Why You Should NOT Play Total War Thrones of Britannia - 2021 Review
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- Опубликовано: 29 авг 2024
- So, why did Thrones of Britannia fail? This was a game that could've been a revitalization of Total War, bringing the early medieval time period back into focus. Instead, it's been three years, and the game is all but dead, clinging on to a few hundred players here and there.
There is not just one reason for it's failure, although the biggest one might just be what caused it; the use of the graphics engine from Total War: Attila, also known as the worst Total War engine ever.
But what do you think of Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia? If you enjoyed the video, then please consider supporting me on Patreon: / andystake . Don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe to help me befriend the algorithm ;)
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I want so much a "Total War Pike and Shot" based on the XVI - XVIII, post medieval and before Napoleon battles, the time of discoveries and the 30 years war. Playing with Spanish Tercios, Polish Winged Hussars, Ottomans at their peak, Mughals, etc.
I’d love a mod for English civil war. Perfect pike and shot concept
Yesss pleaseeee!!!
I really don't see why they can't make a TW that covers 1500 -1850. If you can do pike and shot, you can do Empire, and Napoleon, which was just a DLC for Empire really. I still play Empire to this day. It is my favorite TW. For me it is one of the few TW games where they got the campaign exactly right.
If you have the self discipline not to cheese, it is a lot of fun, from the "shooting fish in a barrel" of the British campaign, to the grind of the Ottomans and the difficulty of the Polish.
IF you have self-discipline, it is the best. Something for everyone.
Pike and shot warfare is amazing. There is so much in that era we have missed out on. The whole 1400-1700 is neglected.
In warhammer 1 and 2 I play empire and drawfs just for the gun lines.
Thats a Medieval Total War 1 and 2. you change to those as same as time in history.
Never understood the hate this game received, sure its not perfect, it is to small to name one of many flaws but overall i enjoyed it and felt it offered a solid experience.
People say that the game was a weaker version of Attila
People have been frustrated with Total War and CA for a while now.
TW Britannia likely galvanised that frustration.
@@hoseadavit3422 They managed to fix the performance issues of the Attila engine however. I wish they could port those improvements into the Attila game itself though.
I say it’s a good game, just needs more playable factions
@@theomsb there’s a couple mods that open up the other playable factions, I’m currently revisiting the game on a Cent playthrough and I’m loving it
Too late, I’ve already played it. I must have done something wrong, because I had no lag issues, and I enjoyed it. I like that you have to supply your armies-that’s not found in older TW games.
I'm glad you enjoyed it, James! Just wasnt for me. And yes, it has some cool mechanics, like the supply and replenishment system for armies!
@@AndysTake could be that I know quite a bit about the British Isles’ history, and I’m interested in the period (Banished is one of my favorites). I like the graphics on the Battle screen. But, yeah, the cartoony cards are meh.
SHIELDWALL: THE THRONES OF BRITANNIA MOD THAT FIXES EVERYTHING! - Total War Mod Spotlights
ruclips.net/video/tSlr0Dn__dE/видео.html
I liked that but I disliked how the ai completely disregards the challenges the players face. It was all I could do to field one stack sometimes and the ai was still spawning armies everywhere. That being said i actually enjoyed this game
Supply your armies?
I was thinking about buying this one but I heard it had mixed reviews….
Is it worth the money?
Probably the most fun I have had with a Total War game. And I have 250 hours on Warhammer 2. You HAVE to like the time period and area, otherwise it's not going to be interesting for you. I love it for that, I am a English history nerd, and this games artwork, units and settlements are so so damn good.
Runs brilliant on my system, Attila runs trash but ToB runs well. Idk why. I just really like the game, but I totally understand why people dislike it.
I’m glad you enjoy it mate, don’t let me bring you down! :D just one man’s perspective is all!
@@AndysTake Yeah deffo, I can totally understand why people don't like it tbf
SHIELDWALL: THE THRONES OF BRITANNIA MOD THAT FIXES EVERYTHING! - Total War Mod Spotlights
ruclips.net/video/tSlr0Dn__dE/видео.html
@@uberraschtedame1510 You're a g for sharing this everywhere, the mod doesn't get nearly as much attention as it deserves. It makes the game everything it deserved to be on launch.
Lol, presenting yourself as some kind of TW vet, cause you played 250h of WH2 ...
I loved thrones of britania. esspesually the mechanic of giving estates to your nobles, something I hope they do for a 3rd medieval game
Yea if they fleshed that out it would be amazing
I hated that mechanic. I just found it a mini-game that was way to important, and if it started to go wrong you had to restore back 30 turns to put it right. Just the worst design decision ever. Every time I reinstall it, I remember that mechanic and de-install it again.
@@TheToledoTrumpton because you sucks at strategy bro, sorry to tell you the sad true 😅 also that mechanic make the game more fun like in TWR2 the annoying civil wars
@@Raddosseuss OK - but I'm not sure I care if I suck or not, at a single player game. I'm far more interested in whether I enjoy it or not.
@@TheToledoTrumpton well , if you want just to enjoy somethign without using too much brain power theres shooter games , strategy games are for people that actually spend time investigating and learning so if you dont really like strategy games like many of us you wont enjoy it and more games like TWs where a single mistake in insane mode can cost you the campaing or 3 towns
I appreciated the change of pace ToB presented, especially with the model of ungarrisoned small settlements. Playing on the defensive, it forces you to be active in defense, lest you lose a critical source of income or food that jacks up your whole campaign. Offensively, the game forces you to pick your targets and diversify your forces, for example: a large field army that bounces from siege to siege, supported by one or two small cavalry focused strike forces to pick off small settlements and bait enemy field armies away from siege relief.
I also appreciated the diverse province builds that force players to choose proper governors for their provinces and specialize them for either food production, income, or military training. ToB was by no means the best Total War game, but it wasn't a stinker either.
thrones is a great game,its a bit simplified but i really enjoyed it,best sieges yet.
SHIELDWALL: THE THRONES OF BRITANNIA MOD THAT FIXES EVERYTHING! - Total War Mod Spotlights
ruclips.net/video/tSlr0Dn__dE/видео.html
Truly the best siege game play I've experienced
Can confirm it had decent seiges.
Optimisation is definitely an issue, and CA really shot themselves in the foot with the ridiculous number of identical settlements + lack of unit diversity, BUT its still an ok game for me because 1. Battles are decent and fun, 2. Great mods like Shieldwall, 3. Great political mechanics 3. Faster paced campaign and 4. Interesting/complex building trees
One if my biggest gripes is there’s no real Trade system 🤦♂️🤷♂️ Like why?
Glad you like it, and I do fully agree they tried with some cool things here, but my problem is that they’re not fully realized. And yes, this game’s trade system is the weirdest. It’s kinda like a Paradox system where everybody trades with everybody, and I suppose buildings or whatever are supposed to influence that? But it gives to power to the player, and there’s no real explanation for it or ways to influence it, I believe. It’s really strange, although something cool COULD have been there. Thanks for leaving a comment, man!
I don't understand, ToB is definitely the best optimized TW game ever alongside Troy. That was precisely one of the few good points reviews were pointing out when it released. It just seems Andy's PC is a potato toaster
@@alcoolamus4208 My potato is specked with an RTX 3070, so it’s a pretty good one. Got less to do with me and more to do with an unreliable engine.
@@AndysTake Is the game installed on your PC's SSD or an external drive? I noticed it can lag on external drive but runs very smoothly on SSD, that might explain the difference between your experience and that of most other users
@@alcoolamus4208 SSD.
IMO the reason Thrones of Brittania was a fail wasn't because it was too slow. Quite the reverse, it was too fast. The game starts with a lot of interesting factions, but most of them die in the first 30-40 turns, leading to an inevitable slog to stop Alfred the Great's domination of the British Isles. The game would have been more interesting if the small factions had made alliances to preserve their independence.
Unfortunately that’s not canonically what happened. Your faction can affect history but the AI still run off the primary theme
of events
I feel that this is true, however if you ally Wessex you can focus on establishing colonies in Ireland and other regions around the isles to establish a power base. Funny thing is I allied Alfred as Guthrie lol they had a war right before game start.
They suicide...
The biggest problem I had with this game, and it's actually a common issue in Total War games, is how long it took to move troops across Britain. If I started walking from Land's End to John O'Groats it would take me 2-3 months to do, the record for a runner is 9 days. Harold famously walked from the battle of Stamford Bridge in Yorkshire to Hastings in four days. So why does it take so many turns to travel in this game? It's so frustrating watching your troops take the in-game equivalent of a year to travel ridiculously short distances. It slows the whole game down and means that you can't react to lightning-fast raids.
I agree, but as you say it's not a new issue. The scale and time frames are not realistic, I'm pretty sure that if a galley from Rome to Egypt took 10 years to reach its destination IRL, history would be quite different. It's just game mechanics.
If you research the industry tech tree, you will get a 25% campaign map movement boost, also if you give your generals quarter masters as companions, they get a 5% boost for every one you add to their attributes.
Not defending the game as I agree it's far too slow (I gave it one session and gave up), but medieval armies (and all their supporting functions) typically did well if they managed 8-10 miles in a day. Less was common, especially in bad weather or difficult terrain or with poor roads or not enough grain for the horses or they needed to rest or it's a Sunday or... or... or...
Sure, Harold famously did London to Yorkshire (~185 miles) in four days, then from there to Hastings (~250 miles) in another seven days, but it's famous for a reason - that kind of speed was extremely unusual. And we don't really know what proportion of his troops fell out from exhaustion, demoralisation, injury, or disillusionment on the way. Quite a few, I suspect. All the ones not rich enough to afford a horse, maybe.
Anyway. As I say, not defending the game. Just chiming in.
Played as Ireland, tried to unite the area, killed one Viking faction, all the others instantly formed a confederation with double my food output. Not a good first campaign.
I guess you didn’t… seer… that coming…
SHIELDWALL: THE THRONES OF BRITANNIA MOD THAT FIXES EVERYTHING! - Total War Mod Spotlights
ruclips.net/video/tSlr0Dn__dE/видео.html
For me the game has the most inmersive battles, when you put two shieldwalls one i front of the other you can hear warcries, also when you charge, drop ships or select the units you hear other war cries.
Yeah that’s awesome :) glad you like it!
SHIELDWALL: THE THRONES OF BRITANNIA MOD THAT FIXES EVERYTHING! - Total War Mod Spotlights
ruclips.net/video/tSlr0Dn__dE/видео.html
Thank you! Someone else that gets it. The battles were the most immersive for me too. That's why I loved it
@@uberraschtedame1510bruh vanilla is fine for me thanks. Also you getting paid to advertise that?
The most immersive battles 😂😂😂
What? Thrones of Britannica had even less unit diversity than Shogun 2? Alot of people complain about the lack of unit diversity of Shogun 2 but frankly I love Shogun 2 because partially the identical units show how similar of a culture you are fighting against because it's a civil war unlike other total war games were you are fighting a foreign country and culture.
And all Shogun 2 clans are pretty very unique with their own DLC unique units as well as clan boosts which makes every clan play very differently. Just by being a bow clan, the Chosokabe is better at using bows can literally any other clans. So if you are playing Takeda, although you are still somewhat similar to other clans like Chosokabe, it makes overall less sense and efficiency to use bows compared to cavalry etc.
And Thrones of Britannica is basically fighting different cultures as well as foreign raiders.
Yeah nobody is praising the unit diversity in Shogun 2, but Shogun 2 was an overall great game, especially for its time. This ain’t it.
Literally no other strategy game community cites something called "unit diversity" as a factor: TW is literally the only strategy franchise where this supposed "factor" is a thing. Even guys who are highly critical of CA's TW games, namely Volund (he's here on RUclips), have destroyed this idea of "unit diversity." I recommend looking up Volund's vid on the topic to hear a great exposition as to how this supposed factor is literally, and in reality, a non-factor.
@@LibertysetsquareJack That is because the TW strategy community values the intermix between realism and fun gameplay. AOE values strict gameplay rules above all, the Paradox community has basically no noteworthy unit diversity since they have no real time battles (obviously it has varying units though, but this is basically just text based). So I view it as pretty natural that the TW community feels like unit diversity is important, otherwise things just look and play stale.
Let me try to be more clear: "unit diversity" is literally a non thing, i.e. it's a nonsensical that doesn't even have heuristic value. If anyone studies the game design, as in they literally go to school to learn how to design strategy games, there won't be anything called "unit diversity." At best, what wargame designers would concede is something like variety in army lists, or faction differentiation/characterization. But "unit diversity," as some in the TW community use the phrase, is a nebulous, nonsensical idea: in base terms, it seems to refer to the idea of giving units with the same stats different skins. It is a nonstarter if one is actually serious about evaluating game design and professionally reviewing strategy/wargames.
As I said earlier, here is a nice exposition of this crap: m.ruclips.net/video/dw2AwhuTRMM/видео.html
I get this is a subjective review based on your own personal experience but there is a severe lack of objective analysis, as the title of the video is "Why YOU should not play ToB"
Firstly, the game lagging is a personal technical issue, not an inherent flaw of the game, as many other commenters like myself didnt have lag issues.
2) Normally, the complaint of geographical diversity could be justified in games like NTW or Empire, as their variation is generally lackluster, but in thrones that is MASSIVELY unsuited. Britannia in the real world doesn't have a wide landscape of mountains and forests in comparison with other areas of europe, not only that, but the parts that are displayed are made as close as the real world. For example, all the mountain terrain are located in Scotland, with one or two in Ireland, and the bogs/swamps being in the marshy wetlands of western Ireland and Central England.
3) The campaign mechanics; There are some similarities between Rome 2 for construction and CK2 for governance but you shouldn't criticize Thrones for not meeting CK2 standards in that arena as they're two separate styles of games. As for the troop mustering, it certainly is slower to build armies, initially, but over time, depending on what characteristics you upgrade for generals and governors, you'll be able to recruit at cheaper and/or faster rates. Now I personally love having to ensure that the military has both food and money like Rome 2 as it adds more immersion and challenge of maintaining your relam.
4) finally, there is the segment where you say that the art design, particularly the portraits, is bad, that you dont like the style. To which I respond with, "it's to match to art style of the game's time period "
I don't put this game in the list of top 5 total wars but I do believe more credit should be given alongside a fair trial
Ok I hear you, but as a historian covering this time period and being resident in Scotland, this game is peak geek fulfilment! I just fended off a huge Sudreyar invasion force at Applecross, and the landscape looked like the real place down to the shape of each section of shore! I got to assault Dumbarton Rock / Alt Clut, a place I've written about in my book and numerous articles, and they got it right! I laid siege to Din Eidyn, where I live, and my army passed through the geographical area my flat is now in!
Pretty niche, sure, and I wish it had the old engine and better unit collision etc., but Thrones is the closest thing I can get to a 'my favourite time period' sim and I LOVE IT.
I think besides the Atilla engine related problems it really is the time period. It really has to "click" with you to enjoy it. I myself enjoyed Charlemagne in Atilla tremendously and so did Thrones of Britannia. Still hoping for a Medieval 3 ranging from Edward the Confessor to Henry VIIIs.
I loooooved Charlemagne as well, a great expansion which, if expanded a little, totally could have been its own Saga title. Would love a Medieval III, they HAVE to make it SOME DAY, right? … right?
a Medieval 3 would be mighty! Let's go!
You know why diversity is low? BECAUSE ITS REALISTIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is not a disney SCI-FI cartoon or a forced racial diversity. ITs realism. You dont like it? Play Warhammer. PLenty of diversity there.
Perhaps I should make a video being the opposite, saying TOB is a misunderstood epic? haha
But I can see what you mean
Well totally do it if you actually think Thrones is better than I think! :D
Exactly what I was thinking. But I chose instead to write a comment.
I'd be very interested in watching that video Medjay! I haven't actually played it myself but TOB strikes me as the type of title TW fans will come around on eventually. The music and the siege battles both really immerse me when I'm watching other folks playthroughs.
Someone should make a king Arthur mod for this game.
Some people’s obsession with King Arthur, hahaha. Although it could’ve made for a good MYTHOS game…
Who care of him
Chris....you're right
I wasn’t keen at first, but actually I love the inability to fortify villages. It draws you into open combat a lot more and forces you to be more tactical. This is a good game despite the naysayers
i do wonder if some folks genuinely expected some massive fortresses in this era and setting (dark age britain)
Gregg Wallace would like a word! He doesn't spend 2 hours a day playing this just for you to slag it off on RUclips mate.
He’s also never been disappointed in a harvester
I understand most of the criticism but I personally like Thrones of Britannia. It's the one TW game I enjoy the most, and I played (in this order) Rome 1, Rome 2, Attila, Shogun 2.
I say this every time I hear people bring this but Attila and ToB run and look better then Rome 2 for me(don't know why) so performance issues were never a problem with this game.
For me the campaign map isn't boring it's clean. I don't need a bunch of shades, colours and effects, I need to see what's a road, what's a forest and what's a settlement.
I think the art style is perfect, it's appropriate for the period, it looks good, you can see what is what and (this is a speculation) the characters and units cards easier the cpu and gpu then the 3d ones from R2.
Also related to character artwork. You said the style doesn't help with distinguishing between the (lack of personality. To be fair in any TW I play I completely ignore characters after the first third of the game (they become to many).
The UI (again) is clear. You can easily find everything you need. All non-main map screens are in a corner easy to find and if something in that panel requires your attention is made clear. Army and provinces list the same. The annoying the notifications from R2 and Attila are put in a non distracting but obvious place.
The recruitment system is a breath of fresh air, appropriate for the period and no longer bound to the building system (you are recruiting people not building robots). Some might think it can be abused (create a full army out of nowhere at 40% strength). Well..yeah, but there are consequences, food limit for one and good look having anything to recruit for the next 5 yeas.
Another thing, global recruitment, meas les marching around just to recruit.
"The battles are slow", exactly my man. I absolutely hate this trend of making battles fast. I want to enjoy the tension a slow battle brings, the shieldwalls pushing against eachother and alike. And if the armies move to slow there are always the faster speed buttons.
Also, the sieges are amazing.
These are the main point I wanted to make. I consider Thrones of Britannia to be a good game, but one that lack many features it should have. The games does a good job at everything it dies, especially after the last major patch, unfortunately there are a lot of things it actually doesn't do.
I understand why people might not like or enjoy this game, but I consider they are focusing to much on the negatives (missing features mostly and the lackluster launch(which every TW launch has been since R2).
Another thing there are a few mods thet make the game more enjoyable. I know a game shouldn't rely on mods to be good but come on, ever since good old R1 mods made TW game better.
I hope you won't take this as a hateful comment, just a list of reasons I like the game.
Edit:
The lack of features isn't always a problem. The first thing I do when I start the second campaign in any TW is install "no agents". I completely detest agents in TW.
But ToB doesn't have ambushes or fort battles. So it balances out, maybe..?
Thanks for the comment, man, of course I’m not taking it as a hateful comment! It’s great that you love Thrones, honestly I’m jealous because I wish I loved it too. You raise some valid points as well, it’s just to me, the game ends up boring either way, for the reasons I mentioned. But the fact that you loved it is awesome, I just hope we get another, even BETTER one that we BOTH can love ;)
I agree with your TOB assessment especially the slow battles and the recruitment system. Much more realistic
For me, the worst part was, if I played as a viking. I could not spread the asatro religion. It did not feel like you were able to actually take over land and change history.
It felt more like you fought over who the population should pay their taxes to, and nothing else. I mean, why would a heathen viking decide to build a church?
So true dude!
Maybe to keep their Christian subjects happy and not rebelling so they can focus on conquering and pillaging more lands?
"Why would a heathen Viking decide to build a church?"
Read some history about the actual Viking Age, if you want the answer to that question, because the way that the religious dynamic is portrayed/modeled in ToB reflects actual history. The way you're thinking it should have went (ie. 'Pagan Vikings spreading their paganism') is fantasy.
It would be cool if a team of modders made a War of Roses mod and fix the problems you’ve stated above. Just like how Medieval 1212 saved Attila
This review and the comments made me want to play the game LOL ... Other than the lagging, none of the issues mentioned would bother me at all, not much at least. Especially because most of the criticism seem to reflect things that are accurate to the period and that is one of the things I like the most about TW... or just cosmetic stuff, which I get used to pretty quickly.
Go for it, mate! But perhaps wait for the Christmas sale :)
@@AndysTake Thanks for the feedback! I definitely will wait for the sale. I always do. But I will also subscribe and watch your videos! It was a great review.
@@chicoarraes Thank you so much! :D excited to see you around!
So much wrong with this review. Attila actually has a hack that uses Thrones of Britannia optimized files to make the game better because Thrones did in fact run WAY better than Attilla did.
Played it a couple times because I love the time period and I do like the modest sense of nation building that Three Kingdoms would massively expand upon. Not really much a reason to come back to it but it was fun for a little bit
I can see that :)
To me it really hit one of my favorite historical struggles. I wish they had a little more scope, more like the map of M&B Warbands "dlc"- Viking conquest which had northern france, the edge of denmark, and norway. I think including more islands and more island one off nations would have help as well as actually having to deal with trade agreements. Loved the food system since it was historically one of the biggest factors of when armies went on campaign. I think the fyrd units should have been largers but weaker while the household warriors should have recruited at 60-70% and only take one or 2 turns to fully muster while the fyrd took 4-6 depending on the season. the siege battles were some of the best imo. shieldwall overhaul also makes the game alot more fun in my opinion
I wanted to love this one - but I feel like you're correct in your assessment overall.
In particular two things really frustrated me:
You couldn't zoom out very far on the campaign map... It's not a huge issue, but honestly... grand strategy needs to give me a grand view of what I'm doing and where I'm trying to go (easily fixed via mods iirc). It made your complaints about how the map looked overall really stand out since the blandness was kinda always in my face.
The ability to raid / take small holdings without battle seemed great on paper. Jim's cow farm doesn't need an epic siege but in my experience this mostly just ended up with incredibly repitive "ai steals a thing, I take it back and try to chase down that army..... something else didges in and steals same thing... repeat.... repeat... repeat..." it just never felt like ti gelled into something fun, just lots of hit and run (which, for the time period, hey, not inaccurate.... but not fun as a player).
I very much need to check out the Shield Wall mod, that might bring exactly what I needed to the title.
I appreciated the game for qol improvements and didn't expect this to be a full title. It was supposed to be an experimental title. I really hope they do a proper British isles/Viking game tho..
I’d personally love a 1066 setting :)
@@AndysTake oh yeah. My fav war. That could be an expansion of mini campaign.
I liked it bc the time period is superior to the others. I get my rare rh negative O negative blood type, blonde hair and blue eyes from these awesome ancestors. It's so fun to dive into a people that were the scythians in Rome.
No one cares.
@@nathaniliescu4597 jelly
I guess I am weird, but I actually liked the cartoonish troop icons and buildings. I actually got the mod for them to be back on the dei mod. Now this game's ui reminds me sort of the civilization games with the blue menu interface. I do recognize I have a soft spot for total war games specially the historical ones so my opinions are totally biased. Great content man.
Thank you, Adrian, and don’t worry, you’re perfectly able to like whatever you want! :D
My biggest problem with Thrones of Britannia is Age of Charlemagne had just come out 2 years earlier, which was basically the same setting and also very good.
Yeah this, I loved Charlemagne but didn’t feel the same for Thrones :/
learn what lag means, low fps is not lag, lag is relating to a slow response rate to player input
I'm addicted to the show The Last Kingdom. This game is really the only one other than Valhalla to get a video game experience closely to the timeline of the show. I personally have had a blast with it but also get it's far from perfect.
I'm glad you enjoyed it, I can see why people like it if they love the era!
Heavily disagree with why you shouldn't. This is my all-time favourite Total War game!
Well I’m happy for you even if we disagree!
When it initially came out, it was basically Attila with new skins. However lately I've start playing again and this game is so refreshing and the battles are awesome. The music and atmosphere is brilliant during battles. I understand why people didn't take to it immediately, but go back and have a another try.
The portraits aren’t a stylistic choice that’s sorta how they was painted back in day.
i actually quite like them , very unique
yeah I always love total war historical period UI, even 2D unit cards, it's really awesome and immersive.
Never understand why it get's so much hate across multiple titles... but I guess it's like with any art (music included), most people like the most mediocre tasteless stuff
Well, that's is a historical experience.
Lacking of units diversity ? spears, axes and swords were the weapons used. Do you want to add dragons, naginata samurais or maybe youd like to add some spartan hoplites ? XD
Lacking of terrain diversity ? So maybe you want to add a desert and a jungle region in england XD
Honestly I just got the game on sale and I love it
Well I’m happy for you! :D
What's so bad about Three Kingdoms. I actually really enjoyed the game and the campaign
SHIELDWALL: THE THRONES OF BRITANNIA MOD THAT FIXES EVERYTHING! - Total War Mod Spotlights
ruclips.net/video/tSlr0Dn__dE/видео.html
Total Success... Runs great on my system, overwhelming positive reviews in 2022 on steam. You can adjust the color using the sliders.
I think people like you fail to review the game for what it was made to be, but instead of comparing to other TW games it was not meant to be like.
I find it fun fast paced streamlined but with a lot of depth. And yes replayability especially if you try to play the game how they have set up for each faction. Which all play and feel different. With a different set of goals mechanics for each.
Its funny the factions all have similar soldiers as this accurate for the time. But each have thier own best version so again historically accurate and fun.
Either way dont listen to his bad review. You can get it for $10 on sale on steam. Get it it's worth it. And the sieges are amazing and very fun.
Also great first TW for new comers as it doesn't take 20 minutes to do one turn.
Exactly. I laugh as many of the features reviewers want in other TW games are here... Yet they dismiss them. Like ships matter in tob unlike showngun. And they wanted the map to represent what the battle field would look like to help strategy... Yea tob has it.... Yet they don't get the credit. Etc etc..
Andy is contradictory in his reviews what he says he likes it wants in others games he doesn't like in tob.
Runs fine in 2023 to main update from CA ....
Great games. Andy got this horribly wrong.
I never care about vanilla TW games ever. I only play them with mods. In fact most of this stuff you have covered in this video has been improved by mods. I have enjoyed playing this game with Bran's Campaign Ai and it is a super fun challenge. Shieldwall and Crucible of Kings are other good mods to check out too.
Good to hear! What I covered in this video was the actual game itself, so I’m glad you can enjoy it with mods :) the big mods weren’t really there at launch or in the immediate period after though, which I think also meant a lot
Thrones of Britannia was my first ever total war game so it’s special for me. I enjoyed it.
Glad to hear it, Nikolas :) have you ever played any of the others since?
@@AndysTake I have played Three Kingdoms and Atilla. I’ve liked Three Kingdoms the most out of the 3.
@@discobroccoli198 I think 3K has the best campaign gameplay in the series
I could have forgiven everything except the slow recruitment. I need to raise an army... so I need to sit around doing nothing but click "end turn" for ten turns before I can get going? Boring, boring, boring, never playing this boring mess again.
“The terrain is just brown and green and inherently boring.”
Have you ever been to Britain :)
Edit: I am British btw so I know what I’m talking about.
Hahaha fair enough!
People honestly just don't actually understand Viking-era Britain. At all.
The idea of a whole bunch of small scale counties all warring with each other and backstabbing and treachery and so on might even sound intriguing to people. In practice it's exactly what the period was: an endless messy bloodbath of small-scale conflict with weird rules that nobody could agree on. You want giant epic historical events? Go somewhere else or fast forward three hundred years or more. The 800s are not your grandmas fantastical historical revisionism. Early medieval post-Roman Britain has a shit tonne happening in it, but most of the big stuff isn't about a guy with an army of ten billion dudes. It just didn't happen.
What diversity would you want? It's early medieval Britain. You've got: Danes, Celts, the remnants of the Picts (to really push the envelope at best), Celts... and more Celts.
Scenery isn't diverse? Yeah. It's the Britain. So: Grassy hills, bogs, and the occasional forest.
Vinland saga did a great job with that.
yeah you have to kinda understand the period to enjoy this game , most armies were composed of levies and relatively few ˝˝elites˝˝ so to say , and the tactics were relatively simple but not only limited to the shieldwall and everyone and their mother probably carried a spear and nothing else
I was really expecting a lot of hate for the game in the comments but I am so glad that I am not the only one who has thoroughly enjoyed this game!
Yeah, I'm happy people enjoy it :) Just not my cup of tea personally.
Honestly I think thrones could've been good if Creative Assembly doubled down on its minimalism to make a small, simple and low cost game that would be great for beginners. Even stuff like the lack unit diversity could actually work well in this context.
"Total War Thrones of Britannia" need more mods.. let say upgrade of Empire Total War, Napoleon Total War, or an Era between 1600 - 1700 AD (including Battle of Lepanto and Battle of Vienna Scenarios)
Utterly disagreed. What an awful title.. If you didnt like the game then ok thats your opinion. I absolutely LOVE Thrones of Britannia. Sure, when it first came out it had many issues. But since then patches have come out, fantastic mods have come out..etc Moreover this game has the BEST audio features of all the total war games..
Excellent soundtrack, FANTASTIC soldier chants when armies face each other (very immersive), excellent ambient sounds..etc
This game has a great RPG system where whatever you do ACTUALLY has an impact on your skills, and attributes that you gain. For example if you win several close victories you may gain a specific attribute pertaining to this victory.
It is a shame you dissuade people from trying this game just with your rant and title to be honest. A real shame. I hated the game when it first came out, because of the initial issues, but since then they have all been resolved and people are missing out on this fantastic time period.
Folks, I highly recommend you get this game and install the mod called Shieldwall. You will love it, trust me.
Also try the mod 1066 where you can play as Harold Godwinson, William the bastard and other lords. You have all the actual companions of William the conqueror (Eustace of Bologne and others..etc). Don't believe this negative person. The game is great, just give it a shot for yourself :)
2:25 'few spectacular mountain ranges' .... its England, we only have hills!
Andy's Take vs Alex The Rambler in Total War. Make it happen.
It’s a shame they messed this one up. Viking Britain is a really interesting time period for a total war game. I’d also be interesting to see a war of the roses total war game. But only if they do it properly.
The classical Roman period will always be my favourite though.
Yeah, I would love if they returned to the time period or Britain - perhaps the time of the Viking and Norman invasion - and play as either the English, Normans, or the Norwegians (plus other smaller factions)? I think that would be epic!
@@AndysTakewar of roses could be cool or the hundred years war
Don't hate me for this but I loved the game, probably because I'm such a Viking age nerd as you can see on my channel. Plus, when I played, I was geeking out over all the English cities being named in Old English such as Wintanceaster, Eoforwic, and Exanceaster. However, Lunden should actually be named Lundenwic, similar to Eoforwic. Also, York should be called Jorvik due to what the Danes called it rather than Eoforwic at the time and I think a lot of that influence came from the Last Kingdom series.
I just didn't like how difficult it was to keep up legitimacy without conquest and what not for the Irish and Scottish Ciccern clan. I also didn't like how you couldn't build navies like you could in Atilla and the other total war games, but you had to resort in putting all your land units on the high seas when most of them are useless on the seas. I preferred Barbarian Invasion to Atilla, but at least you can change the religions easier as I like to make the Saxons become Christian and then carry the gospel to the corners of the map.
But that's me and I don't mind others having their own opinions.
You can fix the lagg for attila and ToB by limiting the amount to cores/threads the game can use to 4/8.
Do this in task manager.
1:22 they should have made an empire 2 total war instead
For all the flaws it has, Total War ToB has much upgraded since launch, and now I believe it is a very solid Total War game that although isn't perfect, it's good for what it's meant to be; with a good dynasty system and engaging battles. It's laggy and there's not a lot of issue with replayability, but it's gotten better over the years with more factions like the Irish if I recall correctly, and it's supposed to be on a smaller scale so personally the map "boredom" isn't really a problem
The reason people don't like Thrones of Britannia is because it is the most historically realistic and accurate of all the games. Few people have the historical background truly appreciate some of the seemingly contradictory mechanics. No King was ever secure in his throne. Armies didn't just pop up overnight. And they marched on their stomachs. Furthermore there wasn't a huge array of unit types. In fact there were no "units". People were called to arms and had to supply their own armor. As far as the mat being boring, are you kidding me? Great Britain is a small island.
Picking on the engine used as a central factor in the assessment of the game is a red herring, and a pretty weak one at that. ToB doesn't suffer from the performance issues of Attila, simple as that; but your review repeatedly comes back to the premise that it does. All the reviewers who tore ToB up in 2018, 2019 and 2020 cited its smooth and stable performance as one of the game's few positives: you are literally the only review vid on RUclips that says otherwise, so that's a pretty strange lynchpin to tow your review by. Similar with UI and presentation: even amongst all of the negative reviews on YT, improved and effective UI, good production values in the presentation, etc., were mentioned as positives, so idk why you would hinge so much around the aforementioned aspects of the game in determining why it "failed."
Everything I said is correct. Everything you mentioned everybody else said is wrong. See how that sounds? Just like you said “everybody mentioned” this and that, it doesn’t matter. This is my experience and opinion. And on my machine with an RTX3070, this game lags in comparison to Three Kingdoms and Total War Troy, games that look a shit ton better.
If you disagree or have different experiences, that’s fine. But that you “don’t know why” I mention what I do is just ludicrous because I specifically mention why I think the way I do. The game runs sub par, so I mention it. Perhaps people back in the day felt that it ran well compared to Attila, but there’s so much of the negative Atilla DNA present in this game, and none of the positives, in my opinion. The engine is definitely what I’m going to pick on because it frames the entire game, and had it looked, run, and felt like Troy, the only other Saga game (except for the retconned FOTS), my experience probably would’ve been completely different.
@@AndysTake Except they dont look a shit ton better. And yes, if you re one of the few having performance problems then it s a very localized issue and not reason to criticize the game for.
Personally I thought this was a huge upgrade to Attila the look and feel just seem polished. Attila was unplayable for me
Optimisation and various technical issues seem to be the constant problems in CA's games, if I'm being honest.
Empire suffers from persistent sound bugs and occasional crashes to desktop.
Rome II was kind of infamous for graphical glitches of all sorts on release.
Attila was... well, laggy to say the least.
Warhammer 2 persistently tries to burn your graphic card on the main MAP screen, because it apparently unlocks FPS there without telling you and the map itself is flooded with particle effects you can't turn off without compromising the look of battles.
I know.. have you played Troy though? A perfect example of a wonderfully optimized game.
@@AndysTake True, though as they say - one swallow does not make a summer.
@@hideshisface1886 Let's hope there's more swallows! I recognize your hesitation though, I'm not celebrating either until I see it :)
The irony is, ToB runs very smooth and doesn't have a bunch of tech problems or bugs, something that Attila, Empire, and Medieval 2 all acutely have, despite their fandom.
You SHOULD play it with Mods like Shieldwall. Then it's an extremely good addition to the TW saga.
TW really needs a new good engine.
What sucks is the battle modifiers. Such as when you completely surround a unit of lower spears and they succeed in battle after you surrounded them with swords. It didn’t make sense.
I loved the period of history. I thought the game looked good. It gave me that “Charlemagne” vibe. But it didn’t hit it home. The “politics” should have been completely different from the English to the Viking armies. Honestly, I could think of multiple things. It’s kind of silly. These guys simply wanted to bank off the Viking craze that was going on at the time.
“Looks good don’t care.
Yeah, kinda felt the same way, sadly. Hopefully there’s a better next time.
This was a total war game for history buffs. To them, the lack of unit diversity and realism is a plus.
As an Irish-German American, I haven't played any of the Total war games myself because I don't have a pc, but this is a game I would get just to unite my ancestors land and kick the vikings out and then reverse history on the Britains
They really messed this one up.
I only played ToB with Cody Bond's mod "Conquest 1066"
What deranged thought process has led producers to not make full scale game since 2015, except for Warhammer, which is rather a niche game ( I mean, we became total war fans because we love historical setting).
I cannot get over it. We had such a great series of game and now it's basically gone. I don't get it. Was Attila such a failure they don't have funds to make new game?
Id love to play total war but I'm just not interested in local spin-offs.
After playing a lot of total war warhammer I redownloaded this game. I couldnt believe how much I missed a historical total war . Although I did not like the game when I bought in the first place and deleted, I was in such a hunger that I liked this game.
Frankly the game is bland. You are correct about that. Not only is it bland and simply boring to look at, its broken. As in every TW the AI is completely incompetent and they moved a known bug from a different TW game concerning siege towers and the main gate being open.
As you may have learned yourself, if you bring a ram plus siege towers, and knock down the gate. Your only entry will be the gate. Running under pouring oil and taking heavy casualties. So you bring siege towers and go for the walls. But that is when the AI decides to send a single javelin unit out through the gate and bug out your siege towers. It's frustrating and it simply kills whatever fun Im having at the time, ending my fun with a tab out and execute the game from desktop.
When it comes to challenge, the initial obstacle is ok trying to get your main army upgraded and set for conquering. But as you gain a full stack the AI basically roll over on its back and give up almost. They wont put up much of a challenge unlike TW Warhammer 2 that will actually put up obstacles and hard battles even in late game. I played as Mercia which is supposed to be challenging due to alot of threats around you. I declared war against Powis who have a military alliance with Gwined in Wales. Only to witness gwined setting sail for ireland and abandoning not only his own territories during a war but his military ally to deal with it himself. This typically took away the whole challenge and became a huge disappointment. The AI is fickle and unpredictable but not in a good way. You can expect them to do stupid shit like digging their own grave.
Apart from being bland and broken - the whole paint the map stage of the game starts way too soon which underlines the tidious side of the game. Me and my friend used to play on Very Hard and even then the AI wouldnt throw much at us. No this game failed in so many ways, its obvious CA launched this to milk money from the community.
SHIELDWALL: THE THRONES OF BRITANNIA MOD THAT FIXES EVERYTHING! - Total War Mod Spotlights
ruclips.net/video/tSlr0Dn__dE/видео.html
Don’t know what your talking about. Besides shogun 2. This is my favorite total war game. I absolutely hated Attila.
I really wish we could get Arthurian Total War mod for Rome: Total War as a polished and updated game. I found that mod to be one of the best games for this era.
Three kingdoms has THE worst total war UI. Like it is terrible. It upsets me every time I play it
I AGREE. I cannot get past that UI, there’s so much black and white on the screen and it hurts my eyes.
If you mod it correctly, permanent and effective shieldwalls become really fun ways to play battles and the Shieldwall mod itself, at low unit size makes total war into something it has never been before and succeeds mostly - a small scale skirmish simulator with realistic campaign management. Honestly, its worth trying if you can be bothered to mod it a little and reshade works wonders if you want to polish the graphics further. At the end of the day, not something I would sink hundreds of hours into like Med2, Rome2 or WH2, but fun for 50 hours to play a couple of campaigns and immerse yourself in this historical setting (that I'm biased towards because I'm English and love shows like The Last Kingdom and Vikings.
Very much dislike click bait review titles dissuading people from playing a game e.g "Why you should NOT play". TOB is a great little TW game, it's not perfect for sure but like all Saga titles it's more stripped back and focused, and patches did fix some of the initial launch issues. It garnered a lot of negative publicity from people like Legend of TW at launch (who I respect as a creator but he very much likes what he likes) and this ended up snowballing it's bad PR and ultimately CA abandoned it so we never got any content. Performance wise I'd say this and Troy are actually the best for me, short of very old titles. Anyone who is a fan of The Last Kingdom tv series will probably love this historical period, since you can tell it very much inspired the games design. UI design is excellent, army recruitment and the strategic value of food/hunger is great and I really like the siege battles compared to other TW games.
It’s totally fine for you and anyone else to like the game. This video is about my opinion (obviously), but also why Thrones didn’t do well - that has little to do with my personal preference. Anyhow, Thrones had issues before Legend posted his video, so you can’t blame the game’s small fan base on him.
@@AndysTake Where did I blame the games small fanbase on Legend?
What I said was that content creators impact public opinion, why else do games companies give them early access to make videos about it? It goes both ways, if people say good things then people go and buy it, if they say bad things, they don't. There's no doubt that bad publicity from some influential RUclipsrs at TOB's launch contributed to it's demise, and unfairly in my opinion considering the fact that the game has a great core and could have been made better with more content. As fans of TW series it's counter-productive to be too heavy handed in criticism, especially if the game has potential.
Games DO have issues on launch, look at Rome 2. TOB's issues were insignificant compared to Rome 2 and yet you made a video about how CA turned Rome 2 around. Well we won't get that opportunity with TOB I guess. Putting a video up with a title of "Why NOT to play TOB" is part of that problem. You are entitled to an opinion sure, why not call it "TOB Revisited". I just personally find the title distasteful in that it is clearly aimed at putting people off playing the game before they even watch your video and I think content creators have a responsibility to not do that in good faith.
In my opinion (and plenty of others) the game is good, not the BEST TW ever, but worth playing. The fact it's got a small player base means nothing in terms of how good the game actually is, when most people won't even try it because they hear that it's terrible and remember the bad PR on launch.
@@Forgotten-Gaming I made this video IN good faith - I dont think people should spend their money on this game when there are waaay better Total Wars out there, so that's me using my influence for, in my view, the good of the people.
In such a small geographical area and timeframe you will only encounter so much military diversity. So I find that a non-argument.
For me I thought thrones was really well optimised :0 no lag at all
I’m happy for you!
@@AndysTake it goes to show mind that game optimisation on pc is very hard. Given all the different cards and processors out there.
@@owainevans89 Yeah true, must be a nightmare
I thought Britannia was the best historical Total war to date.
Well good for you! I guess you “get it” and I just dont ;)
That's a really different viewpoint I hought it was ok and had fun as East Anglia bit I had no pull to play it again.
If you don't mind me askingasking this as I'm genuinely curious what makes it your favourite?
So I just saw a mod called Shieldwall that overhauls this game and makes it playable/RE playable. Figure I should mention it for any curious RUclips travelers.
Definitely makes the game better! :) thanks for pointing it out, I believe I might’ve mentioned it in the review, but the video is obviously mostly based on the vanilla experience.
the OST is one of the best parts of this game, it's an awesome total war, but I think it just feels too much like Atilla. But i'd still rather have this than warhammer. History is such an untouched thing in gaming, and we could always use more historical total war games or sagas.
Is this game worth it on sale? Its currently £7 on steam
Thrones of Britania was a big deal for me. It covers one of my favourite periods of history, in the country I grew up in. I was excited as all hell to play it and explore the historically accurate seige maps, place names, characters and setting in general. And whilst I would be inclined to disagree that it is boring, I have to stop and think; when was the last time I played it?
I haven't touched the game in at least a year or so, which must surely say something about its failure. As someone with a great interest in the setting and characters, I should be wanting to go back to it regularly... but I don't. Honestly I sometimes find that the Britania dlc for Medieval II sounds more appealing.
SAME, I absolutely loved the Britannia campaign in ME2. For me, I think it comes down to the vibe. The vibe in Britannia was fantastic - the graphics, the music, the units, the factions, the events. It was simple, but great. Thrones is dreary, unappealing, kind of laggy, just… yeah
@@AndysTake Couldn't agree more, I loved playing the Britannia campaign for those same reasons. It really makes you ask what went wrong with Thrones. You'd think it wouldn't be hard to improve on an expansion to a game as old as Medieval 2, with all the possibilities that the last 14 years has given CA. But yet somehow the music and atmosphere of Medieval 2 sticks with me far more than anything from Thrones
r u joking? attilla doesnt look beautiful it looks like trash. engine is way better in this.
I like this, especially because its a time in British history before William and shows the Viking's not just as raiders from across the sea but as a mainstay on the island
Brilliantly stated my friend, great video. I agreed with every single argument you made lol.
Happy to hear it, bro 😎
@@AndysTake oh one slight point of disagreement is the UI. I actually like the sleek blue buttons!
OH HEAVENS NO. Haha! Thats fine, although I find everything to be sleeker in Troy, yet look so much better. There’s something about the dark blue that just feels so very much in my face. A matter of taste for sure!
CA just saw the hype with crusader kings 2 and they thought that if they would make a copy of the medieval 2 kingdoms britania campaign they would sell. The bad thing is that they dont try to make something new instead they try to old titles with a lot of awfull ways so they can make some money and then dumb the game.
Total war TOB is a game that implements new mechanics in the saga and that to my taste are excellent (recruitment system, "missions" for technologies, food maintenance, etc.) but it fails to pass any of these mechanics. ..In summary, good mechanics, poorly implemented and incomplete.
IMHO, this Thrones of Britannia game is worth the price for the epic art you get in menu screen with soundtrack,.... that shit is just epic
I must say, a Roman Invasion mod for this game would possibly make it really fun.
I tried so hard to like this game, but I think I maybe managed 40 hrs and I have never bothered to go back. It just felt so empty.
Sick and tired of people complaining about unit diversity in a historical game. Go and play Warhammer!
Agree. It s basically a cosmetic reason
"The game world is boring and ugly"
UK irl: boring and ugly
This may be the most accurate total war game to date
I do not understand people who say Attila looked good. I can't stand to look at Attila, it looks so drab that it sucks any kind of enthusiasm I can have to play it before I even finish the first turn.
"Even though this is a stylistic choice, I personally am not a fan"
I'm halfway into this and so far that line could have been the whole review.
Sounds like he just doesn't like the setting.
Thrones of Britannia runs so much better than Attila. It’s easily the best iteration of tactical melee combat that we’ve seen in any recent TW game. I don’t know why you criticized the game for “lag.” Have you actually played this game?
Regarding UI and half-cooked mechanics - I agree that CA could have done a better job. Still worth noting that some of these mechanics are unique to ToB. So the campaign and mechanics are enough to justify playing this game…steam sales are often enough.
I like the game but there are two things that really bother me. One is that I was unable to save the game (pre battle) and fight. Not a big deal because I would usually have the 2nd army and usually win either way. But the problem with that is that my general has only 30 units and I have to hide him otherwise he is dead. Yes, I know, mods... But the 2nd issue and I think the biggest reason is that armies tend to run around and not even fight me. I can just walk in while they are away and take half of the island this way. Also if they have 2 armies, instead of combining and attacking me with both they usually spread them around and I defeat them one by one. That is the most boring part for me, regardless of the difficulty it seemed like they are just running around with no real cause.
I have been playing campaigns on this game recently and I definitely am enjoying the game. For me this is my favorite time in history the dark ages. Kingdoms (some that still exist today) are just starting to establish themselves now that they have taken what was left of the western Roman empire. So I wish they included France and maybe a few other major areas that the Vikings hit during there time but I still like it. The big negative for me is I don't like the building system. An the lack of having a small guard house or somthing to defend your smaller territories gets old. But that one is a minor complaint. It's about a 7/10 for me.
Would have been cool if they made it a king Arthur story which would allow for a much more diverse game, but I'm more of a fantasy fan so that's just my style.
I get that it may not be that good but half of the video was just aesthetics and then the other half seemed more like gripes. But I don't have the context to understand why these gripes are crippling enough to say "Why you should not play this game". I came to this video looking for information about a game and leave with nothing of the sort. Actually I leave with more questions than I came with but not questions about the quality of a game but the video itself. Why is CK2 being compared to total war? Why is this not fun? What is the game boring and slow. Frankly a terrible review, I suspect the audience for this is people that already know what this game is and has played it.