Total War: Rome 2 developer diaries show Carthage crumble

Creative Assembly have released two developer diaries, detailing their recreation of the siege at Carthage for Total War: Rome 2. The videos show more of the absolutely gorgeous looking battle engine than was previously shown in their first teaser trailer , plus you get some meaty cuts of information as to how wars will work.

The Unmaking of Carthage talks about how the recreation was achieved, but also about how this iteration improves on previous games in the series. Battles combine land and sea units, with ships landing on shore, and a tactical map has been added to allow players to get an overview of what your larger, more varied selection of troops are doing. It's a purely overhead look at the action, designed to give an at-a-glance report of where the enemy is in relation to your force, but not allowing you to issue orders.

The second video is a much more in-depth look at the game's balance. With the team no longer able to rely on the multi-level set-up of Sogun 2's Japanese castles, Rome 2's walled cities will require taking multiple capture points. Add in a complete rebalance of combat and a tweaked system that will favour land battles over sieges, and it sounds like the Creative Assembly team have a solid plan for ironing out the problems that previous Total Wars have faced.

Phil Savage
Editor-in-Chief

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.

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