Total War: EMPIRE – Definitive Edition

This is easily my favorite total war game so far. I have played MOST of them, and ALL of the big titles i.e Rome II, Attila, WH1 and 2 so on. I understand some peoples views on it being boring. The combat does tend to turn into a slugfest. BUT, the naval combat in this game is completely unmatched. I also tend to enjoy the line infantry era of military history so thats a thing. The multiple map set up with trade routes across the world is a really neat touch. The AI tends to be pretty chill even when at war they do tend to be a little less aggressive than other titles. Troop movement feels very good for the year of release and the units are actually pretty balanced for beginning, mid, and end games. Its a must play if you like the idea of shredding your enemies with vollies of musket fire and cannons. 10/10.

This game and its mechanics were far ahead of its time... highly recommend trying some of the more popular mods for this game (DarthMod, Empire II, or Pirates Uber Alles) and you have a Total War game that holds up to this day. Still one of my favorite Total War games outside of Rome II and Attila.

was fun but lost my 60 hour long campaign because i selected short campaign by mistake instead of long and lost because i thought the time limit was longer also download total war empire 2 mod makes the game way better

By a very long shot one of my most all-time favorite games to play. Very much enjoy the troop / economy management. Would love to see more like this!

War, More Like Conquer Everything until you get molested by the british

Hola total war. Puedes parar de hacer juegos tipo Warhammer, solo haz empire, napoleón y medieval

awesome strategy game, both long term and combat

There are no good total war games because they are all fundamentally flawed. They get old very quickly when you realize that every 'start' is just a limitation that you need to strategize around instead of being like an actual strategy game such as Eu4 or even RTS games where you can adapt meaningfully. Every turn in every total war game plays the same because you either stick to a strategy or get blown out on a 'hard' start since you didn't watch or read a reddit post telling you exactly what to do.

A very good game.
The different continents are great, and the naval battles as well.

I also enjoyed the fact that the native language is used for the country you play.

Fun, gets complicating really quick

This is great game, me and my older brother would play this one together all the time, even beginner friendly if i do say so myself. Although it definitely shows it age, memories too good to forget have been made with this beauty,

Decent strategy when played on the harder settings, once you get a decent grip on spending and commerce its just a matter of winning early campaigns and getting the technologies developed before your competition does.

One of my favorite total war games by far, old but classic, there are some mods to make it complex, but vanilla is not bad. Wish Total War / Sega would bring back the large scale that this game had in the campaigns

The base game is now pretty outdated to todays standards but with mods it holds up quite well. AI can be little buggy but this usually is also fixed with mods. Overall one of the best games i've played and still my favourite Total War game by far. I still come back and do new play throughs here and there. PLEASE BRING OUT EMPIRE 2!!! RULE BRITANNIA

very good for the wargamer with no-one to compete with. can give surprises every game no matter who you play as

The goat time period that got me into the series! Modded or vanilla, this game offers loads of fun for history nerds and RTS fans!

It's decent, but it would need much more polishing to be on par with top Total War games.
For instance, almost all maps look the same - just flatlands with some hills and trees. And all fortresses are exactly the same. On top of that, fighting on walls is basically bugged. Musketeers rarely shoot at the enemy below and cannons have a very tight angle in which they can fire.
There are also many good things but all in all, Medieval 2 was much better.

if the devs are planning to update the game please add a workshop so that darthmod is more accessable to the public

This game doesn't work on modern hardware. During fort battles. If you destroy a wall, the frames go waaaay down to 1/2 a frame per second. Not playable.

More discovery, more gunpowder, and the line infantry are very exciting

Could be a great TW series game, if werent so buggy and laggy.
Basically a next step from Medieval II, which can be felt from the gameplay, for its still the same old game on its base level, just with some updates and renovations, its own "theme" of technology research and some colonial management. Naval battles are a thing finally and they are pretty allright.
Much more simpler than Europa Universalis, thus also more boring, but then again you can have real time battles not just RNG rolls.

Great timeline but really outdated in 2025, no proper mod community or support, maratha being too op makes the game not fun at all, people are changing the game files to nerf maratha so they can enjoy the game :D

Great game, always playing with mods on but that makes the game unreliable at most which means frequent crashes.

get this before napoleon if you want both, it will take you longer to notice the flaws over how napoleon fixes it

Great game. its pretty crazy how old it is and how amazing the graphics are. 10/10

I'm just going to lean in here to say something whilst this game is on sale:

This is a fun title, (especially playing as or against the Native Americans), except for one thing: the AI is absolute brain dead levels of stupid. I'm not sure how they managed to make an AI as stupid as this one, but you will be unchallenged, uncontested, throughout the entire title. Honestly, the AI just does -nothing.-

Have fun, but don't expect much from the campaigns.

Empire: Total War is one of the weaker entries in the Total War franchise. While its setting and scope are ambitious, the execution leaves a lot to be desired. Thanks to a clunky UI and an aging engine, the game feels more outdated than even older titles. It runs poorly, frequently stuttering, freezing, and crashing — even on modern systems.

Combat, both land and naval, is a mixed bag. Naval battles had a ton of potential but ended up frustratingly unintuitive and hard to manage. Land combat is equally annoying at times — many basic, common-sense tactics and mechanics are locked behind late-game tech upgrades, forcing players to slog through hours before combat becomes bearable. Artillery rarely hits, and the AI behaves erratically.

The campaign construction and settlement management feel stripped down compared to earlier titles, offering little depth. Replayability is limited, and once the novelty wears off, there's not much reason to return.

Overall, Empire had incredible potential but fell short in almost every area. It doesn't need a remaster — it needs a full remake. As it stands today, it’s only worth picking up at a heavy discount — $15–$20 at most.

The game is perhaps among the best turn based plus real time strategy games.

Great game if you love huge scale 1000 man battles than this is for you highly recommend checking this game out.

Install Darthmod with the extra factions, makes this game so great to play. hours and hours of fun and i've only scratched the surface

Many compromises made to balance the game, and the usual Total War overpowering of cavalry and micromanagement of each unit in battle required to have a hope of a decent result. BUT - still great fun, a remarkably good attention to historical reality and a great mix of trade, diplomacy, naval and land warfare that beats Napoleon:TW for sheer global scope and ambition.

I love this game wish it had new graphics and the forts were not so buggy other wise 8/10 recommend

good but dead game
no workshop support and mod browsers make your files crash

This is just about the best Total War ever made. Too bad it is not remade and expanded upon like the Warhammer installments. It would be well worth it, I do believe.

best totalwar game best time period but very buggy and lag a bit of content i will love to see a empire 2 cus this is a good game when it is bad and if it become good it will be a fantastic game

Pure brain ecstasy it is -Yoda. This game has a well rounded balance of war based combat while keeping accurate to results and statistics. In this game you can't just win a battle by spamming a certain troop over wise you'll get crushed, however if you are overwhelmed there still is a fair opportunity to make something of it. The tax system is good but not as good as "Rome total war", however the nobility/citizens tax system is interesting and works. The rebellion system is hugely improved from it's predecessors and the building system is still detailed and engaging; with a fun improvement of regional buildings and upgrades. Trade is improved and diplomacy although sometimes unfair, is logical. Factions are time accurate however they never follow historical tense which is funny. Battles are fun and turns are addictive. superb game 10/10

can spam musket balls and fireballs at natives...10/10 game

first total war game i ever played. so much fun, and also very nostalgic. i highly recommend this entry to the TW series.

best game ever for people who like history,battle and stratigey games

AI nations declare war on you all at once, no breathing space whatsoever. You have to somehow survive with nothing. It's an annoying game that gives you no chances and throws everything at you all at once, presumably because a niche selection of players moaned to devs about the game being too easy so now we have to suffer with extreme AI difficulty even on a normal mode of difficulty.

One of, if not the best total war series game. Even with the subpar maps, pathfinding and the rest.
The game is enjoyable with or without mods. Artillery is king, diplomacy? non-existent, fun? unlimited. Buggy and bad? every town or fortress siege battle makes or breaks the immersion.

Harder difficulty settings only make the AI some kind of morale gods.
Naval battles are, well, how would I put it.. stupid at best?

I'm still waiting for Empire 2 total war, but for now, i'll stick with the modded empire to pass time.

alot less demanding of graphical power id say it never overheats my cheap laptop lol
also at the price its the best bang for bucm id recommend the mobile version for any total war player its actully better in most ways from dilomacy less ai agression pointless agression i mean and a new tech system lol still cant type very fast or correct and now im not seeing auto correct so yea i hope this works

IT's a fun game even now in 2025! I love putting battle difficulty on easy and simply dominating, NGL!

This was the first Total War game that I ever bought. There are still some bugs and exploits as to be expected with a Creative Assembly game, however this is still my favorite game in the series. The scale is unmatched, but I wish that there were more regions in each theater, as it doesn't make much sense that France or Spain are only made of a single province essentially. The game is starting to get a bit dated, and Napoleon holds up better graphically. I would still recommend giving a campaign a try.

good, fun, and worthwhile.
probably not for 30.00$, but still. I find that it's generally fun to play, especially for an older game.
maybe if you can, it'd be a better purchase for napoleon total war, but if not, then just play this.

2025 and still no option to scale the UI. It is unreadable at resolutions that are normal for today's PC's. Hundreds of posts on this and not a peep from the developer or publisher.

FIX SO YOU CAN PLAY MANUAL BATTLE IN THE MULTIPLAYER CAMPAIGN! its a useless add to the game if you cant choose to play manually. The feature of a multiplayer campaign is only good if you can always choose to play a battle manually otherwise its a joke of a thing to add and just makes the whole thing feel worthless and not enjoyable at all, hard pass on the game until its fixed

As someone who owns almost every Total War ever. This is without a doubt one of my all time favorites, Empire was the first Total War game i played and it made me love the franchise. Great game

I like muskets. Indeed has muskets. This game makes you feel like a tactical genius at times when deploying a much smaller force and winning. Other times this game makes you look real dumb. Very fun would recommend

A brilliant game made in an era of peak intellectual freedom in the gaming community. I doubt they could make the game again due to its "problematic" built-in historical reality (Europeans dominating the globe), but it would be great to see a new release w/ a larger map