I'm not much for RTS. But this game has changed everything. There is more depth to this game than you can possibly explore in a year. I could go on forever about this masterpiece - I've nevver been so impressed by a game. its replayability is unlimited. I started it 4 times (the first 3 ended in disaster for this wannabe dictator) and each time the game unfolded completely differently. Unit types are interesting (incendiary pigs and screaming women are hilarious!) and a few references to Monty Python's Life of Brian are worth a chuckle.

There are some truly unique abilities like doing a flyby of the cities you've built dynamically rendered with all the buildings you've added, the ability to manage each battle personally (and the detail in doing do is pretty good) a well as some other effects. This one's definitely worth getting. I usually buy then trade my games in. I'm keeping this one for a long time.

"Let's hear it for the pansies in the light mechs.....WAY TO GO LIGHT MECHS!" - Duncan Fisher

HEH my royal family is slowly being killed by the pest right now,that SUCKS!!
Seems like i have to find a way to let my family breed like rabbits again, multiplying like they did in the beginning im open for suggestions...
Love the game though, never had a thing for rts games but this one is good,even kept playing while i had mp2 downloaded and ready to install.

iscreamuscreamicecreamicecream!!

your review seems to indicate a deeper game than the demo for it implied. I was impressed with the demo & was considering buying it, looks like I will have to now. Thanks for "pushing me over the edge".

The demo doesn't even begin to do justice to the game.

There is a lot of depth to the game, but I think I could explore all of it within a year. Invaribly, I notice patterns arising but this new addition of the Royal Family makes the game fun as me and my brother often like to come up with stories for our guys. I had a dude who lived to 99, he was my leader, but then he died the day his last remaining son defeated 2 larger armies of traitor-Romans. Nevermind that all loyal Romans are traitor Romans to me since I'm the real traitor. The addition of a retenue to all characters is simply brilliant I think. Because it exposes in gameplay those behind the scenes manuverings that take place among a leader and his close friends. It's just those kind of things that makes the game a little better to play.

This game can get better, but not in the way that the game has faults, but just in the new ideas and possibilities this game has opened question to.

AT the risk of repeating myself, this is defintely the best game I've ever played. I'm finding out more and more about this game all the time. Here's somethign worth a laugh.

If you engage in a battle with an enemy force you can play it 2 ways. You can let the Ai resolve the battle for you (giving you the results and off you go to the next one) or actually play the battle yourself. If you do the latter you'll get to hear your general (or captain) provide the troops with a little motivational speech before the fight (the depth to this game is truly astounding). Normally, you'll hear things like "We're Rome's finest", etc. Typical speech stuff. Someone found a pre-fight speech sound file in the game files that goes like this.......

"Well ride me sideways and whip me with a winkle fork, lads! There's a lot of the bastards, aren't there? Those arseweasels are here to get away from their unfulfilled, shrill wives. Hardly surprising, as they all have tiny little manhoods! Smaller than a flea on a cockroach's bum!"

I haven't heard it in game myself but I'll bet there's more stuff like this around too.

"Let's hear it for the pansies in the light mechs.....WAY TO GO LIGHT MECHS!" - Duncan Fisher