In a multiplayer match you can set up historical battles or any number of custom scenarios in any terrain or with any weather. The turn-based game doesn't have a multiplayer component, which is a shame, but understandable given the variable length of turns and size of the campaigns. Up to six players can fight it out in the real-time strategy battles. But the multiplayer definitely deserves a mention.
Multiplayer Throwdowns You can buy Rome: Total War for the single-player alone and get your money's worth between the huge campaign games, the historical battles, or the quick-battle generator that allows you to create any number of scenarios. The core gameplay is still very strong hardcore strategy gamers can overlook the rough spots to see the game's brilliance for what it is. You can work around the AI problems as you play. What? No video of my troops triumphantly marching through the city gates or beating down the senate doors? No special message with a picture of the Roman people throwing roses at my feet? Even a text description of some sort of palace orgy would've been cool. Also, after marching onto Rome and taking control of the senate, I was greeted with the generic "faction eliminated" message. One bug caused my largest fleet to get stuck in a coastal area with no place to move to and no way to scuttle it. Great, now I had a huge empire, but nobody left to run it! Rome has awesome gameplay but lacks that final level of polish. Suicide! Given how important these characters are to the big picture, couldn't you at least be able to tell the AI to protect them? During one massive assault on Rome I lost three of my four generals because the AI used them stupidly. What's not cool is helplessly watching one of your generals, an important named character, rush his cavalry alone into a waiting phalanx of spearmen. During huge massive battles with multiple armies, it's not uncommon for your reinforcements to be controlled by the AI as they storm in from another part of the map. Most frustrating of all is when the AI is on your side. The enemy capital is often left with only token resistance, despite its importance.
On the normal skill level, your opponents never even blockade enemy ports, nor do they go out of their way to lift blockades of their own ports, regardless of how big their navy is. While the AI makes for a capable opponent on land, the game is not very good at managing its affairs at sea: your opponents never seem to make very many amphibious landings, despite building up big navies, and rarely go on the offensive from the sea. Chief among them is the enemy AI on the big map. Barbarians at the Gate While Rome is a triumph in many ways, there are a couple of nagging issues that keep a great game from being the next instant classic.
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