Your top ten Total War games

Self explanatory title - just curious to see which your favourite Total War is, the one you can open up any day, any time, and lose a few hours of your life to.

Mine:

1. Empire:
my inner British patriot thoroughly loved this game, and the world scale was previously unseen in TW

2. Medieval (original):
the first Total War my ten year old self played, and what got me hooked on 'History' in general - invested so many hours into the Viking Invasion expansion pack

3. Rome (original):
the 3D campaign compared to the original map-style of Medieval was a welcome change, as was the battle engine

4. Medieval 2:
with the most mods, this game offered countless hours of replay-ability and enjoyment enabling me to play in settings such as Middle Earth, Westeros and Tamriel

5. Shogun 2:
highly polished, fantastic campaign aesthetics and all round a great game - sadly not as replayable for me due to the low-scale of Japan and very carbon-copy factions

7. Rome 2:
a classic update to the game that I loved, whilst filled with flaws on release, the game itself was solid in terms of the campaign, bettered by mods such as DEI

8. Warhammer 1/2/3:
was never sure how I'd feel about these, as I knew nothing of the Warhammer Universe prior, but I found the games and huge scale of the map to be enjoyable and offer a lot of replayability

9. Napoleon:
sadly not as good as Empire, but still enjoyable - wish the campaign map hadn't cut off huge section of the map such as Egypt

10. Thrones of Britannia:
basically just Atilla focused on the British Isles, but my inner patriot did enjoy playing such a large scale of Medieval England

Games not played; Shogun (original), Pharaoh, Troy

I'll nibble.

1. Medieval 2
Little shock to anyone more than a little aware of me. Mods give this campaign the diversity of any future total war game, and nearly the mechanical diversity too, while having a core I can come back to again and again. The graphics are just right for me, the setting is nice. But it has one feature that's well-realized which has given it more life than any other total war game, an unfair advantage if you will.

I'm a weird player, I like character and story... I don't like it pre-scripted. The game offers a special combination where the tales of characters feel just right, more than any later total war - my frustrations in later titles tend to come when I think of doing something similar, better in this game. I'm a bit of a GM at heart, people familiar with tabletop/roleplaying will recognize this. So what I've come to do is play portions of the campaign map, or even the entire campaign map, and try to realistically pit factions together as a palpatine of sorts. I know, it's bizarre. But I've gotten years out of this style and several deeply memorable campaigns with not just one faction, but several rising to the top with the help of randomized character creation as new challenges to explore and the ability to engineer world class engagements in a way CA probably couldn't dream of engineering their AI to do. Civil wars, grand crusades and religious politics, much more are all in my loose but extensive collection of house rules.

Oh, and I can set up a map, let the ai roll for a couple hundred turns and come back in, and I have a totally different scenario to work with even using a near-vanilla mod.

The game isn't perfect and I wish there was just a bit more to it, but I still have one campaign I'm doing this with and my interest will probably hold at least until that one comes to a conclusion. Be it the inevitable crash that doesn't come back or a situation where a few factions are just too big to fail. I've wondered about how a campaign where one of these factions was another player would go, attempting to conquer the world against my roleplay mechanics, but that's an odd sell and I'm not holding my breath.

2. Rome 2
This one wormed its way up the list because despite its many many, many flaws, I've had a lot of neat campaigns with it. Even in earlier, buggier days. I think I just wanted to give this one a chance really badly and despite the effort it took sometimes and the fact I would semi-regularly just drop the game because something was just too stupid for me, I've had very good runs including a full world conquest: and the ability to let it crumble back into independent states, the inevitable fall of an early world empire. That was memorable for me. So it's up there in nostalgia and also up there as something I'll probably play again when I pull my head out of the medieval 2 sand.

3. Medieval I
There were quirks to this game I've been missing ever since. Each general, captains included had some sort of substance, and it was interesting to watch the careers of even the least of leaders. I liked how factions and periods were implemented, the seamlessness of how a state could emerge, fall or return. The simplicity of campaign movement was a drawback but also refreshing - it showed a different way this series could have gone, and I'm a sucker for medieval settings. Perhaps campaign ai would have been easier to improve this way. I do appreciate the flexibility but if there was a total war rival that chose this game as a foundation in how to build its campaign I'd probably get a kick out of it. I've also had very good runs in this one so it's easily in my top ranks despite the age. Oh and the atmosphere was glorious. Medieval 2 has a killer soundtrack but there's just something to the audio design in this one that has me, too.

4. Warhammer II
I know, I know, you're looking at this and I'm committing sacralige. So here's the thing. I tried to get into fantasy total war and I did for a little while with this one. I'm really not anti fantasy, far from it, and I think there was some good stuff here. But I'm not a warhammer fan by a long shot (I downright disliked it and you still won't catch me near the sci-fi), and I didn't get terribly far. However it's something I might replay again to get something out of it and I've gotten nice campaign experiences playing this one on its own merits, so on that basis I can't put it any lower. It would actually be #3 if this list were about what I was most likely to pick up again.


5. Rome TW
I played Medieval and frankly I kind of skipped this one. First Total War I played was Shogun, then Medieval 2, then Medieval 1... yeah it's weird. This always felt like an obsolete Medieval 2 for me which isn't fair because this one is what kicked things off for the franchise and Medieval 2 was more of a clone of Rome, but it had just the right balance that I've only gone back and played this for posterity. And to be fair I enjoyed it and got more out of it. I fully respect what this game did for the franchise. It firmly holds itself in the top 5 on principle. But it never had the effect on me as it did the earliest fans, or for the legacy of TWC.


6. Shogun I
I played it and I have some nostalgia of doing so, including a round of conquering the map completely and letting it collapse for fun. It's a surprisingly difficult experience to replicate, I've only done it again in Rome 2.

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My play hours get way lower below this point. I've played enough of these to have an impression but they never stuck.

7. Shogun II
Look, I respect it and I get what it's going for, but it's the best of my least because I was never that interested in it and the original was enough. It collects dust with me. But I respect its level of polish, something I don't think has been matched in a title since, even a saga title specializing in narrow scope.

8. Attila
I like the premise, but I've never gotten too far with it. Performance did a hit which isn't helped on my potato pcs, and I've always just neglected it.

9. Empire
I don't really care about the setting to be honest. I've given it a few rounds but it never stuck. I respect the ambition and it's probably the most technically advanced attempt from CA in a long time to really change the engine underlay.

10. Thrones of Britannia
I like Britannia, I like the expansion in med 2. I like the setting. I should like more about this. I just don't really enjoy it. I launch it, piddle and forget it. It's more than the non-entries on the list but only by a thread.

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Off the list are Warhammer I and Napoleon, simply because they are after 10 and never made an impression. Pharaoh, Troy and Warhammer III I do not own nor do I intend to own them. I respect Three Kingdoms and would probably rate it higher than some on the list if I got it, but I don't expect it would rank high enough for me to make the investment. Not when my backlog is extensive as it is.