Total War Collection: Rome Gold

The Rome: Total War Gold Edition includes Rome: Total War and its expansion pack, Barbarian Invasion.

Rome Total War

Rome: Total War is the next generation in epic strategy gaming from the critically acclaimed and award winning Total War brand. The aim of the game is to conquer, rule and manipulate the Roman Empire with the ultimate goal of being declared as the "Imperator" of Rome. Set in a time when the mighty Roman Empire emerged to conquer the known world against powerful enemies; when gladiators fought to a bloody death in the Coliseum; when Spartacus defied the might of the empire; when Hannibal led his invincible army and his war elephants across the Alps to strike fear into the very heart of Rome itself; and when Julius Caesar finally smashed the Barbarian Gauls. This was a time of brutal confrontation between civilisation and barbarism, and of civil war as the ancient world's only superpower turned on itself.

A completely new Total War engine uses innovative technology and groundbreaking design to bring the world of ancient Rome to life to deliver the biggest and most cinematic battles ever seen in a videogame. So the battles in Rome: Total War maintain the epic scale that fans of Total WarTM " are used to, but now use high-detailed 3D polygonal troops and allows huge cities to be displayed on the battlefields. The result is truly spectacular.

Sticking with the award-winning formula of Total War games, the campaign game lets players build an Empire using the arts of war, diplomacy and trade. The new engine recreates Europe as a 3D game world ripe for conquest, where the whole physical terrain of Europe has been re-created.

Cities and settlements will grow and develop over time (providing they are managed properly) and as players develop the environment around their cities (e.g. by building roads and bridges or improving the agriculture) the battlefields will adapt to show these features. The result is a fully dynamic interactive world.

Features

• Epic battles between collosal armies. Over 10,000 fully polygonal, motion captured men can be displayed simultaneously with virtually no sacrifice of performance compared to Medieval: Total War.
• Players can command entire Roman Legions, Greek phalanxes, barbarian hordes and the armies of Carthage, Egypt, and the Successor Kingdoms, each with a mix of exclusive units.
• The campaign game is accessible to all gamers from those who want to do everything through to beginners (who can use city governors and automatic systems to handle the detail of taxation, military training and building) and those who just want to fight enormous battles!
• Besiege huge cities and storm mighty fortresses with powerful artillery and siege engines. Bring your enemies defences crashing to the ground with catapults, smash through their gates with battering rams as burning oil rains death from above, fight your way onto the battlements with siege towers and assault ladders and undermine their walls by igniting sapping points.
• Rome: Total War also allows up to 8 players to fight epic battles over a LAN or the internet.
  
  Rome: Total War Barbarian Invasion
  
  The expansion moves the action on 350 years to a time when the Roman Empire is in deep trouble, beset by enemies inside and out, and possibly even dying. The year is 363 AD, and the Roman Empire has split into two parts ruled from the cities of Rome (for the Western Empire) and Constantinople (for the Eastern Empire). If this weren't bad enough, barbarian tribes have been massing on the Imperial frontiers in Europe for many years. In the East the Empire faces a renewed threat from the Persian Empire, under new vigorous rulers, the Sassanids.
  
  This is an exciting and turbulent period of Roman history: the Fall of Rome itself and the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, the slaughter of Emperor Valens and a complete Roman army at Adrianople in 378, the arrival in Europe of the terrifying Huns, the political in-fighting that saw Rome's best generals hounded as traitors, and the final humiliation of the last Emperor of the West being forced to retire in 476 AD as a barbarian took his throne. Romulus Augustulus simply wasn't enough of a threat to be worth killing.
  
  BI starts just after the last Emperor of a unified Rome has died. His successors in Rome and Constantinople are now uneasy allies and rivals for power. The ¿barbarians¿ are massing along the borders, and in some cases are living inside what used to be Roman territory. There are many, many challenges for a Roman to face - and some may be almost unbeatable!
  
  New Factions
  
  Fortunately, you don't necessarily have to play as the Romans! BI includes 10 brand new playable factions, (and some more that you'll get the chance to meet during the game). Each of these factions has its own strategic options and a selection of exclusive units for their armies. The Franks, for example, have warriors armed with the fearsome francisca throwing axe, while the Huns and Sarmatians are peerless cavalrymen and the Sassanids are the only nation to still use elephants in battle.
• Eastern Roman Empire - the rich part of the Roman World, and now reverting to a more "Greek" and Eastern outlook than strictly Roman. Their heavy cavalry is frightening indeed.
• Western Roman Empire - under the rule of a strong Emperor there is the chance that Rome could become the centre of the world once again. The Legions may have changed, but they are still potentially powerful!
• Huns - When Roman envoys finally met Attila the Hun they were horrified - the Huns were a new breed of warrior who live in the saddle and could ride and fight all day!
• Goths - An ancient people from the Baltic, the Goths struck fear into their enemies thanks to their habit of sacrificing captives to Tyz, the war god. They may now be nominally Christian, but they haven't forgotten all their old ways!
• Vandals - Their name is still a byword for wanton destruction! Driven from their ancestral lands, the Vandals carved their way across Gaul and Spain, eventually marching through North Africa to settle around Carthage.
• Saxons - Unlike the other German tribes, the Saxons didn't look southwards to expand. They look seawards, and westwards towards the rich province of Britannia, creating the idea of "England" in the process.
• Franks - The "Free Men" are a Germanic tribe of fierce warriors, famed for their steadfast infantry and their utterly dangerous throwing axes. They managed to conquer all of Gaul and give the land its modern name: France.
• Allemanni - Although held off by the Romans over many centuries, the Germanic Allemanni people are now on the rise again. They crossed the frozen River Rhine in 366 and now are a threat to the good order of many Roman provinces.
• Sarmatians - A fierce warrior people from the steppes, the "Syrmatae" rule the lands to the north of the Black Sea. Their women-folk are supposedly as savage as the men, but as horsemen they are almost without equal - which is why they can be found as mercenaries in Roman armies.
• Sassanid Empire - The Persian Empire has waxed and waned over the centuries, but in the Sassanid dynasty its rulers are vigorous and strong. At loggerheads with the Eastern Roman Empire over the Sassanids' persecution of Christians, they are a power to be reckoned with in the East.
  
  Features
• Barbarian Hordes - A barbarian faction can flee en masse from an attacker and take its entire people in search of a new homeland. When a faction loses its last settlement the entire population can move as a series of horde armies. If - and when - the faction manage to conquer a new homeland region, the people can again settle and begin life anew. While a faction is "on the road" it can't recruit new units other than mercenaries, but it doesn't pay any upkeep on its armies. Hordes are a "get out of jail" card for some factions facing defeat - or they may just get hacked to pieces as they run!
• New Units - New factions means new units! In fact, almost every unit in BI is new. This means that there are plenty of new tactical tricks to discover, strengths to play up, and weaknesses to exploit! Every faction in the game has a "signature" unit that is unique to them, such as the axe-throwing Francisca Heerbann of the Franks to the ultra-heavy Sassanid Clibinarii cavalry. Even apparently familiar units have been revised.
• New Special Abilities - Some units in the game have new special abilities. The Shield Wall allows barbarian elites to "lock" themselves into a defensive stance and withstand frontal attacks. The Schiltron is a defensive "hedgehog" formation for spear-armed troops - great for withstanding cavalry, but very vulnerable to missile fire. Swimming allows light troops to cross rivers and flank defenders who think they are safe at one end of a bridge or ford!
• A modified technology tree - allows barbarians to build and expand larger settlements. It also includes new buildings to reflect the changed importance given to religion at this time in history.