Talk:Empire: Total War/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

ETW relies on Lua scripting

Just google for it; e.g. [1]. Though you may argue that hackers' forums are incompetent/unreliable, or the demo is not a game release. --4th-otaku (talk) 20:31, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

It's not a hacker forum its a mod forum but I don't think this is notable enough to be mentioned in the article. Ace blazer (talk) 05:16, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

This should be treated only as an explanatory for the Lua-scripted categorizing I've made. And modder do is a kind of hacker (cf. cracker). --4th-otaku (talk) 14:45, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

XP/Vista

Will this work on XP? Amazon just seems to have it listed as a Vista game. Please answer quick, am thinking of ordering!! :D SGGH ^ping! 21:08, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

This really isn't the place for such discussion—we're not a forum—but yes, it's designed for both XP and Vista. -- Sabre (talk) 21:12, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Is it confirmed about the Campaign Multiplayer going to be released after release in a patch? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.42.176.149 (talk) 00:36, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

For questions like these you should really try a forum dedicated to the game rather than Wikipedia Jom (talk) 16:10, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Naval Tactics Age of Sail and Naval Combat Critisicm

I understand that Wikipedia articles shouldn't include tips and tactics on Game. The topic, the New Naval Combat Engine was criticised in the review as being Chaotic and hard to control many ships. To avoid POV there should be links that mention somewhere the historical context of Naval Engine. I added a link to Line of Battle article in Wikipedia for those that might be influenced. Alternative take on the combat is that you cannot micro-manage combat and CA, obviously took a design choice of giving players limited controls simulating the era. I thought of adding links to topics such as wind guage also, but I thought maybe this could be common sense reason you are limited. I've noted some comments on the review via google as critism being taken out of context. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.208.239.141 (talk) 18:45, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Crashes and other difficulties

For such a high-profile game with enormous amount of praise from critics and with large sales figures, the game seems to be very unstable and unpolished. An unusually large (in my opinion) number of people seem to be having fundamental game-breaking problems such as crashing, freezing, distortion of text/graphics, performance issues on high-end PCs, and inability to even start up the game. These issues have been further aggravated by its distribution service, Steam, which apparently has been having problems with downloading, installing, validating, and patching the game. I myself have not bought the game yet, but I am getting discouraged reading the forums. (9000 posts in Support Forum only in the first week of release?) PC game launches are generally shaky with plenty of technical problems, but this seems a bit too much, even though further patches are reportedly on their way.

So my question is whether or not this is in the least bit unusual, and if this is worth mentioning in the article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Spiritaway5177 (talk • contribs) 20:32, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Its only worth mentioning if it has been covered by reliable secondary sources on the issue. Forum posts do not count for this or are considered representative of a game's community, and what sources we do have only point to a minority of users having problems. As such, per undue weight guidelines, problems are briefly mentioned, but not given any major coverage. -- 21:49, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

"Secondary sources", such as gaming sites and magazines, are paid by the program developers for adversitement space. As such, they are not impartial in reviewing a game and may even face a conflict of interest in doing so, as a poor review may generate less advertising money for future games/projects. Forum posters are impartial, and a high volume of repeated issues must be mentioned in the article. The article as it stands does not reflect the views of a large percentage of the public which purchased the product. As it stands now, the article only cites the reviews from companies who recieved money from the game publisher for advertising. 87.238.116.162 (talk) 09:40, 14 March 2009 (UTC)Frank 14 March 2009

Well, good luck challenging that. Wikipedia is built on secondary sources, not forums by any anonymous person with an Internet connection. We only report the published views by the perceived experts in the field: in the case of video games, the industry journalists. That's not going to change unless a whole load of core Wikipedia policies and conventions are torn down. Your opinion on whether the companies have received advertising money is also nothing more than theory and speculation, invalid for removing a whole bunch of sources considered reliable for a good few years. -- Sabre (talk) 10:58, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't know if game industry journalists are paid behind the back and I am not interested, but most of them either did not experience serious problems or failed to mention the numerous bugs/crashes. However, IGN did do a "post-mortem interview" where the CA representative acknowledges and defends the game's instability and performance issues. I still think this doesn't cover the scope of the problem among customers sufficiently, (e.g. IGN reader average is 6.9, etc.) and I think Wikipedia videogame policies are slightly flawed in accurately reporting on the casual gamers' reception.

Still, should I (or anyone) add some info about the post-release "Techincal Problems," while citing the IGN interview? Spiritaway5177 (talk) 22:10, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

The IGN interview doesn't warrant the technical sort of stuff to being covered in any depth than it already—it is only one question among many, where the answer is essentially "we're working on it"—but there are some valid points within the interview in general. I've integrated the reference in. -- Sabre (talk) 22:50, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Omg you integrated it in? Forshizzle? Why isnt a whole chunk of this article revolving around these stupid crashes and problems. Oh thats right- Wikipedo rules. Yeah whatever. Enjoy your site that will never be respected in the real world because of stupid byzantine rules that ignore reality. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.205.33.223 (talk) 17:20, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a video games review site. End of story. If people want to read reviews and opinions by random people it isn't as if they are impossible to find. But Wikipedia is not the place for them. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 17:55, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

This seems to raise an important point on forums. At this point in the games release it is likely that reviews were written by journalist chosen by the games manufacturers, who, although not actually in the pay of the game manufacturer, would not have been selected if they were considererd unlikely to give a positive review. It is likely that if problems persist with this game then the reviewers will eventually publish material to this effect and this material would be available to reference as a secondary source. I do not believe that careful media control by an accomplished commercial organisation in the early stages of a game release is particularly suprising or contentious but it clearly must be taken into account when preparing this article. To go back to the point on Forums, these are a rapid guage of actual experiences with the game and, although effectively annonymous, it is logical to suggest that once a sufficient volume of forum posts point towards the same issue then these would be considered of sufficient weight to justify coverage and it is reasonable to assume that they indicate the experience of a significant number of people using this game. As there is no truly neutral measure of overall satisfaction with the game at this point any statement that these views represent a minority is as likely to be a personal opinion as any other statement. Given that the current article is very pro the game I feel that reconsideration of the level of emphasis given to current technical issues is warranted. --GeneCrash (talk) 19:49, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

See my above comment. Wikipedia is not a games review site. It is not the job of editors here to gauge when forum posts reach sufficient notability. Forums attracts those who wish to complain. Those happy are more likely to spend their time on the game itself than frequenting forums. So forums are not a valid way of determining customer satisfaction. Nor is it editors responsibility to speculate about the neutrality of reviewers without any evidence. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 20:12, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) What he said essentially. Your opinion on the nature of the reviewers is unsubstantiated and irrelevant. Wikipedia is not a place to publish people's own thoughts on a subject, it is only meant to contain the information from those considered experts in the area; in the same way we don't publish what any random person thinks of the actual historical period Empire is set in, we don't publish what any random forum poster or otherwise unknown internet person thinks of any game on this site. Credentials and due editorial process in sources are paramount to the successful operation of Wikipedia. -- Sabre (talk) 20:20, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

U guys say thad u tell the story as it is. Well the truth is thad if the game is a problem (and my god it has a problem!!) it shold be mentioned. http://shoguntotalwar.yuku.com/topic/51588/t/Post-patch-support.html here u can see hundreads of people who have reported thad they can not play the game. Devolepers admit thad there is a problem. Is't thad proof. It shold be mentioned for the respect of those people who demand justice. people a demanding money back. I wold do it myself but my english sucks as u can see. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.50.134.15 (talk) 17:33, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia isn't about the Truth^tm, its about whats properly verifiable to professional, reliable sources. As already stated, forum posts are not reliable sources. -- Sabre (talk) 20:48, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Since Wikipedia isn't about the truth then it should stop presenting itself as a fact-providing machinery since following that statement Wiki in itself is nothing more than an opinion. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.138.162.6 (talk) 00:17, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Is it possible to get another party to arbitrate here? No offense to you Sabre, but you're kinda wrapped up in the Total War series. You get lots of awards, so people obviously recognize you as knowledgeable, but the higher ups need to have some kind of review here. The policy causes us to miss something so obvious that perhaps its best to re-examine the policy. The goal of Wikipedia is not to create a set of policies and map the world accordingly. The policies are supposed to help us map the world well. The Frog (talk) 04:27, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not attempting to "map the world", it's attempting to be an encyclopaedia. This is how encyclopaedia's work. verifiability and no original research are core policies and this talk page is not the place to review policy. Wikipedia cannot include material that is not reliably sourced (and the opinions of random people on forums are not considered reliable sources). So Sabre is entirely correct. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 07:07, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

This is not how encyclopedia's work. They do original research. The policy is wrong because it creates disinformation. How do we raise questions about this policy? 69.143.12.236 (talk) 20:55, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

This is how this encyclopedia works. Other encyclopedias hire suitable experts with various qualifications and accepted reliability in their work, this encyclopedia uses entirely anonymous people with internet connections—there is an essential difference. No original research is one of the core policies of the site, and isn't going to be torn down on a whim. -- Sabre (talk) 18:30, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

I ain't trying to do it on a whim, I want to raise a discussion about it. You don't see me just editing this article as much as I can until it's locked, do you? I want to discuss whether a game with well known problems, that has three major patches in less than six months, and has frequent tech support questions on the game's producer's own website, can have a note in its Wikipedia article that there are problems, even though no journalistic sources have cited it (either because of paid relationship with the developer, lack of extensive playing time beyond the review, or superior technology to the average gamer). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.143.12.236 (talk) 16:59, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

The straightforward answer is no. As it would not be verifiable with a reliable source. If you want to question this policy and guideline then you can do so on the talk pages for them. Follow the links. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 18:10, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Flaws

Might there be a mention of the many flaws it had upon release? Like the way AI ships cannot transport units, so there are very few land battles in India or the Americas. Or the frequent crashes and memory leakages. On almost all TW forums it gets slammed.

So - anyone with too much time [;-)] might like to add this in.

Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.152.21.31 (talk • contribs) 21:37, 25 March 2009

It can only be mentioned if reliable secondary sources have commented on it. Personal experiences from playing and testing the game, or forum postings aren't suitable for this (see WP:V, WP:OR and WP:SPS for relevant guidelines). Only a few sporadic mentions have been made, such as this article and this interview; if the people considered experts for the area—in video gaming's case, the industry media—haven't given it any significant coverage, Wikipedia shouldn't either. The sources mentioned above warrant the mention of problems, as already in the article, but more indepth elaboration isn't appropriate with this level of critical commentary. -- Sabre (talk) 22:00, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

But surely something must be said if the Grand Campaign is ruined by something as simple as dodgy AI - and I am amazed that no major company has notices this - although I suspect that it is something to do with the massive advertising campaign that has been launched into many websites and magazines. Do you have any idea how this massive flaw has not yet been recognised by major reviewing companies? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.152.21.31 (talk) 21:29, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

They didn't see it as a massive flaw, just minor AI problems that some suggested could be sorted out in a patch. They certainly didn't regard any aspect of the game as ruined. -- Sabre (talk) 21:55, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Well I would say that it is ruined - because enemies cannot transport armies via the sea, the Americas are reserved only for the player, GB and Spain, and France. India is always untouched. And the way they attack your bases. But anyway, enough of that. Can't there be some criticism using this review as the professional whatever? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.152.21.31 (talk) 08:36, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

That review has only cropped up in the last few days, I'd only noticed it recently. It is useful as a dissenting opinion, so I'll get around to throwing it in, but bear in mind undue weight: this is the only vaguely negative critical opinion out of around a pool of 50 reliable sources. -- Sabre (talk) 20:48, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Understand that the reason why these so-called reviewing companies like IGN and Gamespot won't criticize games like Empire is that it recieves tons of advertising money from the same games that they "critique". Of course you don't bite the hand that feeds you and they won't point out game-breaking flaws or they'll lose their cashcows. If anything IGN and Gamespot and similar companies are just decieving people into buying broken products. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.138.162.6 (talk) 21:18, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

This has been brought up many times, regardless of what you may personally think about the validity of such sites, the fact is they are a Reliable source, hence they are used for their reviews. QueenCake (talk) 21:28, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

How about historical stuff? like St Petersburg existing or such. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.69.59.85 (talk) 22:29, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Same thing applies, only if sources have commented on historical inaccuracies. And St. Petersburg was only founded in 1703, so a little leniency with game design is understandable for only six turns into the campaign. -- Sabre (talk) 20:48, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Reader/ User ratings

Are reader/ user ratings ever discussed in these articles? For example, IGN readers currently give the game 6.9, Metacritic users currently give the game 7.1 --Merlinme (talk) 16:54, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

User ratings and reviews for video games aren't considered reliable for Wikipedia in any article. There has to be proper editorial process, something that is completely lacking in a review written by any random anonymous person with a keyboard on the web. IGN, Metacritic or any other facility that allows user reviews and the like do not extend editorial control over these areas in the same way they do over their own editors and writers. -- Sabre (talk) 17:06, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Are we allowed to talk about problems with the game?

I was curious to see how my direct quote from The Creative Assembly: "Are there issues with Empire? Yes there are" would be handled, because although I can see that we have to use reliable sources, there still seems to be a bias in favour of the game developers.

In answer to my question, the direct acknowledgement that there are issues with the game as it was released, which needed patching, has now been replaced by a slightly vague reference to "post release support" and "improvements" to come.

I'm all in favour of using reliable sources, but I do think there seems to be some bias creeping in here. Anecdotal reports of significant problems with the game as released, even when supported by post review reporting and even from interviews with the developers themselves, seems to be edited out almost instantly. I'm not convinced that the article as it stands is representative of the experience of a significant proportion of gamers. It's quite unusual for a game to receive 20% less from users than reviewers on metacritic.

To make my own bias clear: I love the Total War series and have been playing them from the year dot. However I've been buying computer games long enough to suspect when something has been released too early, and I certainly get that impression that is the case with Empire. There were two significant patches in less than four weeks, with the promise of more to come. I'm not sure this is currently given adequate weight in the article. --Merlinme (talk) 17:31, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I restored the quote, I just thought it was redundant to the mention that patches were coming—no sane developer claims there aren't any problems with their software. As for the other stuff, see the reply above. Yes, it is an odd one that the critics and experts disagree with the vocal user opinion to this extent, but within Wikipedia, what the random passerby thinks isn't relevant unless properly covered by reliable sources. Those sources haven't seen fit to comment on it, although negative comments from those sources have been factored in when found. Its somewhat comparable to why you or I cannot put our own opinions in on the evolution article; we are not experts, we are not editorially overseen, nor are we people of credibility within the subject area. We're just anonymous people with a web connection. -- Sabre (talk) 18:30, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I've removed it. "Direct quote" or not. It is both uncited and vaguely attributed to no-one in particular, making it doubly unsuitable. Otherwise, I'm in agreement with everything Sabre says above. Wikipedia is not a games review site. It is not even here to represent "the experience of a significant proportion of gamers". Its purpose is to summarise what reliable sources say. If you have a problem with what they say, then take it up with the reviewers themselves. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 20:33, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

What are you talking about, Escape_Orbit? Excuse my bluntness, but the quote is directly attributed to "Studio Communications Manager Kieran Brigden", in an interview by a respected magazine with the game developers. It comes from the interview cited at the end of the relevant section. I would scarcely describe this as "uncited and vaguely attributed to no-one in particular". In what way is this an unreliable source? --Merlinme (talk) 07:42, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

The quote was attributed to "One designer", whoever that was. The sentence it was attached to was also strangely constructed, not making it obvious it was part of the same cite at the end. In fact the sentence appeared to be broken fragments. However, the replacement you've added is much clearer. Thanks. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 19:14, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

That was my fault, not Merlinme's. Sorry. -- Sabre (talk) 22:09, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

No blame allocated or intended :-). End result is improvement, so it's all good. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 23:12, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Yeah no worries. I think the end result is also better than my original edit. Kieran Brigden did say that quote in that interview, but I don't want to get the man fired! It was in the context of "we made such a big and ambitious game" etc. In any case, I think the balance is better now. --Merlinme (talk) 08:00, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Faction List

There's bee a lot of discussion as to whether there should be a faction lost here. However opposing it is to the 'guidelines', there's a lot of reasons to actually list it. One of the bigger reasons is that there hasn't been complete, well-organised informative list concering the brief history, nature, characteristics of the said factions of most of the games in the Total War series anywhere; including Sega official websites.

Furthermore, if other films, anime and even games can have such information, then I don't see why the total war articles have the'guidelines' in the way. The List of gangs in the Grand Theft Auto series is completely covered in fictional "Gameplay Aspects" and it is "listing the gangs just for the sake of it". Is that not an article-worth of mile-long list of "gameplay that may not be of relevance to readers who are not gamers"? And yet there's an entire article standing right there, defying the 'guidelines'.

While I'm aware that there're already articles for "Great Britain" or "The Holy Roman Empire", you wouldn't find links of unique factual historical units belonging to a particular such as mamluks or at the very least a mention in these articles.

Check out The M2TW Talk Page to see the debate there, there's no point repeating the whole thing as it is here. --WiKID Daryl (talk) 15:16, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Just because article X does something one way doesn't mean its necessarily correct. Most article on Wikipedia are below quality standards, such as the GTA list, due to its very nature as a freely editable website. Articles that don't meet content guidelines are everywhere, but that does not mean that those errors should be replicated elsewhere. We aren't here to act as the game's instruction manual, a feature list or a Prima game guide to the factions and their indepth details such as their objectives and units. The focus of video game articles is on the real-world aspects of the game, not the minute gameplay/plot detail. That these details happen to have wikilinks to historical counterparts is irrevelant. Early modern period is the portal to those subjects, not Empire: Total War. -- Sabre (talk) 15:35, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I understand there are guidelines. But the point is that if articles like the List of GTA gangs, M2TW and ETW contains useful information rarely found elsewhere then it is a question beyond guidelines and the articles/information are worth keeping. This is especially useful when wikipedia is such an extensive database. If there are so many other errors than why only pick on the Total War Series? Why aren't the whole GTA gangs article deleted and the gangs listed on each of the GTA series pages?

Guidelines are also articles, guidelines aren't necessarily perfect. In fact, there's nothing in the "NOT" page that mentions games specifically. We can't always stick to unchanged rules, rules change through time and are therefore on-the-whole flexible. Individual cases can be exceptional and that is when the suitablity of such rules in these cases needs to be examined and determined.

In a computer age as such, it is much more likely for someone to relate to aspects of the relevant historic periods with specific and outright media such as these games than identifying something as tedious and hard-to-identify as the early modern period. I mean come-on, who would type early modern period when they want to search for the gun-totting reiters of The Holy Roman Empire; when they know it is from Medieval II: Total War but cannot find the information on the page of M2TW itself?(assuming that they've forgot both the name of the unit and which faction it's from?)

Not to mention that one'll have to spend an eternity trying to find a page for a single type of historic military unit after flipping through page-after-page of "history of"s, "demographics"s, "politics"s, "monarchs"s, "battles participated"s andet cetera and then failing to find anything?

The fact is that there are a lot of people on M2TW and here who prefers lists to be present for the convenience of us including other users.

--WiKID Daryl (talk) 15:49, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

There's no mention of games in WP:NOT because its not meant to be a definitive presciptive policy covering all possible eventualities—it sets up principles with a few odd examples, nothing more. More precise guidelines are given elsewhere, such as at WP:VG/GL Guidelines aren't articles, articles are the pages that are part of the encyclopedia, not the administrative and editorial pages that make it run. The faction information is available elsewhere; game guides, the official websites, reviews, previews, fansites, and various other places already contain that stuff. We aren't meant to be a database for all details, we're an encyclopedia that is supposed to deliver a concise summary of the details. Indepth lists of gameplay material goes against that. If you want to challenge that, the VG Wikiproject is the place to go, but previous discussions there regarding factions in the Total War series and similar gameplay concepts factions and units in other games have all ended up with maintaining the concise prose overview > indepth list approach. That the basis for some gameplay mechanics can be traced to real-world historical factions and units is still irrelevant. Arguments concerning "if" someone wants to find out information about a particular unit are equally moot; Wikipedia is not and will never be a game guide. Ultimately, this is an article on a business product, its development as a work and its critical reception. This is is not a crash-course in history and should not be treated as such. -- Sabre (talk) 16:28, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure what would be achieved by your suggestion, WiKID Daryl. The main factions are already mentioned in the article, and if the reader wishes to follow the link for Maratha Confederacy, they can. If there is a particular unit in the game which they are curious about, then they can look them up in Wikipedia, and to the extent that the game reflects a historical unit, they can find information about reiters or anything else. Having such information in the article on the game however is a level of detail far beyond what most people would expect in an enyclopedia article on the subject. If they wish to find out about things in the game to a greater level of detail, there are many other places they can look which will perform that job admirably. Like all enyclopedias, Wikipedia attempts to provide a readable and accurate summary. It can never hope to be readable, accurate and exhaustive in the amount of detail it provides. On an academic subject, for example, a reader can find many books, hundreds of pages long, which consider what is a relatively short Wikipedia article. For a game, a reader can find many internet sites which list factions, units, strategies, statistics and many other topics which change every time an expansion is released, and in which the average Wikipedia reader has minimal interest.--Merlinme (talk) 16:46, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

We really need a list! Nostalgia of Iran (talk) 12:52, 7 November 2009 (UTC)

--Split article-- Parts of article about technical problems should be split from reception. They are buried. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.175.243.64 (talk) 05:56, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Empire Games Renaming Discussion

For those of you who are unaware, this isn't the only game called Empire! Well, actually, there is only one called "'Empire!'", but the point I'm trying to make is there are loads of games with Empire as (and in) the title. As you might imagine, this can cause some trouble when choosing what to name each article and how to disambiguate them, and has, in practice, led to some rather unusual choices in some cases... Since it's probably best to consider all the games with Empire as the main part of the title at once when deciding how to rename a few of the worst offenders, this game has been included in a discussion on how to name (and rename) Empire titled games here. Please join in the discussion there and add any thoughts, comments or suggestions you may have. Thanks! --xensyria^T 15:42, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Napolean Total War

Semi confirmed reports have come out of an expansion, calle Naploean Total War

Serious concerns about the neutrality of the "reception" portion of the article

the reception part of this article, while well cited, is exclusively concerned with the reception the game got among critics, and has virtually no mention of the reception the game received from the community. There is a stark contrast between the review's ratings and users ratings of this game, but the article makes no mention of this, and is therefore misleading. thus, i propose that portion of the article be tagged with a "neutrality disputed" tag because right now it is nothing but a praise of ETW, when a cursory check of the facts indicated widespread disgust with the game in many, many respects. and this is reflected abundantly both on their official forums and on the fansites. Dmcheatw (talk) 21:36, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

This has all been discussed at length before. Unless you can produce cites from reliable sources, all you have is opinions on forums which are not acceptable as cites on Wikipedia. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 21:43, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

that is why i posted here, and this needs to be at the top of the page, so people who want to dig a little further can be made aware that even there official forums are apoplectic. tell me, would it be reliable to post the link of their official announcement under reception, so visitors to this page might see for themselves the response of the community? also, i was proposing we put a neutrality disputed tag on the article, to show that a very large % of people do not in fact agree with the game reviews. obviously i don't have a credible source, but i could quote prince of macedon who said the game wasn't good. he has a very large viewer base on youtube. or i could quot tomi of CWC, who has also expressed disgust with the situation. these are known and respected names among TW fans, especially PoM. do not move this to the bottom of the page, as it is fairly important relative to the other information presented here if the aim of wikipedia is to inform, not mislead. inform would be present both sides of the coin, by posting links the the shogun forums and the CWC forums. simple links would point visitors to the forums, which will clearly show there is serious discontent among the fan base over the quality of the game and the marketing practices of CA. keep in mind this webpage is not an ad for CA/SEGA.Dmcheatw (talk) 19:43, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Please read the endless discussion on this, forums are not reliable for reception of any game. Only reliable media sources can be used for reception, regardless of what you think of this policy it is no use arguing it here. Btw, latest posts always go at the bottom, read the talk page protocol. QueenCake (talk) 20:50, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

The aim of Wikipedia is to report what is in reliable, secondary sources, not what we think is true. Forums are always full of complaints for everything; they are not in any way a suitable measure to gauge fan opinion, negative or positive, on an encyclopedia. Nor are random, unknown people who happen to have popularity on YouTube. The only way is if someone writing for a reputable source with editorial control comments on it, and they haven't. Wikipedia's neutrality works around these reliable sources: when you try to say something that isn't in those sources—like this sort of stuff—it is original research and is removed. As Escape Orbit has already said, this has been discussed to death. -- Sabre (talk) 21:03, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

In respone to a forum post made by Kieran Brigden of CA, i have edited the reception portion of the article to include the (perceived) community backlash to the plans and state of ETW. This was done in the interest of neutrality and fair representation of the game. While there is no original research in my edit, there is deductive reasoning which any human can verify for themselves. This reasoning, coupled with his post, is strong enough to verify that CA is aware of a community backlash. If you want to revert my edit, I suggest we call for arbitration. I understand you gentlemen are doing what your doing in the interest of quality standards, but it was sure awfully convenient for CA. I'm not sure what the Wikipedia policy is on deductive reasoning and everything i said is something anyone can verify for themselves. Moreover, if my edit is reverted due to arbitration then I will push for neutrality disputed tags and/or those tags that say "this article reads like an advertisement," because it does. Just look at this discussion page. Most all the discussion pertains to the shortcomings, perceived or otherwise, of this game. In short, this article is not an even handed representation of the game, partly becausesome people, for whatever reason, have been able to use wikipedia's quality standards in order to stifle any negative portrayal of the game.Dmcheatw (talk) 15:29, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

i see that you completely erased my edits, S@bre, in violation of this: "if there is any doubt about whether an edit should be rolled back, please do not use this feature. Use the undo feature instead, and add a more informative edit summary explaining your revert." since i usled links to credible sources, i don't see how your revert was justifiable.Dmcheatw (talk) 15:41, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

What the heck are you talking about? The only rollback I've performed on this article recently was this, where some idiot replaced every use of "faction" with "fraction", which you reverted (which thankfully got reverted back by someone else). -- Sabre (talk) 17:00, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't know how this can be explained any clearer to you, Dmcheatw. Forum posts are not reliable, verifiable sources and may not be use to cite opinions in articles. Period.

Forums, and unfortunately this talk page, naturally attract people who wish to complain. They are not a reliable indicator of general opinion. The opinions on them are generally written by people with no verifiable experience or expertise in the subject matter. Their value is therefore indeterminable.

Unless you can find a published source that is critical of the Empire you may not add this information. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 16:56, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Negative portrayal is not "stifled", there's plenty of instances of criticism in the reception section as provided by said reliable sources. For instance:

• Notes on consumer problems with Steam and nVidia drivers.
• Admittance by CA employees of existence of issues and the need to fix them.
• Inconsistent and sometimes downright stupid behaviour of campaign AI.
• Lack of naval invasions.
• AI getting "confused" and "falling apart" in land battles.
• Poor pathfinding in sieges and around obstacles.
• "Frustrating" controls for naval battles.
• Poor pathfinding and formations in naval battles.
• Comment on bugs and crashes as part of a "heap of problems that need resolving".

If negative portrayal was being stifled and this is written as an advert as you claim, these points wouldn't be there; they hardly promote the game to a prospective buyer. The reception section is not happy bells and whistles for the game, it is balanced between positive points and negative points as is required of an article of GA standard. -- Sabre (talk) 17:20, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

If you want "reliable" citations that aren't forum posts, look no further than google. [2] [3] ηoian ‡orever ηew ‡rontiers 22:03, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Plus the metacritic score is in the 60s. Everything that has come out since I wrote this complaint has supported my position. From the press release on august 24th, to Mark Simpsons blog (where he openly admits the game was rushed), to the feeback by users on NTW in advertisments and youtube videos... I like to think the quality of CA's workmanship is well known.76.182.120.155 (talk) 00:22, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

User reviews are not reliable sources by any stretch of imagination. There's no way I can emphasise this more, so stop wasting our time with it. What angry internet person number 6349 thinks is irrelevant to any encyclopedic analysis. You are more than welcome to introduce appropriate sources that raise negative grievances if they are from published, reliable sources with editorial process provided that it is done in a way so not to put undue weight, but what happens on Youtube and blogs is not appropriate for inclusion on an encyclopedia. Metacritic's score is 90%, not in the 60s. -- Sabre (talk) 10:43, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

actually, the user score, which is primarily composed of people who own the game - as opposed to a reviewer who played it for a few hours - is 6.6. additionally, Mark simpson is one of the founding members of CA, and the blog is their official developer blog, not some 3rd party blog (http://blogs.sega.com/totalwar/ take note of the entries where he says "empire had to be in a box by february '09," and "I was too embarassed to give this game away to my friends [until version 1.4]"). plus, I find it rather comical that you seem to think game review magazines are credible. i can only assume noboody has explained the link between game sales, ad revenue, and review scores to you. 76.182.120.155 (talk) 11:04, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Oh no, not the old "Conspiracy!!!11" crap again. Not interested, not relevant: nothing more than the ravings of the anonymous internet person and the exact reason why we don't take user-generated content for anything on this site. User scores and reviews aren't valid sources, regardless of where you find them. End of. As for the blog, if official, that's a different matter, but I'm not going to trawl through all those entries: if you want to point us to a particular entry, link to it. -- Sabre (talk) 11:29, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

there are only about 4 entries and i suggest you actually read them in their totality, you might actually learn something about the game you speak of. For obvious reasons you wont find too many sources within the company who say "this game is crap" but the Mark Simpson blog is about as close to an admission as i've ever seen from a developer. And plausible theories to explain a descrepancy in user reviews as compared to official reviews hardly qualify as some looney conspiracy theory. developers pay sites like IGN to advertise their product. To enhance the effectivness of these advertisments they review sufficiently hyped titles (which in and of itself is advertising) and give them scores that are skewed to the higher end of the spectrum. if the game sells well, SEGA has more money to advertise the next product, which they will do presumably through IGN again because they have a mutually satisfying business relationship. That's not conspiracy, that's how the world works. And i'm not even postulating any blatent corruption among any specific companies or reviewers, or any bribes or all expenses paid visits to the studios complete with a steak dinner, even though given CA's integrity I wouldn't rule that out, either.76.182.120.155 (talk) 15:02, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Still ultimately irrelevant. These are the sources which are considered the closest thing to expertise within the industry; thus these are what we go with—that's how it works for every video game-related article on this site, and is no different from how we deal with related articles that cover films and novels. We aren't going to use user-generated sources and reviews, regardless of what relationships you think developers have with the media. As I've said, you're welcome to add content from established, secondary publications that aren't user-created provided it doesn't give undue weight; otherwise, I've had it with dealing with crusading fanboys moaning simply because the overall critical opinion doesn't match their own. -- Sabre (talk) 15:58, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

It's not irrelevant if you're trying to get the truth across.76.182.120.155 (talk) 16:06, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Read the first sentence of WP:V. Good day. -- Sabre (talk) 16:08, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Are people still on about this? Argument on this subject is wasted energy until a reliable source can be produced that supports the claims. Until then, it remains fact that;

• Self-published websites and blogs are not suitable sources of information for this encyclopaedia. This is not a negotiable concept.
• Conspiracy theories about developer/reviewer collusion and observations on "how the world works" is, at best, unsupported original research and not within the scope of this article anyway.
• Wikipedia is not a game-review website. If anyone wants a game review, there is certainly no shortage of websites that will supply one.

--Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 16:20, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

I think he has a point about the way reviews in general are handled, and the reviews for this game in particular were handled. Having read some of the background, I personally didn't buy the game till patch 1.5, when AI and stability concerns had largely been addressed. Reviewers not mentioning all the bugs has been around probably as long as computer games magazines have though. It is admittedly a significant problem for reviewers, who are expected to review a copy a month or more before release, which will probably have bugs which the final release (and certainly any "day one" patch) won't have. On top of this, reviewers see many unimaginative clones, and in my opinion they have a tendency to give too high a rating to originality and ambition in game design, over enjoyable and bug free game playing. I've added some negative comments to this article for balance where I can find them. I agree it would be nice to add something like Metacritic aggregate user scores. However there are known problems with user scores (e.g. the way Amazon scores were driven down by users angry about Steam). Wikipedia is not going to stop using Reliable Sources, and unfortunately anonymous, self-selecting user surveys don't count. Even where a lot of them say "I'll never trust a game review again." The best you can do therefore is make sure that the few negative reviews (and there are some) and media reports about the game are given appropriate weight. --Merlinme (talk) 16:32, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

I can't fault the need for criticism, that's a key part of a balanced critical reception section and as I've listed in a previous post, criticism is given when due in the article. But we cannot write articles from our own personal experiences or beliefs about review integrity—I've had more than my share of problems with this game with crashes and bugs, but I don't let my experience influence article content. I'm open to extra negative points being added when it's done properly and with appropriate sources, but not when its what random people on the internet think. WP:V allows some flexibility, but not when it comes to user reviews, reader comments, etc. As you say, they come with too much baggage to prove useful sources, regardless of reliability issues. -- Sabre (talk) 16:46, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

regardless of what you, escape orbit, and you, sabre, want to believe, I can assure you that_is_ the nature of the relationship between big gaming magazines and big game developers. it's a symbiotic relationship. This is not to be mistaken for outright lieing or corruption, but it does influence review scores.76.182.120.155 (talk) 18:09, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

You're missing the point though. Let's say I believe you (which I do, more or less). How do you propose we reflect your beliefs in the article while sticking to Wikipedia's principles on Reliable Sources? And how is the general point (that game magazine reviews are unreliable) relevant to this particular article? --Merlinme (talk) 09:05, 25 November 2009 (UTC)

well the reason I wrote that snippet above is simply to respond to assertions that this is some conspiracy theory - it is not. I do not have sources, but this relationship is not exactly a secret. If you look at my first post when i signed with my IP, this is more about me convincing readers that my position on the game - that it was an abomination at release - is correct despite what this wiki page or what "official" reviews say. So that is the short answer and you can stop reading now if you want to :).

Anyway, i understand the point that multiple people have made, which is why I have refrained from editing the article, for the most part. I got their point at the beginning (which they keep making - i suppose I should have been more clear that I understood them), the points that I was trying to make, which you seem to understand but i'm not sure others do, is that the entire review system for this industry is flawed, thus the whole idea of "credible" sources (for an encyclopeadic article about a game, lol!) is laughable. The other point that I wanted to make was that many people who actually own the game and play the series agree with me (and you?) but that the standards for wikipedia, which are designed to ensure accuracy, are perversely distorting the accuracy of the article in this case due to the way the game industry is structured. And then the last point I was trying to get across was that there are plenty of official sources but you have to look for them and you have to extrapolate and use deductive reasoning in most cases, because, as i mentioned, it is hard to find an example of their PR guy (or any employee) explicitly admitting the flaws in the game. Fortunately, recent blog entries by mark simpson, one of the co-founders of CA, overtly admit that the product was rushed and incomplete. Here are some specific quotes from his blog that have only been published within the past month or so:

"We were not entirely happy with the state of Empire: Total War when it went out, and are only now (october 1st) getting to a point where we are broadly speaking happy with the game."

"I’m not saying that we didn’t deserve to have a fair number of verbal bricks thrown our way."

"I’ll be as honest as I can be without getting sued or fired."

"The Empire campaign AI has been way too passive for me, and the community pretty unanimously shares that view, so it’s not something I need to explain."

"Making a passive AI may have sold us lots more games in the US, but it wasn’t intentional."

"It’s worth talking a bit about how we ended up with an AI that didn’t have the play style we intended on release, and has taken 6 more months work to get there. The short answer is an excess of ambition."

"When [the AI] firing on all cylinders, it will be way, way ahead of anything we’ve seen in any PC strategy game before."

"The net result is an AI that plans furiously and brilliantly and long term, but disagrees with itself chronically and often ends up paralysed by indecision."

"I had 6 copies of Empire: Total War sat on my shelf (until october 9th) intended for close gamer friends that I didn’t send out because I was too embarrassed about the flaws."

"Those necessities tend to be short term compared with the dev time of a game or the lifetime of a series. They are also necessities that we cannot ignore - if we do it’s Game Over. Empire: Total War happened the only way it could - it had to be in a box in Feb 09. Damned stressful for all concerned, but it’s so much a fact of life it’s almost not worth talking about."

"Just before the end of Empire the lead Battle AI programmer left CA to return to his family up north. Unfortunately, thanks to Mr Wilberforce’s efforts 200 years ago we couldn’t stop him. It left us with a battle AI, which at that stage, struggled to beat good players in a fair fight, and was pretty much at the mercy of great players, even with a level of handicap (I call it cheating) that is all too obvious."

"These improvements take the code further than we’ve been able before and will be there for Napoleon but we’re not sure yet whether we’ll be able to reverse them back in to Empire in a future update - the code has moved on."

"The main difference is the shift to a goal oriented planning system rather than a static system that has no long term plans. This has yet to fully pay off. But it will. When it does I’ll talk about it again."

all these quotes were written by Simpson on SEGA's offical blog. Not all of them are as direct as the "i was too embarassed to GIVE this game away" quote, but they all hint about what owners of the game, and long time fans of the series, already know, and what potential buyers need to know. 76.182.120.155 (talk) 16:18, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

It's an interesting blog: [4] It's recent, and written by Mike Simpson, i.e. Creative Assembly's studio director, as a Sega blog. I think it qualifies as a Reliable Source. When I have time I'll see if I can find some balanced quotes and a good place to put them in the article. --Merlinme (talk) 16:53, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

I'll leave this in Merlinme's hands for the time being—I have faith in him to deal with this in a way that doesn't result in synthesis—but just a warning to the aside, Mr. IP, this site isn't a buying guide or a review compilation site, its meant to be an encyclopedia (regardless of your view towards that particular point). As such, we don't need to worry about "what potential buyers need to know" for video games or any other form of media, I'd advise moving out of that mindset. -- Sabre (talk) 17:14, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

I agree that Merlinme is probably the best person to edit the article out of the three of us, however I'm not entirely convinced any edits Merlinme makes will remain. CA is well aware of the advertisment potential of wikipedia, and so am I, which is why i'm fine with simply airing it all out on this talk page for anyone who cares to dig a little deeper than the front page. Out of curiosity, what is your opinion about the game s@bre and what version did you pick up the game at? also, did you follow the advertisments in the lead up for the game's release and what are your opinions about that? The mark simpson quotes i listed above are a lot worse than they sound if one is familiar with the way the game was advertised prior to release. anyway, honestly, I never considered what your own position was about the game, i assumed, but i never actually asked you. Reading your responses, you don't ever state what you actually think about the game, rather your arguments have been that the truth isn't relevant to wikipedia and that what a potential buyer needs to know is beyond the scope of the article, so i was just curious as to your own opinion?76.182.120.155 (talk) 17:50, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

If CA edits the article for purposes of advertising, then they get reverted—its a conflict of interest and will be dealt with as such. In the same way Wikipedia isn't here for the opinions of the internet crowd, its not here to provide advertising. I know a couple of CA employees have edited this article, judging by edit summaries and usernames: some of these have been acceptable edits, like dealing with the credits in the infobox or clarifying the role of motion capture; others haven't and have been reverted, though none of these edits have concerned removing the criticism. Anyway, the reason I've not put down my opinion of the game is that doing so doesn't help to creating a neutral presentation of article content—my own opinion is as superfluous as those of the user reviews—though I've certainly had problems with the game in regards to glitches and and dehabilitating crashes from the initial release. -- Sabre (talk) 18:36, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

in my effort to beat a dead horse: here is a "professional" review that took CA to task on the initial state of ETW: http://www.crispygamer.com/gamereviews/2009-03-17/empire-total-war-pc.aspx Feel free to reference it in the "release" portion of the article. of course, this review was essentially banned on their official forums - any post referencing it mysteriously disappeared. Anyway here is a link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Gerstmann) about an individual who was fired from game spot in 2007. It is widely believed he was fired for giving a highly anticipated game a mediocre score in his professional review. Although this second link has nothing to do with empire, it supports my assertion that game reviews from major sites are biased. Basically, wikipedia should refrain from having entries on video game software since the topic is inherently non-encyclopedic and since their is no peer reviewed content to reference and no "credible" sources that are not financially linked with the material they are reviewing. people do not look up ETW to write an academic paper or engage in scholarly debate. This article and other game articles are little more than advertisments for the game they are reporting on. So to recap, never trust the accuracy of a wikipedia article on video games, and never trust a "professional" reivew that has an advertisment banner for the game on the same page.Dmcheatw (talk) 17:37, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

I'm going to be blunt: begone if you are just going to beat a dead horse by coming back and posting this sort of rubbish every few months. You've made your opinion on video games, sourcing and Wikipedia clear, and we aren't going to cut or change our entire coverage of the video game industry on this site on your whim. Since you have nothing actually productive to say, go away. All you are doing is wasting our time, and yours. -- Sabre (talk) 18:12, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Curiously, you think it is a waste of time to respond in this discussion, yet you chose to respond to my latest points, despite the fact that they weren't even cleary addressed at you (they were simply to reinforce my argument that I made above). Also, how are my points or the evidence I brought to substantiate them rubbish? part one pertians to the article - I was providing a negative professional review to counterbalance all the other positive ones that are explicitly mentioned. Part two pertains to the above discussion about the inherent reliability of these "professional" sources. I'm simply trying to make sure readers (and prospective buyers) are made well aware of the nature of the game review industry and the soundness of my arguments. Moreover, I was not advocating for a change in wikipedia policy as you seem to think I was. Rather I was only trying to establish my point that wikipedia entries on video games are laughable and, in my opinion, the mere existance of such topics detract from the integrity of the encyclopedia. If I wanted to push for a change is wiki policy, i doubt this would be the correct page to do it on. Anyway, try to remain on topic if you're going to continue to respond to my arguments in this thread and actually concede the point or provide counter examples and evidence. I don't need to hear your characterizations of my views as rubbish, especially when they are reasonable and I provide evidence to support my position. I also don't need to hear you make normative comments on how my time is best spent.Dmcheatw (talk) 18:55, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

I have added the Crispy Gamer review to the article. Personally I don't think it adds much, as the criticism of the game already in the article covers much of the same ground. Dmcheatw should be reminded this article is not a platform for making readers "aware of the nature of the game review industry". Nor is this talk page the place to "establish my point that wikipedia entries on video games are laughable". Wikipedia's job is to reflect the content already out there. If you find reviews 'laughable' then please take it up with the reviewers, not here. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 19:34, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps Dmcheatw might be received with more enthusiasm, certainly from me, if he didn't come along every few months (this has been going on since August) to deride other people's work as "laughable"; "little more than advertisments" that the "mere existance" of is a "non-encyclopedic" affront to the "integrity of the encyclopedia". Such comments serve absolutely no purpose except to create an antagonistic atmosphere. As Escape said, this isn't a soapbox for you. Coming along and simply saying "hey, I think this review should be included: it provides a different view from the mainstream but still qualifies as a reliable secondary source" without the contemptuous attitude towards the project would have been far better. -- Sabre (talk) 20:52, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Empire: Total War: The Warpath Campaign article

Do we need a separate article of Empire: Total War: The Warpath Campaign?. Can't it be added it to the main article?. --SkyWalker (talk) 06:43, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Yes, because every other Addon from some game has it' own article, too. No, because this is not German wikipedia! And if it were you, who deletet the article of Empire: Total War: The Warpath Campaign, at least write some replacement in the article of Empire: Total War. But I seriously prefere the restoration of Empire: Total War: The Warpath Campaign. 79.237.247.83 (talk) 09:10, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Given the distinct lack of available sources with which to write a fully fledged article, Warpath Campaign should remain part of this article. That other expansions have articles is irrelevant, this stuff is done on a case by case basis. I had a hard time finding any sources for this: as far as reviews go, I struggled to find anymore than the 6 listed by Metacritic, which really isn't enough to write a qualified reception section—contrast with the 62 reviews it provides the base ETW—while beyond an announcement of the expansion, I'm not finding any development information. Most games news sources don't even seem to have individual entries for this, those that do don't have anything on them. -- Sabre (talk) 12:03, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Elite Units of America

Should "Elite Units of America" be added?

I am wondering because my guess is Steam will charge for purchasing these type of downloadable content for a few dollars dollars (exact numbers varies in my area it is $3.25) for a short amount of time and then they decide to offer it free in an update (the precedent here is the Elite Units of the West).

To me it seems like these "Elite Units" are a waste of money for the gamers (also it can be confusing because not all of the units that purchasable in the "Elite Units" are elite units such as grenadiers) and a waste of time for anyone adding this to wikipedia.

So I just say add it to the article when it is offered to everyone in the newest empire total war update (my guess is 1.6)

Nonetheless below is the article if anyone is interested.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/10607/

(JetBlue241 (talk) 18:58, 1 December 2009 (UTC))

Mention the Steam as condition to play the game .

It must be noted that the game must be activated and played only on Steam . You can also note that during the release hundred thousands of players suffered extremely long download. Edelward (talk) 17:35, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

It is. Read the development and release sections. -- Sabre (talk) 18:55, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

factions playable?

Hi everybody, a quick question are all the factions repersented playable? Including the weaker german ones? (im assuming you have to conquer a faction before playing it) i havent got total war so i cant comment but it seems the article implies this without stating it outright.--Matthewdavies (talk) 00:15, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Only twelve are playable, though one, the US, has to be unlocked first, and isn't in the same full length campaign. -- Sabre (talk) 00:20, 28 December 2009 (UTC)