in those countries, you likely need to use a third party vendor sanctioned by the govt to make payments abroad. that massively inflates the price and no one wants to go through the trouble to do that.

[@warlockengineer]

​@@donkey9113no it's not

[@elite8884]

Legend, you probably won't see this, but I do agree that since you got black listed, you have improved massively, content is executed more professional, fresh ideas, and more welcoming to your subscribers, keep up the great work buddy always enjoy spending a few hours watching you saves someone's disaster on the older games. All the best

[@altromonte15]

he should get blacklisted again, imagine how incredible his content would be if he improves again

[@dean_l33]

Now if only he get black listed by GW

[@honeybadger6275]

Getting blacklisted by game devs just means you actually have some level of integrity.

[@JoseLopez-hs3yw]

Hey, bro!, Can you tell me why he was black listed?

[@honeybadger6275]

@@JoseLopez-hs3yw Because he said that a bad total war game was bad. Total war thrones of Britannia to be exact. That's what happens if you aren't a sycophant towards a game company, you give an honest review and they blacklist you.

[@coolumbrella4376]

If they are planning on making a combined map for Troy, Pharoah, Mesopotamia wouldn’t they want to market that as a selling point? I don’t know what they gain by keeping that a secret

[@Chippaization]

Slap them all into a new Mythos series of total war games where i can do Odysseus's whole journey and call me interested

[@rpl1318]

that is indeed the plan as far as I heard from someone I know in CA. but why they keep it under wraps? no clue.

[@coolumbrella4376]

@@rpl1318 doubt it will happen now, but not sure why they feel like they need to keep everything a secret. Feel like they would be better off leading off with the hype, but I guess selling those 3 games at $60 a pop to get that combined map is pretty overpriced. Feels like they were trying to do what they did in Warhammer with Mortal and Immortal Empires. The only problem is nobody asked for this. All I ever hear people ask for is more Warhammer content and Medieval III for the most part. Not sure if Three Kingdoms is worth mentioning anymore since that ship has sailed.

[@Peanuts1000]

Because it's better to not promise something that might not happen.

[@coolumbrella4376]

@@Peanuts1000 that’s fair. I think they should of released the full map with some lords from each area to begin with for the $60 game and added DLC packs for other lord’s afterwards, but who knows the whole thing is a train wreck. Not much that can be done about it now.

[@ThanksALott]

At this point I am honestly not waiting/wishing for a medieval 3. They need to change the whole game quite drastically to make that an actual improvement over the old game. They need to remodel the unit behaviour in battles quite a bit to decrease unit blobbing, improve melee combat and give charges mass again. For campaigns they need to improve campaign AI and bring all the nice newer features like resources back. If they would do a medieval 3 now, I am afraid that it will be more or less a Rome 2 reskin.

[@bernard3303]

They should do massive AI improvements, and add an option in settings for replenish rate on and off for medieval 3. this alone together with graphical improvements is all medieval 2 lacks imo. they just made such a nice foundation all those years ago its hard to add anything without risking to ruin it all. the only other thing i can maybe think of is a better internal politics and diplomacy system. what do you want to be changed in a medieval 3 game?

[@bernard3303]

Now i think about it napoleon totalwar engineis probably the best candidate for a medieval 3, or a nice medieval mod based on totalwar. The things that make it stand out for me are its dynamic replenishment system which replenishes units slowly unless you have buildings for the unit in the city ( and militia replenishes faster everywhere because it can be made in every city, making them good meat shields ), minor towns, forts ( if i remember correctly ) , ability to send units out without generals, having to recruit units from cities directly instead of regional recruit system, realistic gun and artillery mechanics, great naval battles , great trade system with trade routes, raids, embargoes. We just need melee medieval units and ai changes to make this system into medieval 3

[@anthroposmetron4475]

tl;dr, They need to spend money making a completely new engine, and CA is just too flat-out greedy for that. CA is going to go under in the next few years and the Total War franchise will pass to someone else.

[@armoredchimp]

I agree. I don't want current CA anywhere near Medieval 3 or Empire 2, it will just be a disappointment. They need a complete re-evaluation and restructuring as a company, get some new leadership in and get back to what made them a success as a company originally.

[@vangoghsseveredear]

​@@bernard3303"massive AI improvements" is much, much, much easier said than done. In all the years they've had to figure it out, they've almost made it worse rather than better, lmao

[@YeetThyBaby]

Lol. I think if it doesn't explode over the weekend when people have time off it will be written off immediately by CA. Theyll shit out minimum effort dlc to meet the requirements of the people who purchased the deluxe editions (if there were any stupid enough to), and then move on.

[@karljohan3989]

Well, CA can't kill the post release content without having to refund people who already paid for it so.....tough situation.

[@derigel7662]

@@karljohan3989 ummmmmm 3 kingdoms

[@Keln02]

I'm starting to wonder if they even have an analytics department when it comes to probing for what players want

[@Booklat1]

Seems like that's a big thing they're missing. I don't expect to know what goes on in the heads of the executives of CA and SEGA but they seem to have totally misinterpreted what their marked wants.

[@Krelian89]

They do but higher manager doesnt give a fuck, CA is the biggest RTS right now and they think doing anything will give them instant cash, but ppl are not stupid to buy this shit even if is the only thing in the market right now, problem is all big AAA companies are falling on this they monopolized a genere and they think they can profit developing any shit

[@marcusanthony9322]

They don't care what we want, these companies are so arrogant they TELLS us what we want and then use the failure as an excuse not to bother in the future.

[@pain002]

@@Krelian89which is so arrogant, considering people around the world are struggling to pay for energy, food and fuel. As if people have money to waste right now😂

[@lordfreezer9550]

@@Krelian89 exactly, what other game offers a campaing map and also represent real-time battles... none, at least AAA quality, and they think they have everyone by the balls, little do they know there are other games in the world and not everything has to be an RTS and not everything has to be TW for that matter

[@thehermitthetower1126]

A larger scope of the bronze age, and going back to dynasty building instead of immortal hero leaders would have been a good start. I probably would have bought Pharoah if those 2 things were implemented despite everything else

[@maximum9977]

And they need to return actual population mechanic that was cut in Shogun2

[@thehermitthetower1126]

@maximum9977 agreed. There are alot more things I would like. Shogun was the beginning of the end.

[@HobeBryant]

I appreciate how legend takes the time to shout out the actual devs and not blame them. The saddest part about the recent state of total war is that there is very clearly a lot of passion and hard work going into this and TWW3 on a development side, it's mainly just being very poorly managed

[@chronic6428]

Unfortunately an asshole in a suit gonna watch the sales number and say "why in the hell are we paying these fucks, they bring no dough, cut them".

[@etienne8110]

Not a lot of passion on the game design team though... Graphics are one of the least important things in a stratégy game. And i feel CA is focusing more on that rather than game design, mechanics and UI.

[@Thatonedude227]

@@etienne8110Again though, that kind of thing is usually up to higher level management giving priorities. If your manager’s manager says “graphics are our top priority, put half the team on graphics and leave the other half for other things.” Well, what are you gonna do? You only have so many resources.

[@etienne8110]

@@Thatonedude227 even then you can tell when the design team doesn t care or doesn t know the genre. There are flaws that aren t made by smaller indie teams.

[@nilloc93]

@@etienne8110 graphics matter to the wider audience. People who watch lotw dont care about spectacle but tons of normal people think a game is good because it threw pretty colors infront of them

[@geissler91]

been a total war enjoyer for DECADES and I literally had no idea this game dropped. wow.

[@anthroposmetron4475]

You haven't missed anything much.

[@eltiket]

I'm starting to have my doubts about the capacity of CA to make a good Medieval 3...

[@GeraltofRivia22]

Starting to? It's been unlikely for years now.

[@TwoFistsOneHalleluja]

Medieval III, but it's just an Attila re-skin. I'm calling it.

[@pompeythegreat297]

That's gonna be a disaster too lol Move on, enjoy the old games

[@henryasselin123]

​@@TwoFistsOneHallelujathere is a wicked good mod for Attila that basically turns it into medieval 2.5 I think it's called chivalry

[@peavizzle]

everyone keeps saying "Medieval 3 when?" and I've just been thinking "Why do you think Med 3 will be good?"

[@beanhavok2287]

This game should have been called Total War Classic Age As apposed to Pharaoh. This game could have included Ancient Egypt, The beginning of Greece, the spreading of Hellenism and Egyptian culture throughout the Mediterranean. The western colonization of the Med by the Greeks. Troy and Pharohs REALLY should have been one game.

[@bernard3303]

True. If they added egypt to troy map and maybe persia and assyrians, the game would be more interesting. but hey why not make an empire 2 or medieval 3 instead

[@mylifeisajoke1]

A Bronze age total war would have been dope as fuck.

[@cookiecola5852]

Yeah but that wouldnt been so easy to justify a paywall

[@beanhavok2287]

@@bernard3303 Well now your just trying to make to much sense sir!!! CA BAN HIM!!

[@MrIrrationalSmith]

But Legend made a great point: Bronze Age combat was melee infantry, some missiles, and some chariots. How do you make that interesting? If the solution is to compensate with a great political campaign, why not play a Paradox game? Personally, I can only really imagine Bronze Age combat working if they really invested in individual soldiers like no TW game before. It'd take a big toll on RAM, but soldiers should feel like individual people with collision detection and much more dynamic movement - not just idling in place and occasionally swinging a sword through the opponent's model.

[@markwalter4838]

Just had a check of the numbers out of curiosity, with it being a Sunday evening as I've watched this. 4400 on Pharoh 23645 on W3 4250 on W2 4381 on 3 Kingdoms 2880 on Shogun 2 463 on Troy 516 on Britannia 1420 on Rome 8009 on Rome2 1842 on Napoleon 5499 on Medieval2 3769 on Empire 3427 on Attila Thats shocking. It's the first Total War ever that I haven't bought on preorder or on day of release since Medieval 1 and Shogun 1 and that was because I was a kid. I've got to say I've seen nothing about this game that makes me want to purchase it.

[@Sam501UK]

Very interesting figures, thankyou for taking the time to share them

[@Nikanoru]

Man, for years I was hoping they'd do a warring states period total war game and a bronze age total war game. Then we got three kingdoms and troy and I felt like I had my wishes granted by some kind of maligned genie that wanted to corrupt and destroy everything I love. Then I heard pharaoh was coming out and got excited... at least it doesn't have cyclops in it I guess. I will say it was kinda cool that I could change one of my general's unit type just by giving him a new weapon I found.

[@rokkraljkolesa9317]

this is why you don't make a wish on the monkey's paw

[@olafgurke4699]

Tzeentch heard your plea and answered. Classic Tzeentch.

[@Pers0n97]

Pharaoh, outside of its obvious failings as a standalone game, also suffered from the "Solo a Starwars story" syndrome. The game entered the market after a long string of failure for the franchise, so most consumers have exhausted their good will toward the IP so they won't give them the usual pass they would have.

[@christopheryoung2874]

funny! I havent watch a Disney Star Wars film or show since The Last Jedi, I used to be a huge SW fan my whole life

[@philstory2556]

@@christopheryoung2874 right to give most of em a pass but i highly suggest Rogue One and Andor, those the two best ones they got and hold up pretty well

[@Psychopatrix]

Andor is just a cheap Copy of "the Fortress" franchise with a light wash of Starwars@@philstory2556

[@pain002]

@@christopheryoung2874honestly man…you didn’t miss much. My friends still desperately try to give their Star Wars content a try and so I can discuss it I watch it myself and I am just so bored with 99% they put out. Basically Marvel, but Star Wars. And marvel sucks ass

[@jacksonmcdonald5443]

@@christopheryoung2874 You're missing out on Andor, which is one of the best pieces of SW content ever made, and as a stand alone show it is amazing. Ahsoka had its moments as well.

[@jmill1334]

I think honestly CA is scared to death to do Medieval III. Its so demanded it feels like at this point they could do awesome and still it would fall short of expectations.. Hope they make it but at some level I am betting they would feel like they need to put way more expense into it than most other games they could make in order to live up to expectations of what a medieval III would be.

[@helghast_7203]

I honestly agree with you, At this point, Medieval 3 is so demanded and will be so hyped that no matter what they deliver, even if it’s the best game of the franchise, it will not reach people’s expectations.

[@Mankorra_Gomorrah]

Med3 is CA’s Vicky3 and we all saw how that turned out. I don’t even mind vicky3 but it definitely wasn’t what people were thinking of.

[@pavlepavlovic4073]

Tactical battles aside. How exactly is Medival 3 going to have the same level of depth and complexity as CK3 on the campaign map? I am just curious, because it looks like to me that Medival 3 doesn't have much to offer at the table...

[@randomelite4562]

Yep, even if they make an amazing Medieval 3 that by all objective standards matches or exceeds what Medieval 2 was… it still won’t be good enough. Too much hype and demand for a Med 3 would be its downfall.

[@joshuapeterson2503]

Yeah, I just don't think they are capable of it anymore. Plus the crusaders would have to be the "objective bad guys"

[@Tr33ba1t]

"I would like to thank this company for silencing anybody but ass lickers so they can trick people into buying their cheap reskins". You did nothing wrong legend

[@markusmoller8653]

I really hope they built up on the Three Kingdoms engine in the next game. It was the most stable, fastest loading game i played so far. It looked amazing and you could use huge armies compared to the other games. I also would love if they use similar campagn mechanics. Copying parts of the historical mode would work great. Like having armies with several unit commaders that have a personality. I would love if they would finally change the random same looking generic generals and greate a DNA system like CK3, where you could get generics that look unique.

[@Fang.1]

I do love to read some 3K love. I still think that was the best TW game to date. Though Warhammer 3 is more impressive in scope.

[@Quicksilver_Cookie]

The thing is. If you imagine that Pharaoh was the only total war game ever released. It'd be honestly huge. On a market with nothing quite like it it would be one of the best strategies around. But that's the problem...there's so many other total war games to choose from. Begs a question why would anyone pick specifically this one.

[@jakewalters3951]

You hit the nail on the head at he end. It's the moral that to me feels like the biggest issue with modern total war. No possibility of using your brain to defeat a bigger or more expensive army by setting up a massive morale shock, which was a hugely effective tactic in the older total war games.

[@richardshiflett5181]

I mean, Morale matters in Troy. Folding their Champions and Leaders causes routes and winning duels was huge. Course that made those like Achilles OP when in the players hands

[@GeraltofRivia22]

Shogun 2 was amazing with this. Won some crazy lopsided battles with that mechanic.

[@nilloc93]

@@GeraltofRivia22 I was going to say the same thing, I still remember my first legendary S2 campaign, I fought a battle that would have been a campaign ender if I lost but I managed to blob the AI on a lake and then counter charge their massive army and got 3 yari ashigaru to rout at the same time and it chained 1/2 their army.

[@thedonkey6704]

The problem is that you only managed to give one example. In Rome 2 as an example morale shocks COULD look like this. Play as suebi. Have Suebi berserkers in my army. Snipe their general. Massive morale drop. Charge my berserkers into their rear to get the attacked from 2 sides debuff ( which hurts morale ) and trigger frenzy “ makes charge damage higher and melee attack to kill a lot of models and ruin morale. Ontop of that berserkers have a passive ability called fear? I don’t exactly remember the name but any unit close to it would lose morale. All 5 of these things would make even the best units in Rome 2 break. This is what the writer of this comment meant with setting up a morale breaking chain.

[@peterk2735]

@@GeraltofRivia22It’s why I love playing as Oda, you can get those Ashigaru take on Samurai units with the right positioning and a couple of leader skills

[@skycaptain95]

Creative Assembly playbook: * Make good fantasy total war games * Rake in money hand over fist * Make dubious historical total war game and rush it as fast as possible to ensure the team can't salvage the suits' mistake * Release the worst historical Total War yet * wElL i GuEsS nO oNe WaNtS tO pLaY hIsToRiCaL tOtAl WaR aNyMoRe. ThE fAnS hAvE sPoKeN * Get that games workshop money Repeat until customer goodwill is eliminated

[@mrbigglezworth42]

When you factor in Hyenas, it makes a lot more sense why Pharoah turned out like it did. Money from one project had to be diverted to another, and that project was dead before the race even started.

[@Kraykz]

imagine how much of the warhammer profits went into dead products instead of upgrading the original

[@jaelee1996]

Hyenas and Sega debacle seem to be the very reason for the overpriced Saga game and WH DLC.

[@Tomo_mo]

@@Kraykz seeing that theres a lack of transparency from CA, we will probably never know. Im hoping for some insider to leak some info though.

[@SourceBTS]

You feedback on what the game did wrong and what future titles need to have in order for CA to pump out "reskins" as you called them, was really great. I absolutely agree with your reasoning on the criteria of success of future titles. The pricing of Pharaoh being too high due to executives not understanding the community, is partly because (maybe) they don't know that we - the community - could tell that this was a Saga title from miles away, depsite the fact it's not in the title of the game.

[@BubbaNZ]

CA sooo badly needs a competitor. Considering the woeful state of its titles, and all these devs being laid off, now would be a great time for another competent strategy studio or two to have a good old think about entering this market. Pretty please.

[@HMASbogan]

Check out Manor Lords, closest thing to a competitor

[@MasterIceyy]

Sadly there's no strategy games that come close to offering what CA offers, which is really disappointing, and the fact CA has such a monopoly on it, I don't think any other strategy developer would be willing to take the risk on competing with them

[@SuperAerie]

Just that Pharaoh is doubling down on the character-focus and the one city-start is enough for me to give it a pass. It might be fine for Warhammer but those things have now completely leaked into historical where they dont belong at all.

[@shapeyourmind9620]

Exactly this mate

[@MidlifeCrisisJoe]

??? Many of the historical games have one city starts for many, if not most factions. Medieval 2 playing as the Britons has you start with just London I think? Certainly with the Scots. I don't understand why having a one city start would be a deal breaker?

[@SuperAerie]

@@MidlifeCrisisJoe Its a deal-breaker imo when it applies for every faction and said faction is tied to a character. With the characters comes skilltrees & traits. If we take Rome2, since it was in the video, you have a mix of smaller kingdons that does fine with 1 city but also established empires as Carthage or upstart empires like Rome that have either a region or several from the start. Giving them only a single city to start with would completely ruin the feeling playing as those but thats the current trend. Shogun 2 are also fine since you are a vassal-clan, not a kingdom or empire. Right now there are zero variations in the starts. Everyone settled faction since WH1 starts with one city, one easy army next to it to beat and then a city to take. And I am tired of it already.

[@wandsavera9111]

@@MidlifeCrisisJoe ???? Medieval 2 England start you begin with 3 settlements: London, Nottingham, and Caen... I think Scotland is the only faction that begins with one settlement..

[@parttimehero8640]

Mostly Empire...

[@sxtxlxkoff7795]

Man, I am so sad, I love historical Total Wars, and still hold the apparently unpopular belief that Rome 2 was awesome (I did buy it like a year after release), but with every passing game I just start forgetting that Total Wars exist. I wish for CA to make a historical game on the scale of Medieval 2 with all the improvements modern times have given us, but I guess that is never happening.

[@Pikilloification]

Rome 2 is pretty damn good.

[@mckilly1819]

Rome 2 for life!! il always go back to it!

[@ottovonbismarck2443]

In my arms, brother !

[@Tommyleon225]

Launch was rough but design was good and after patches it was wonderful!

[@bernard3303]

Rome 2 was bad in launch apparently but doesnt change the fact that its a really fun game nowadays

[@RigobertosTacoShop]

Let’s be real. The reason people want med 3 is a return to the mechanics that made the game great. CA, even if they did make it. Wouldn’t make it like the OG. They’d slap the new style on it and call it a day. Instead of expanding on med 2 core concepts or polish.

[@Tomezilla514]

I dunno, I think the Polish in Medieval 2 were already a pretty solid faction, but I imagine they will expand on all of them somewhat.

[@diazinth]

@@Tomezilla514 GO TO YOUR ROOM! :D :D

[@NooqGaming]

You know that feeling when your parents make a huge batch of like, spaghetti sauce, "because you love it" and you eat that for 3-4 days in a row, well i feel like CA is finessing us just like that

[@richardpatton6691]

I'd really like to see a comparison video between various Total Wars actually visualizing the differences in their battle systems. Instinctively, I agree that something feels off with infantry in recent games, but it's hard to quantify. Of course, every game's had their issues with charges, formation fighting, etc - even Medieval 2 had that incredibly annoying habit of a unit stopping dead twenty feet from their target, and then just the first row of soldiers anemically charging in. But what exactly makes that game still feel better overall? Though personally, my absolute biggest pet peeve about the most recent games is the over-the-top death animations - soldiers getting thrown off their feet by an arrow, or taking a dive like Neymar when they get poked with a pointy stick.

[@JimBox810]

What i really miss from older total war games was the animations. The spy animations the faction starting and end game animations. Now all we get are very lazily animated still pictures for all TW games.

[@marcelk2753]

Its fun watching them at first but i turned them off after playing these games for years now.

[@JimBox810]

@@marcelk2753 understandable.

[@Eskeletor_210]

The ninjas on shogun 2 when they critically fail

[@1Caja]

​@@Eskeletor_210 I loved these little animations

[@PattyOflan88]

​@@marcelk2753I agree, but sometimes when I'm making a big move for assassination or a gate, I'll watch it just for the suspense

[@Slie1988]

Biggest thing is that battles are the most important to keep players happy and continue to keep playing. Game developers need to focus on good mechanics rather than fancy graphics. A game does not need to have every artistic perspective and shimmer of water to draw people to play it. People want to play games not look at them, that clearly is what they had in mind with Pharoah with the showcase of the photo mode. Taking fancy screen shots is not what sells games nor is it what will keep players coming back. Its mechanics.

[@jasonquigley2633]

The video game industry is waaay too graphics obsessed. Many of the most succesful games have pedestrian graphics. Dark Souls and Elden Ring have moddle of the road graphics, Breath of the Wild 2 while artistically beautiful has actually pretty basic graphics, Paradox games are as succesful commercially as Total War but clearly inferior graphics. And then there's minecraft, possibly the most succesful game ever, and it runs on a potato and has graphics from the 90s. It's more important to have good art direction then realism (look at our water!).

[@BigGabe-hr3vk]

Kind of mind-boggling to see things going in the opposite direction where they are trading out scale for graphics slowly over time, and physics and realism for RPG/MOBA style statistical "balance" of units. In MTW2 the units aren't balanced. But asymmetry is what allows for tactics. And it also realistically captures the period of warfare. In MTW2 heavy cav are monsters of the battlefield. But that makes overcoming heavy cav interesting and challenging, and also makes using heavy cav to overcome monumental odds fun. In recent games, a unit is dependably just as good as it's cost and it just flattens any interesting asymetrical dynamics that would allow you or force you to come up with tactical ideas. A good example of this asymmetry is chess. Not every piece is equally valuable or strong. And chess is one of the greatest tactical games ever made.

[@casuscnactus4864]

​@@BigGabe-hr3vkThats a bad thing for Multiplayer though. Considering Total War is first and foremost a single player game however, CA seems to have missed the point once again :D

[@TheGuyWhoIsNeverMad]

@@casuscnactus4864 No its not. Theres a reason different units have different prices in MP.

[@richardshiflett5181]

I mean... Troy is fun. Sieges are way harder as they cannot be cheeses as easily. Well, maybe if you get Gryphons in Mythos mode.

[@philmcdonald3322]

Pharoah honestly looks like an excellent saga game, and if it was priced similar to ToB or Troy I'd be all over it- I'm one of the four or five people who still play and enjoy Britannia, but the pricing decisions left me completely cold on this one.

[@PaganMinn]

I really liked Britannia, it could have been something special if they just gave it another year in the oven. i still had a lot of fun with it. put about 100 hours in that title. not my favorite by any means but definitely worth a campaign or two. hell i even enjoyed troy. none of those hold a torch to the classics for me but they are fun games. i just want CA to go back to their roots and lose a bit of that greed stroke theyve been on the past 10 years.

[@Zhohan-]

Yeah I would have bought if it was $30

[@Gargatul0th]

I liked Thrones a lot but I also like the era and setting a lot

[@chronic6428]

Troy after mythos was quite nice, really cool setting. But there is no way I'll buy an okayish game full price for a setting I don't care about.

[@alex_zetsu]

About the thumbnail, Rome II is actually a descent game after Emperor edition (it could have been a great game, but that's another story). I know we all remember the disasterous lunch of Rome II, but they fixed a lot of things, even if they didn't make it the S-tier game it could have been. As Legend said all they had to do was combine the best of Rome 1 and Rome II and it could have been one of the best, but as it currently stands it's B-tier. Saying a CA game is worse than Rome II today is like saying an FPS is doing worse than Team Fortress 2. Now having less players concurrently than Attila... OK we have a problem.

[@danielelkin995]

The beetle pushing isht uphill is a fitting touch

[@scarletcroc3821]

I honesty feel really bad for the devs. The game looks really good and apparently runs pretty smooth as well. This just is not worth a full price tag. For 20 or maybe even 30€ I would have probably bought it. But I’m not going anywhere near it at the 60€ price tag, no way

[@bernard3303]

We wanted a medieval 3, empire 2, or napoleon 2 for a long time. If they make one of them then they would actually make the money they deserve for their efforts

[@squgieman]

@@bernard3303 Empire 2 covering from 1700-1900 (WITH NAVAL COMBAT) the full gambit of combat from linear warfare all the way to early trench warfare, and boats from age of sail to dreadnoughts

[@bernard3303]

@@squgieman the mods are great, absolutely lovely. However the ai is the only thing they cant fix because its hardcoded and needs a team of ai designers to code. If modders can fix that then empire 2 will probably be better than what CA can make

[@squgieman]

@@bernard3303 oh, i meant thats what i want from a proper sequal to empire, is that a mod that exsists?

[@christos-marioseftichidis4139]

30+ is already the cost on cdkey sites. CA knows this and wants to get rid of the 30% steam takes. In the long run this game will produce more revenue than Troy did.

[@Pyromaniac77777]

You definitely did come out better from being blacklisted. You’re so much more positive and upbeat these days on your videos and I’m here for it

[@charlies2641]

I couldn't stand this f*cking pr*ck for YEARS. Remember how pissed off he would get when people in chat would ask/request for him to play a particular faction or TW game next. Every year I'd try and give his channel a watch and every single year he would shit on at least 2-5 different chatters within a 10-15 minute stretch of a stream. He went from pr*ck who I couldn't watch for longer than 12 minutes in a 12 month stretch (this is a bit pathetic but I got no shame in my game lol) to literally shedding a decent amount of tears when he quit mid stream and gave up on WH and TW in general significantly early than his promise to keep it going until the end of the year.. There are pieces of crap who get om trouble and put on an apology tour but they're sorry they got caught is all and are just as big a POS as they were before. Legend however took all his faults and worked on bettering himself and through that became like you said much more positive and upbeat. To see his happiness and joy turn to ash and watch his face go to that of someone who was defeated and no longer happy made me legit cry hard.

[@marcinwojcik5476]

The problem with a potential ME3 is that it would be developed by current CA. Secondly people after so many years would have huge expectations and I don't think they can be satisfied. Also Paradox may be a future competitor. They already develop a civilization like game (IIRC Millennia) . Maybe in a few years they will release their own total war game?

[@marcelk2753]

Paradox is publishing Millenia, they are not developing it.

[@shannonjordan8656]

Virtually all paradox games released over the past five years (imperator, ck3, vicky) have been mediocre at best. I don't think that they'll be able make a total war killer, especially since they're going down their own decline

[@dauddota]

​@@shannonjordan8656 Disagree on the mediocre rating. At least Paradox are not afraid to rework mechanics when something is wrong. Look at what they've done with Stellaris, while the entire Warhammer trilogy has yet to fix some basic mechanics.

[@WILLIAN_1424]

​@@shannonjordan8656ck3 wasn't bad, but I agree with the rest. Vic3 is complete garbage.

[@pompeythegreat297]

If Paradox adds battles to like CK, CA is fucking done, unless Paradox fucks it up. Right now Paradox is winning in the strategy genre, although they have their losses, overall their games have not been dumbed down, stripped of features like newer total disaster games.... Paradox still releases deep games, you just need to pay 300$ of DLC to enjoy it. It's not for poorer people

[@darkrite9000]

My general idea on how they should handle total war games, is having at least 2 major engines, one for fantasy, the other for historical. And if you wanted something to be a bit of an in-between, like Three Kingdoms was. Then you could pick whichever engine seems to fit best, then tweak it a bit for that title. The thing is they need to realize that they can't just put out a game with either sh*t loads of bugs, or very few changes or improvements. Sure if the foundation was solid, a few changes or improvements would be enough to warrant another game, but you need a solid foundation for that to happen. Here is my ideas for the following potential total war game ideas. Medieval 3, well they clearly need to make or revamp an older historical style engine and improve it as the foundation. It should have the following mechanics at the bare minimum, population, religion, family trees and maybe a limited faction politic system (akin to Attila, not too annoying to manage, and still provides benefits or issues depending on choices). Trade resources having an impact on your local economy as well as what they'd provide when you have trade agreements. Public order is something I expect to see, and for the most part it will be in the game (it always is), just depends on how they intend on implementing bonuses or negatives. The battles need to have formations and better balance of units, cav should be strong, but shouldn't destroy everything with ease, shields especially while in certain formations, should provide a lot of protection from arrows. Crossbows and guns (assuming the game progresses to a later time period like Medieval 2 did), should behave like crossbows and guns, meaning a crossbow shouldn't be arcing it's shots like a bow. Siege battles should be fun for both sides, but make sense, the attacker should have a challenge on their hands, the defender should have an advantage, walls should matter and there shouldn't be a** ladders from nowhere. No build a tower mid battle because that's a bit too silly, realistically you could argue that you could build platforms or even barricades mid-battle, but proper towers is not something you'd see happen mid-battle unless the battle lasted as long as historical sieges actually lasted (which in the context of a game would be ridiculous). Things I'd like to see but aren't the bare minimum required (though obviously if they're not in there it wouldn't be great), multiple settlement types, I'm fine if they want to keep the major and minor settlements per province type approach, but it should be expanded upon. For instance major settlements would always be cities, but would have a lot of build slots, and provide a lot of benefits, they'd start off as unwalled but would quickly gain walls, and evolve the settlement in size and layout as it progresses at certain tiers. Lets use 3k's settlement tiers as an example, tier 1 and tier 2 would be unwalled, but tier 3 gains walls, the settlement map obviously changes due to that. Tier 4 is the same, Tier 5 is an upgrade to the size of the settlement, changing it's layout slightly, Tier 6, and 7 are the same, Tier 8 changes the settlement again giving it it's final layout, and tier 9 is again that same layout. As for minor settlements, they'd be split between two types, towns which could get walls at higher tiers but it'd take longer, they'd start off as small as basically a village, and would go up to small towns, towns, etc. They'd gain palisade walls and then proper walls at higher levels compared to the next type. The next type would be castles, or rather forts/castles, they'd start off with walls but would be more limited economically. Now while the build slot count could change a bit, the idea would be 10 or 12 for cities, and then 6 for castles/towns. With the castles and towns having different building types you'd see depending on what type of settlement it is. Another thing I'd like to see is better diplomacy like what 3k had. I would also like agents to be on map but to not be too annoying to deal with, also agent movies would be nice, not required but I miss them. I also think they should have naval combat, I didn't put it in bare minimum but I'd say it's borderline a bare minimum requirement, especially if they go with the same type of map coverage as Medieval 2. Next up is Shogun 3, why, because I love Shogun 2, and I'm a big fan of Japanese history and culture. I think they could use a lot of what they did for 3k here, as the Sengoku period is heavily romanticized as well. I mean, do you know how many shows, anime, and games covering that period with fantastical elements there are? The answer is a lot. So I'd like if we got the option to choose romance or historical, that's actually one of the things I liked about 3k a lot. Because I like giving players options. It's just a shame that they didn't do enough to make the records mode stand out from romance mode for 3k. Again, I'd say the bare minimum should be population, a good amount of difference between romance and historical modes, religion, family trees, etc. And yes naval has to be in the game, you can't do a sengoku period without naval, it just doesn't make sense, hell no period of Japan can you really do without naval, it's an island nation for f**k's sake. Also while not required to do the same different settlement types as proposed with Medieval 3, I think settlement types from 3k would work but need to be expanded upon. Resource settlements does work but I think they should have at least 2 or 3 build slots (excluding the main settlement chain), one building option for any of them (barring maybe farm type settlements) would be basic palisade type walls to make defense easier, and said palisade building would unlock at say tier 3 for the settlement (since in 3k resource settlements have like 5 tiers if I recall correctly). This would be enough for the most part assuming everything in battle goes well for how it functions. Shogun 2 was my first total war game, and is still my favorite due to my bias of the time period, so I really want a Shogun 3, and want it to be good. Last one I will bring up Three Kingdoms 2 as that was a game that CA had mentioned before, when they stopped support for 3k. They're basically going to need to redo 3k and fix it's issues and make improvements. Crossbows should behave like crossbows, and formations should make sense, turtle formation did not look like it would actually block missiles effectively, the gaps were too big it was stupid. Units should brace in a reasonable time period, cause it took too long to brace in 3k, leading to cav doing very well against spears, which makes no sense. And for the love of all that is holy when they add in elephants and tigers, the units should interact with them properly. Elephants had no real viable counters aside from cav, but tigers would destroy cav, and units wouldn't interact with tigers well, they would mostly ignore the tigers themselves. Entities only trying to fight them if the tiger is attacking them specifically, not the unit as a whole. Issuing an attack order on tigers would do nothing, as the unit would go to attack the handlers, which could be on the other side of the map. Leading to them walking over there getting eaten by tigers all the while. Beyond this I think most systems used are fine, and a lot of what I recommended for others could be said here. I think the trade resources should operate differently than they did in 3k, because owning multiple of a trade resource didn't do anything extra unless the resource itself said so (like with silk or spice). Because let's say you had 1 of a trade resource, like iron, your trade influence would be the same as a person who had 2 or 3 iron resources. Because trade influence only went up for acquiring the resource, not having more of it, and then it'd also increase if you had buildings or characters that buffed trade influence. So I did make a mod for myself that gave every resource settlement a trade influence bonus depending on the type of resource it was, farms provided the lowest trade influence bonus due to being the most common, while jade provided the biggest cause it was the rarest. I'm not going to bring up Empire 2 ideas as I am not as interested in that time period. But if CA did make an Empire 2, I'd hope it would be good for those who want it, I just have no interest in it.

[@joedatius]

I think the biggest nail in the coffin for something like Pharoah is that there are incredibly few people who even knew about the game or straight up have no interest in wanting it to succeed. with all of TWW3s glaring issues, there will always be people wanting the game to improve and before IE where lots of people where saying the game was dead it still basically got a full relaunch that brought back an absolute crapton of people because even with its overt huge flaws there is still a large core audience who will be willing to come back no matter what controversy happens in the past.

[@NightWhisper8462]

The one thing that I will give Troy credit for is the fact that all stat changes on your units mid-combat were shown, what this meant was that you could accurately see just how screwed over your troops were when they were completely exhausted vs fresh and ready to fight, but at the end of the day that's just a huge QoL thing that they should be able to implement in all their games.

[@Chippaization]

Never played troy, but that sounds awesome

[@jackmiller8851]

and yet they never will. absolute clown company

[@eeeertoo2597]

@@ChippaizationGame has tons of cool features, but is really unsatisfying to play

[@yuron8210]

@@eeeertoo2597 bad battle mechanics and requires brainpower and strategy to choose which provinces you want to control

[@eeeertoo2597]

Personally I just can't play the newer releases because the battles are very unsatisfying and boring to play@@yuron8210

[@doctorlolchicken7478]

You can easily separate genuine reviews from review bombing just by reading them. When your negative reviews are detailed but your positive reviews are extremely short and don’t provide reasons, your overall score is actually being propped up by people who are non-critical, they’re more supporting CA and Total War rather than judging the game on its own merits.

[@pogo8050]

I feel legit bad for the devs and marketing department. They worked their asses off and had to carry this excitement promoting the game, for literally no one to care about it. I hope this is a good and true wake up call for CA this time

[@N4chtigall]

"Good and true wake up call" - bro, do you even believe in what you saying? They are under the control of another greedy, out of touch corporation who will blame their own fans for not buying the game and in result they propably will cut the manpower/funding of TW developers...

[@MandoMTL]

Guess they'll just have to make a good game for a change, huh?

[@derigel7662]

nah stop letting devs slide they are at fault just as much. they could have left or stepped up

[@GetFochD]

@@derigel7662 and lose your job?

[@exantiuse497]

@GetFochD Yes, leaving a company means you no longer work there. And @derigel7662 You're 100% on point. I'm tired of the "don't blame the devs they're forced to do this" excuse. Nobody's forcing anyone to work for a game company, they're not slaves, if they don't approve of the things the company does they can just leave. Developers that continue working for heartless soulless companies that don't respect their workers or their audience enable carbage companies making garbage games while treating their employees and fans like garbage

[@thomaskaplan4898]

Legend, ive been away from your channel dor awhile. You have really grown and matured as a creator. Well done!

[@joedatius]

I think an issue going on with CA rn possibly is that they need resources and time to build a new foundation for new BIG Total War titles but possibly can only really get the go ahead to push things like Troy/Pharaoh along with Hyenas basically just burning a ton of money and time and flushing it down the drain.

[@APDM_Analysis]

Legend, I just want to say thank you for criticizing the Total War games when they deserve it. You often provide very clear insights on why certain game design choices are wrong. Your self-reflection after ToB is commendable as you are now both knowledgeable and humble. Really is my favorite TW content creator.

[@Chtigga]

Total War: Pharaoh is a good Saga game. But it's just way too expensive, and it would have been better to make it a big DLC for Troy (like it was initially planned).

[@toneysebits8458]

if it was good people would have bought it regardless of any issue.

[@alyssinclair8598]

past a certain point it's genuinely depressing how many saga games would have sold more than twice as well if they had half the price. I like a lot of the mechanics tested out in thrones and troy I just wish people didn't have to pay a total war warhammer to see them

[@SunlessSage]

@@toneysebits8458 There's a line to be drawn depending on price though. When the price is lower, people tend to be more forgiving. Since it's not priced as a saga game, people buying it expect a higher quality.

[@Chtigga]

@@toneysebits8458 It's not just a question of being good = people will buy it. A cheeseburger can be delicious, that doesn't mean that I would be okay to buy it for 100 dollars. Pharaoh is a good game, but its value isn't 60 dollars, euros,...

[@KellyBomaye]

Without bias the best Pharaoh can be is okay. its not that it cant be fun, but being fun for some people doesnt make it an objectively good game

[@Loalrikowki]

The optics of abandoning the dynasty edition would be so terrible for consumer confidence, it's hard to imagine them making that decision. Then again, all their other decision making has been horrendous lately, so who's to say?

[@Khorothis]

"Narcissism is bad for business" - excerpt from Business 101 in a better timeline than ours

[@IceniTotalWar]

D.O.A. is an understatement ! IT has the worst release ever if you measure day 1 player count, ToB which was murdered by CA at launch with no DLC/FLC and just 1 minor patch i think still had 22k players at launch whereas TW Pharaoh peaked at 5.4k. Many people said to wait until the weekend as they expected the player count to increase. I just checked Sunday afternoon and TW Pharaoh player base has fallen even further, behind even Med 2 .

[@Tywv91]

Legend I have been such a fan of yours for what feels like a decade. I wanted to say I’m so happy and proud of how much you’ve grown over the years and especially during the darker days of being black listed. It’s been a joy watching all your videos!

[@imperialisticvonhabsburg3149]

I am still wonderig how out of touch one must be to have thought Pharaoh was a good investment. CA higher ups are eating cryons.

[@bl4ckhunter351]

One must never forget that sega is the publisher that delivered us sonic '06.

[@JustSome462]

I mean they are the same higher ups who decided that milking WH3 for all its worth was a bad idea and they would rather focus on a game so late to the trend that Blizzard killed Overwatch in the time they almost released it

[@pinoniq]

I would love to play this game, for like €20. €60 is just to much

[@ChimpOnComputer]

Still sounds like theft, voluntary somehow.

[@eHarchovy]

So you want a troy dlc... not a major game title? 😂 Although dunno whats the actual difference between them in this case

[@superguy911]

and they were probably planning 40 dollars for troy, 40 dollars for babylonia, 40 dollars for sea peoples, etc

[@urahi830]

btw the peak player count is so low that there's no way this game doesn't end up being a financial drain, even if it's basically an asset flip

[@NemanorTheAlmighty]

we actually know what Ramses looked like, I wonder why I drew him like that

[@swordboy5477]

The leadership at sega has been misguiding the direction of TW for awhile now and the worst part is, they will blame the devs and marketing as they have and lay them off while they keep their jobs. It’s borderline criminal

[@ThanksALott]

They will not just blame the devs, they will also blame the historical setting.

[@swordboy5477]

@@ThanksALott great point

[@chickenmadness1732]

@@ThanksALott They will probably blame the customers too lol.

[@ingratus8160]

The worst thing is that the marketing was actually done great. There simply is a limit to what marketing can do when they are trying to sell a brick as a diamond.

[@sheepfly]

At Sega? It's most likely the leadership at CA

[@ravenguard0098]

One of the detriments of Historical Total War is that the Era has to be interesting or that the faction that the player really likes would be part of said era such as ancient Babylon or the Assyrians in the case of Total War: Pharaoh. But due to to focus being in the Levant and Egypt not in Mesopotamia its quite a shame. Then there is still the backlash of the price hike due to "reasons" and because of it eroded whatever goodwill was generated in TWW II.

[@glassberg5018]

I think Egypt is a really interesting time to have a Total War game set, but having the geography so limited is just a killer. I was interested in the game but not for this price.

[@balthus9105]

Those factions will probably be the DLC, them needing to take things out so they have something to sell later is what killed any interest I might have had.

[@off6848]

It would be cool if they opened the map massively and let you try to do a-historical things like make Pharaoh colonize south Africa or India

[@maxpflughoeft6806]

The hittite and canaanite factions I feel satisfy that but they were largely pushed to the side in favor of probably too many egyptian factions. I love the bronze age and I was really looking forward to something like this but between the shadows of change debacle and pharaoh being a little more expensive than it probably should be really discouraged me, and I imagine I’m not in the minority

[@Ztygs]

@@glassberg5018 I think it's limited so they can sell them as DLC's later.

[@L0RDLUK]

They thought re-releasing Rome 2 for like the 6th time would actually work. I don't care what you say, Legend. I am happy that they were shown a middle finger. They absolutely deserve it. Hopefully they come out with some actual good, NEW games next time. I'll be there to buy them if they do.

[@GeraltofRivia22]

They tried something new with Hyenas.

[@L0RDLUK]

They did, but that was something completely outside out of their playerbase's interest.@@GeraltofRivia22

[@FM_1819]

I had been wanting a bronze age tw since 2015, seeing nu-CA fumble this title is soul-crushing

[@sginrummy88]

bronze age is a fascinating time period. they could have also incorporated mythological creatures and magic.

[@Jim-fi4dc]

@@sginrummy88 Nah nobody really wants that. Thats what they have been trying to do in the past years ( mix history and fantasy in an arcady setting) and it isnt working. Also the Bronze Age is not something many people like or know about. Also there is very limited information from that time which makes a ''historical'' game nearly impossible in this era.

[@brushwakker6547]

Can we get an update video after dynasties?

[@atypicalprogrammer5777]

I really wish someone else would make a historical grand-strategy game with Paradox-Interactive level empire management, and real-time grand battles. I would especially like to see one set in Europe during the 30 Years' War. I have tried a few times to do that myself, but I have never been able to get it to work.

[@Koelebig]

Yes, well, perhaps give the Unreal 5 engine a go? I'd personally be ok with units just being simple blocks of formations on the battlefield instead of consisting of individual soldiers, but with way more interesting features during battles and on the campaign map. Not the simplistic braindead Hollywood style. I'm sure UE5 should be able to handle that?

[@Mikko088]

Like the Crusader Wars mod for CK3 and Attila Total War?

[@ThePadadada]

it must be real hard to make medieval 3

[@SmokeyBCN]

I'm actually glad they aren't making it. CA in its current form would just butcher it.

[@OrthodoxGod]

Why do people even want a med 3? This engine and the devs are simply not good enough for that game, its just going to be bad compared to med 2

[@DrakonPhD]

​@@OrthodoxGodA better camera alone would be amazing. Also a better map

[@OrthodoxGod]

@@DrakonPhD maybe they should just patch med 2 to have a modern camera, but at the same time that would probably break all mods haha

[@siegessaule]

CA not cashing in on nostalgia and releasing a crap medieval 3 is a good sign

[@BillyBob-kj4qq]

Historical total wars need to go back to the original Rome game, or even Shogun 2. Be able to send troops without leaders, have cities recruit troops from the population. There was a simulation layer to Rome with traits and what-not that these new games don't have.

[@TheseColorsRunFromPutin]

I'm still on Attila, my favorite one with super challenging campaign AI

[@toddfromwork8931]

I just don't get why they can't have an Egyptian on the cover

[@LeonSwiss]

because we wuz pharaohs

[@eHarchovy]

Basically, 4th in a row dead historical title.. Great job CA. It's really amazing how you (CA) are able to do this

[@Praenuntium]

CA never learn from their mistakes. They never learn from what works either, its like every new game is designed from the ground up.

[@iskanderkhan2220]

exactly, like when they designed the best multiplayer battle setting they ever had in Shogun 2 and then just threw it into the bin...

[@Praenuntium]

@@iskanderkhan2220 Perfect example.

[@blanck7457]

Its more like it was undead the entire time

[@ranierberger8697]

shogun 2 is the best total war ever the m,p with avatar system is f brilliant

[@jakewright1932]

I loved ToB especially at its price. Pharaoh is just way out of my price range for something so seemingly limited.

[@blob22201]

Yeah Thrones is actually really good.

[@israelhusky]

Im a fan of TOB as well, I still play it from time to time.

[@Brett-rx8sr]

I've been saying for years, I'm over and done with 'ancient' time settings with total war, even before taking into account questionable game mechanics decisions. Either a medieval 3, or a mid-late 19th century are what I'm hoping for. I'm currently playing Attila's 1212AD mod.

[@GeraltofRivia22]

Total War Victoria would be amazing if done similarly to Fall of the Samurai.

[@samurguy9906]

And they keep using an engine designed for primarily ranged combat (empire) to make games for pre-gunpowder eras. It’s kinda baffling honestly

[@PiterburgCowboy]

Creative Assembly lost the "Creative" part in their name long ago. The creative part became how to milk the most out of aging fans, since now it's 30-40 year olds throwing their salary at CA without thinking twice thus confirming and prolonging their insane DLC policy.

[@etienne8110]

I d be really curious to see what is hapening during meeting between suits and devs. "We need to make money" "Ok let s make a new game, fanbase has been waiting for our next historical game" "Yeah, let s do bronze age, egyptians are cool" "Euh, okay. I was thinking more med3 or empire 2, but fine with bronze age, lots of interesting civ, we could do trading, the rise and fall of civs as iron comes into play..." "No no no, just egyptians. No new gameplay features and we ll sell other civs in full proces dlcs" " euh okay. If it is a smaller twsaga it might please some players." "Nonono, this will be asking for a full AAA price." "But we won t have time to design naval warfare, city sieges or even an economic system." "Then don t, less work, more earnings for us." "But to get earnings the game needs to be good!" "Nah, it will be fine..."

[@IceniTotalWar]

Nah it'll be fine says The Critical Drinker ! what could possibly go wrong... 🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@etienne8110]

@@IceniTotalWar haha, now i can t help reading it with his voice in my head.

[@MidlifeCrisisJoe]

Oh man this video reminds me to start a new campaign in Rome 2! Thanks Legend. You're a legend.

[@Droidman1231]

I think a big thing mentioned here, that I've never thought of before, is that Total War is competing against their older games. I was super busy/playing other stuff when Warhammer 3 came out. I've returned to Total War, but given all the stuff going on with TW3, I'm just playing TW2 now. Same with Pharaoh; if I want a recent historial one, I'd just by Three Kingdoms probably. These games are like Madden games at this point

[@jamiesteele9291]

As a big fan of the bronze age who hasn't bought this game due to the very limited scope, this is quite sad. I'd hoped to get it in a year or two once the dlcs have added more factions and a bigger map but now I'm worried they're gonna pull the plug early and that won't happen.

[@Nightmare_52]

I really want tw to succeed but by god they are making it difficult for that to happen

[@monstershogun6008]

CA: silently pressing the panic button.

[@grimaldur778]

From the announcement I was immediately thinking "Why wouldn't I just play Rome 2 if I want to play Egyptians; since rome 2 has more variety in Eastern factions anyway." And alas... time proved people who thought this way to be correct.

[@dnash2131]

Best case scenario is that is fails so abysmally that CA start paying attention

[@tuckerkoch7027]

I think the current engine is mostly based around ranged combat. Melee is the huge glaring problem. CA could probably make a very passable Empire 2 gunpowder rang based game. If they where smart use that time and money to remake a new melee focused engine that is actually built and optimized for all these other melee based games we all what to get back too. But they'll just keep trying to put a square peg in a round hole.

[@JohnSmith-df6oi]

This video had more views in 35 minutes than Pharaoh had max players. Ouch.

[@FireFlamazo]

You saw the writing on the wall? More like hieroglyphics lol

[@adrianaslund8605]

I liked Three Kingdoms. I found it pretty ambitious. With interesting mechanics. Troy was alright. Pretty interesting mechanics and I kinda liked the mythicized history vibe it had.

[@thrandompug2254]

Honestly I think all total war really needs to be decent again is to get rid of the healthbars. If we went back to the system where each model had like maybe 1-3 health depending on the unit I think things would feel a lot better. It would reduce the bullshit cavalry charges in the warhammer series. I can't STAND charging into retreating enemies and not getting a single kill because my light missile cavalry apparently are armed with baguette for melee weapons