Empire Total War - naval battle gameplay trailer released
 

Gametrailers.com has some gameplay footage of the naval battles in the forthcoming Empire total war

Ugh, we have to wait until February...

Naval battles were one of the things I missed the most in the Total War series (Mostly in Rome), good to see they're adding them in the era where they're really needed

:doh:that looks really awesome.

Wow, that looks cool. Wonder if it will have fantasy sailing like potbs.

Probably.

Just as I feared:

More eye candy with no substance.

That's the philosiphy they've stuck too for every Total War game thus far. They've yet to make a weak or uninvolving game.

I wouldn't know, I've not bought any of them. Course I also maintain that RTS games are neither real time (NONE are, obviously), nor strategy (most are more tactical).

None the less, I'd dearly love to see a good age of fighting sail simulator. Contrary to what some have said on other boards (potbs, for example), there is no reason why a realistic sailing model has to be too hard for players to master. It's entirely a question of the UI for the game. In addition, with the player as Captain (or Admiral), there is no need for them to be overly concerned with HOW the ship does what they wish, just that it does it as well as possible. For an "EZ mode" give your ship an AI sailing master. As skipper, you order the boat to be placed at pistol shot from the target, on the same tack, and the Master makes it happen.

From an interface standpoint, you could have the ability to place a target marked on the sea, and the game would draw a rough path line showing how the ship would get where you want it placed. If the target point is upwind, it could draw tacks to get you there, and you could hit a key to swap wearing for tacking, and sliders for the length of the legs of the tacks (down to the minimum possible length based on crew and timing).

Anyway, it could be done so that as skipper you are concerned with the path the ship takes, but the officers and men make it happen. It need not require the player to reef every sail by hand.

SH suffers the same poor paradigm for the position of the player, BTW. We either have to do ALL the jobs, or it's made ridiculously easy. Ideally, the player would be skipper, and his firing party would plot his observations, etc. We'd have a model between what we call 100% realism—which unrealistically requires the captain to do jobs he never did in RL), and auto targeting which is is joke.

UI is everything.

They're quite good. How much do you know about them, interface wise? Only the battles are 'real time'.

Me too, but I wasn't expecting one from Empire: Total War. Producing a full on sailing sim would be a massive project if you wanted to do it justice, and naval battles are only part of the whole.

Even battles in RTS games are sped up. Or do napoleonic battles take days sometimes (real days)?

Sorry, I'm just being pedantic :)

As for age of fighting sail, I keep seeing games that LOOK fantastic, and I wish they were built with the bones to make them realistic.

It needn't be painfully realistic, just realistic enough to simulate outcomes. All the stuff we see with fantasy sailing makes things like The Battle of the Nile impossible.

I've even seen that problem even in turn based games, with multiple days of a particular battle being their own scenario, without any carry over of casualties, morale, etc. And these weren't crap games, either. Ever play Age of Rifles?

Day and night cycles and other such would be a neat thing to see in a Total War type game, though it does beg the question on whether that level of 'single battle' detail would serve that kind of game.

Might be marketing more than anything else. While it's entirely realistic to be at the mercy of the wind, how many people want to play a game where that's accurately simulated?

I do. I don;t think POTBS is doing terribly well, are they? I think that had they made sailing more interesting, there'd be FAR more replay ability. In a world of magical windward sailing, all the battles become slug fests.

As I said, realistic sailing does NOT require grognard like detail. No individual sail controls are needed, it's the end results that matter.

You can have a momentum indicator that shows if the ship will make stays tacking, for example, if you won't get through the eye of the wind, you have no choice but to sail on close-hauled, wear, or miss stays trying (might be useful to bring guns to bear rarely).

Fudging the wind in a sailing game is like messing with gravity and lift in a flight sim.

I'd play it as well. But I've adored games that were definite niche products before, and while I can lament the fact that more specialized games aren't made, I do understand why they're not as common, heavily budgeted, etc.

This is, of course, counter-balanced by the fact that, if it's done really well, any game can find a market.

Despite great interest, I haven't got to play it. The satellite connection giveth, the satellite connection taketh away.

How'd you think of how sailing was handled in the latest version of Pirates?

Omg, that just made me want it even more! Well, that and the fact I just visited HMS Victory. Empire is certainly looking good!

Interesting. I was involved in the closed beta of PotBS, and I left due to the lack of realism. The closed beta forums were filled with complaints about the direction the game was going. When they announced they would add magical content, I told them I was gone.

Anyone who has read Patrick O'brian or at least watched Master and Commander knows what type of game I would like. Maybe it is a niche, but seeing how many people were dissapointed by PotBS, and knowing that everyone I hang out with also wants a true depiction of the Age of Sail makes me think that an accurate game would do well.

Part of the fun is sailing and the fact that the wind must be a primary factor in any engagement.

I like PotBS very much (Though I still think introducing the Supernatural content was stupid), but I guess it's a matter of taste

I would also like a game that accurately depicts 18th century naval combat though

Supernatural content?
I played PotBS a few months ago and found it alright. I liked the naval combat because it was light hearted and looked nice. I gave up though because im just not a mass multiplayer person. I think the problem is you have to dedicate too much of your time to leveling up which just makes me think i could be doing something better with my time. I got to level 13 after hours of playing and as always with these games it gets to the point where it takes 3 hours just to level up once.... :doh:

Back on subject though i do hope they do a half realistic job here. It looks fantastic so far but the one bit i didnt like was those trails left by the cannonballs. I know the odd shot would leave a faint trail but these are full on white lines :down:
Have a good look at one of the first broadsides in the trailer if your not sure what im on about.

The devs have said these trails will be optional, I believe.

Now if that is true then that has just made my day :up::up:

I wasn't in any betas od POTBS, I left when I saw the change in direction from the devs in the forums. I hung around posting for a while, trying to get digs in (realistic feeling vs magical sailing) but to no avail.

Here's the deal.

The age of sail is fascinating from a role-playing standpoint with the player as an officer/captain. It offers cool ship combat, hand to hand, cutting out, sending parties to on shore to attack land targets (gun batteries, etc).

Part of what makes such things challenging is the wind. Blockading harbors works because there are limited times and places ships can leave due to the wind. Accurate at some base level—again, I don't require player control of every single staysail, etc—means replay ability. You can have the same French Frigate vs British frigate action, and with variable wind conditions, it would be fun and different every single time. Strikes me in POTBS (or similar), the only difference might be randomness in the damage models.

Sailing is everything to an age of sail game. I can even see for multiplayer speeding up time, so that engagements take less time. More important is not allowing ships to sail past close-hauled without towing (and only then in light wind after manning the boats (at GQ, they should have been hoisted out and trailed astern with a painter anyway).

I see all these games and it makes me sad there is no way to mod the awesome models into something realistic. I'd be all over a good frigate level age of sail game like a bad suit.

I am 99% sure someone from CA said this in a thread at twcenter, the reason for these trails is so you will easier see whats shooting at what.

Anyway, if its not an option its probably the first mod we will see.

In other news Empire is supposedly easier to modify, and a WW1-mod is allready announced.:rock: