Total War: Rome II takes screenshots to the extreme with the Battle of Teutoburg Forest

Creative Assembly are giving us the biggest look at Total War: Rome II yet, thanks to this giant panoramic shot of the Battle of Teutoburg Forest. This is their second panoramic vista for the game, but with their last one a mere 29063 x 3872 depiction of Carthage , they were barely even trying. This time they've gone all out, providing a massive 30000 x 9785 shot of Rome's defeat at the hands of the united Germanic tribes.

With 293,550,000 pixels of hot Rome II action at our disposal, there's bound to be some interesting titbits hidden within. Let's fire up the INVESTIGATRON 3000 and go digging for clues!

Here we see what a 30000 x 9785 image looks like when scaled down to a blog-friendly 610 width. It's a vague suggestion of a landscape with tiny indistinct dots representing people who are either fighting a raging battle or attending an outdoor music festival. Maybe both, if its Leeds Festival. From this, we can conclusively state that you shouldn't shrink giant pictures.

These soldiers have been told that if they hold their swords up to the sun, it'll reveal a QR Code. QR Codes hadn't been invented in 9 AD, yet they're still trying it, the gullible twits.

An early Roman nourishment tactic involved taping marshmallows to each soldier's shield, then firing flaming arrows to roast them. Casualties were high, and the practice was eventually banned, depriving legions of gooey goodness until the invention of the "stick" two years later.

These soldiers are hiding in the shade of some trees because they are vampires. Rome had been at war with the vampires for decades, after emperor Augustus said their fangs looked "silly".

The man in the yellow shirt has recently won Le Tour de France. He's holding his shield to his face to hide himself from the shame of knowing he used a performance enhancing stallion. In the row in front of him, a soldier has trained his horse to do an "endo".

Here are some soldiers letting off steam by beating a dead horse, which was both a popular game of the era and an accurate description of what I'm doing now.

Blimey, who'd have thought you could pack so many historical details into one picture! If you spot any more clues lurking within the full panoramic spectacle , let us know in the comments.

Phil has been writing for PC Gamer for nearly a decade, starting out as a freelance writer covering everything from free games to MMOs. He eventually joined full-time as a news writer, before moving to the magazine to review immersive sims, RPGs and Hitman games. Now he leads PC Gamer's UK team, but still sometimes finds the time to write about his ongoing obsessions with Destiny 2, GTA Online and Apex Legends. When he's not levelling up battle passes, he's checking out the latest tactics game or dipping back into Guild Wars 2. He's largely responsible for the whole Tub Geralt thing, but still isn't sorry.