Zardon

Read the review here
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Medieval II is (as all Total War games) composed of two main parts – the turn based strategic map and the real-]time tactical battles. The strategic map is where most of the time will be spent in the main campaign. You have to manage the regions you have control over, build up your armies and develop your settlements.

A new addition to the series is the introduction of two types of settlements. Cities are your main source of income and they are generally culturally more developed. The second type of settlement is the castle. They are generally better protected and offer a wider array of troops available for training, but they generate less income. In the early stages of development it is possible to convert one type into the other, but you always lose all the buildings exclusive to the previous type.

OmegaRED

Great review. I've always been a classic RTS fan and Total War series just looked too slow and complicated for my tastes but I picked this one up and have been addicted to it. There's no other RTS that can match the thrill of defeating 2 attacking armies besieging your castle at the same time.

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Zardon

i wish I could agree, i find this whole series immensely boring and ive tried to like them

OmegaRED

I hear ya, I did put Rome: Total War on my pc but found all the tactical map stuff to be too tedious and confusing for some reason Medieval II: Total War was easier to get into and the battles much more enjoyable. There's a lot of random stuff that happens but the humor in some of it is a nice touch (like assassinations). I'm having a tough time with this game because I've scared off all my allies and always execute my prisoners

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Mazuko

I have played through the long campaign (250 turns) 4 times and still never managed to hold 45 territories + Jerusalem in order to win. That stuff is HARD TO DO! I do love the fact though that you can continue the game beyond that 250 turn limit and conquer the rest of the world. However it is noticibly harder to do as for some odd reason once you pass the 250 turn mark everyone can kick your butt.

Look out for the Timurids Elephant Artillery, all I can say is everything the British Army has been able to throw at them is obliterated both in close combat and at a distance. A number of times I have sent 1000+ men against 45 of those things and got ripped to pieces no matter what I used, calvary, men at arms, riflemen, spearmen, archers, it seems nothing can bring them down!

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OmegaRED

I haven't run into the Mongols or Timurids yet but I'm hoping some flanking tactics would work on those elephants. I think some archers can deploy stakes (don't know how) that might stop them?

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BlueMak

I never got into Shogun, don't know why, I like Japan and Japanese culture. I have the warlord edition (or something) but always stopped playing after an hour or so.
RTW I liked a lot due to the setting, but got bored with it for the stupid diplomatic options, meaning none of them. Everybody is your enemy and no matter what they declare war on you no matter how you are doing. So I stopped playing that too.
I liked MTW, though I always wanted to play as a kingdom that was neither christian or muslim, of course I couldn't (is this possible in the sequel?). The problem with MTW was for me how easy it became to win. Even without higher tech I was able on hard to get the yellow iberian kingdom (don't remember names now) and easily liberate the whole peninsula, kick arabs out of africa, make that christian, capture half of france and half of central europe and surround jerusalem while capturing the eh surrounding territories and asia minor. I couldn't lose a battle! Bored with it.
I don't know when I will give MTW2 a go, right now I am thinking of getting Anno 1701.
Good review though as always.

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The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others(Bertrand Russell)"You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn't wear a veil,You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them." - Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis
This is slavery, not to speak one's thought. [Euripides-The Phoenician Women (c.411-409 B.C.)] http://www.macedonia.info/FALLACIESANDFACTS.htm Sic semper tyrannis.

OmegaRED

I'm not sure if you have to play as Christian or Muslim but you can be excommunicated from the church if you disobey the Pope I guess that's kinda close?

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Mazuko

I think you have to be Muslim or Christian as that is how Medieval times were, you were one, the other, or pagen and needless to say the pagen population was never substantial enough to warrant their gaining a "country" status.

I had no clue archers could deploy stakes I will have to see if I can find something out about that as none of the archers I have can do it. I think the ironic thing is in the game I am playing now the Mongols are peaceful once they gained a homeland and quit attacking anyone. I've tried flanking the elephant artillery too and I just get pummeled haha.

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OmegaRED

WooT! I won a 4 v 1 and was severely outnumbered. Heavy Calvary is a godsend, take those up a mountain side and crash them down on the enemy. That's pretty much my main tactic and it seems to work in most cases. I've tried everything I can think of to get archers to deploy stakes but no go maybe it's in the manual.

On a side note, I've been getting some lock ups during a few battles anyone else gotten these? It's accompanied by loud screaching and static through the speakers.

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WhO_KnOwS

You have to give them the order to deploy the stakes before you start the battle (aka in the deployment phase). I find it to be a good tactic when the terrain won't allow for any ambush tactics and all you can do is hope to beat down the enemy before they get close enough to start doing damage.

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Mazuko

Interesting, thanks who knows I will give that a shot tonight when I get out of work.

OmegaRED usually when I got that it was one of these three things that caused it. 1. You need to update your audio drivers. 2. You are attempting to use a version of EAX not supported by your audio card or the driver you are using to attempt to use that version of EAX is not supported and again you need to update your audio drivers. 3. As a last ditch effort sometimes I look for chipset driver updates.

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OmegaRED

It's probably sound blaster related but I have the latest Audigy 2 drivers and I'm using EAX 4 which is supported. It only happens on this game so I think it's something to do with it rather than my system.

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