Is the Last Roman DLC for Total War: Attila too limited, too small, and too real?

Games
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You were doing so well, and then you went and dropped the f-bomb…

Great post, and I’m glad you bring up the thing about Belisarius tricking the Ostrogoths into thinking he was going to accept their offer. I had read that, but it hadn’t occurred to me that’s what Creative Assembly was modeling with their “declare independence” option! What is Belisarius was really considering it!

And I’m especially glad to hear you calling out the visuals in Attila. It’s a gorgeous game for how evocative it is of its specific time and place, whereas Total War Warhammer just looks like intricate realizations of Peter Jacksonry. I marvel at the former. I just sort of casually appreciate the style of the latter. “Oh, look, that’s kind of like Minas Tirith from the movies…”

Also, ha ha, you did a massive wall of text before me.

-Tom

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Someone needs to get that dwarf fellow from LoTRs and make a “you have my wall of text” gif. I would post that if it existed!

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Maybe Creative Assembly should base their next game on this:

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Nice review.

About this whole history VS fantasy debate: historical setting is both curse and a blessing. It really adds context to the story - you automatically getting into a setting with expanded universe bigger than Star Wars, even though the main treat might not be canon compared to other sources and books you can find. Thus historical TW is interesting by default but it’s easy for the game to disappoint you. Is this supposed to be Borodino, 3000 vs 3000 soldiers? Was conquest of Gaul really a 4 battles of 2000 vs 2000 soldiers around 4 Gaul cities? Did Japanese really used fireworks in battles so much? Did people really were in constant war for the sake of war for all of human history?

Attila is relatively OK cause it’s believable for battles to be so small - it’s the story of decline. It’s OK for everyone to fight everyone because it’s a time of migration and hunger and dying empires. It’s the first TW game that I really liked. Haven’t played The Last Roman game - cause the base game is so big. And it makes sense to try at least several campaigns as factions are so clearly defined. It’s not just better archers and trade bonuses, those countries are defined by their position, size, history - almost like in better Paradox games (like Victoria 2 and not like Crusader Kings 2). It’s a treat. Thank you for reminding me to get the DLC.

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@tomchick I love this review. I love how you pack historical evidence into the review is such a way I had to double check that it was you, and not @Brooski that wrote it.

And the idea? A fantastic one at root. The idea of Belisarius going rogue? Well historical Belisaruis did not, but it was certainly a thing that was a worry! At several points along his campaigns in Italy he was, essentially, offered the crown. Offered the chance to establish a separate kingdom by the Goths, he declined. However this was a fateful offer, as it created a wedge of distrust, fueled only by the ambitions of his wife Antonina.

Granted much of what we know, especially the more salacious details, comes from Procopius. And his Secret Histories are far from an unbiased, or reliable, account. But that Creative Assembly would include this historical idea, make it supported by the systems? I love that.

The Total War series is one of my great loves of strategy, along with Europa Universalis. And while they may not always be the most, ahem, accurate histories, they do things to evoke the periods. I need to get back to Attila because this sounds like something that would fire my imagination in the way good histories do.

Oh, one last thing, I also favor history over fantasy in most ways. However good sci fi is its equal. While there are many similarities in the aims, objectives, and methods of storytelling between fantasy and sci fi, I do find that fantasy is the less effective canvas for drawing out meaningful commentary personally. While, practically speaking, the difference mechanically between an orc and a Formic may not be large, and both are fantastical, they do carry a different weight. One is an imagination of an alternate past which does not exist, the other serves as a stand in for a potential future sentient space faring species (that probably won’t exist in any form we meet). But the fact that one can be used as a formulation on the question ‘what would change to human society if, in the future, this were to happen’ it provides more ‘heft’ personally.

Granted both sci fi and fantasy are prone to the unimaginative rehashes of concepts from other, better, stories of their genre. After all just as many stories have cribbed from the idea of an unstoppable alien invasion of HG Wells, as have from Tolkien’s wizards and elves fantasy. So perhaps the problem is less the form, and more people need to stop borrowing so heavily from Tolkien and have an original thought of their own.

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I love this point. I cut a whole paragraph from the piece about why sci-fi gets a break from me, and that’s basically it. Sci-fi is often used as a lens to look at contemporary society and culture because it is – often by definition – a direct extension of that society and culture.

However, I have no idea what a Formic is. I’m assuming from your context it’s a space orc. Which I think is technically spelled “ork” based on the Warhammer primary historical sources.

-Tom

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A great article, but I’m not sure I agree with the idea that fantasy is necessarily more frivolous. It perhaps depends on the kind of fantasy. The Tolkien-esque variety – i.e. high fantasy – does seem more childish, for want of a better word, with its wizards, elves, and dwarves, than something that’s a bit more grounded, i.e. low or dark fantasy stuff like Conan the Barbarian. Indeed, the latter is heavily steeped in history, with Howard freely borrowing from real-life ancient and medieval history.

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I’m glad you brought this up, because it definitely applies to Game of Thrones, right? But doesn’t that then raise the question of why bother to use history as a template instead of just using history itself? Isn’t the answer that it’s trying to appeal to escapism rather than making any sort of salient point about history?

(Again, not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it goes to my point that there’s no story that’s made more meaningful by adding things that don’t exist.)

-Tom

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I was thinking those were used as mean to reach out and share with your culture historical aspects they may reject at first because of some cultural split (or even xenophobia?)? Reaching a different (and maybe wider) audience, in other words.
I find history much more jarring and entertaining than fictions now, but it was an acquired taste, one that may have grown out of a teenager’s addiction to fantasy and sci-fi.

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I’m not sure. Sticking to history is easier said than done, I think.

For example, I’m an archaeologist and the editor of Ancient History magazine (not intended to be a plug; honest!), and we always include a bunch of custom artwork that attempts to show what the ancient world looked like. Writing an article on a particular historical topic is one thing, but doing artwork is something quite different, since it often demands you answer questions that you normally wouldn’t have thought of.

Most recently, I’ve been wrestling with the cover for issue 9 (on Athens), which depicts a man carrying a calf on his shoulders up the steps of the Athenian Acropolis, in a scene that is set around 400-350 BC. The idea for that scene was easy, since I wanted to somehow include the Acropolis and incorporate a statue from the Acropolis Museum that depicts a man carrying a calf on his shoulders (the so-called moschophoros). But the amount of questions that pop up are staggering: what did the stairs of the Acropolis look like back then? where were the city walls located and could they be seen from here? did they actually perform blood sacrifices on the Acropolis? who else would have accompanied this man? what would he have worn? should the landscape include houses and/or workshops, and if so, what did they look like?

Similar questions are raised when you venture out of pure history and into the realm of historical fiction, as some of my writer friends would attest. Ancient historians write about battles, for example, in a fairly straightforward way that includes virtually no details about what it was like to actually be in the thick of it. But a writer of historical fiction wants to present his or her reader with exciting action, which requires him/her to do engage in various mental exercises, read up on the available academic literature, contact re-enactors, and so forth. It’s quite exhausting what you have to go through to get something that at least seems plausible, only for pedants to come along and pick the work apart.

So I can fully understand some writers wanting to avoid those kinds of pitfalls and simply hash out a world of their own creation, where they determine the ground rules, even if they do end up lifting a lot of stuff from the pages of history (as indeed in your Game of Thrones example). By casting a story as fantastical, the writer (or director/screenwriter or developer) ensures that the reader (or viewer or player) is not taken out of the experience when something happens that strikes the audience as a-historical, anachronistic, implausible, or simply wrong.

Game of Thrones is essentially, I think, about power. The story could just as well have been historical. Indeed, in Classical circles, we’ve imagined our own historical versions of Game of Thrones, such as a book series/TV show that focuses on the Wars of the Successors (after the death of Alexander), or on the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC). But I think a historical series would be much harder to do right than something that liberally borrows from history, but nevertheless is set in a world of the author’s own creation. In Game of Thrones’s case, you get people complaining about nipples on armour; in a TV show based on, e.g., the Peloponnesian War, you’d have people complain about historical errors, like showing stirrups or using older types of helmets.

I’ve blabbed on for far too long already and I hope I’ve managed to make my point. Essentially, I think any kind of story can convey a message that has some weight to it, i.e. something to say about the human condition, regardless of what genre it might belong to (historical, fantasy, science-fiction), but I do agree that the more fantastical something is the more removed it might appear from our everyday experiences and therefore runs the risk of having less of an impact.

And just a brief edit about this: I think I’d agree with that, but I’d add that it does also depend on the story itself. For example, something like Pacific Rim wouldn’t function at all without the fantastical elements (the Kaiju and the giant mechs). Note sure if that’s the best example to cite, but it’s the one that came most readily to mind. ;-)

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Excellent reply, Josho. I love hearing about your steps of the Acropolis dilemma! Frankly, I think that sort of thing makes you much more qualified to write about the history/fantasy divide than me.

And just to reiterate, I don’t mean to belittle fantasy. There’s nothing inherently wrong with “less of an impact”. After all, that’s pretty much the point of escapism.

-Tom

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Yes, I would agree with that, too, especially as regards softer science-fiction (like Star Trek), which has plenty of social commentary that makes it more readily relevant to us today than the struggles of dwarven kings vs orc raiders and similar kind of stuff.

Never thought you did. :-)

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It is the proper name for the buggers in Enders Game. Which I used because they acted as a horde, an invading ‘other’, much like how orcs are in fantasy. Obviously some differences exist, but they were a hostile* force whose society was completely alien, whose arrival upends society.

A better point of comparison might have been Skaven from Warhammer, now that I think of it. Oh well, I’m not a Warhammerhead, or whatever they call themselves.

I’m not sure I agree on this point, especially given your specific examples. Now, on one hand, the dark/ low fantasy does feel weightier to start in most cases. I’ll absolutely grant that. However it would be mistaken to apply this to thematic depth. Tolkien, more than most fantasy writers, draws inspiration from history. He includes many elements and themes, builds out their languages, establishes locations based on concepts and echoes of history. Granted it often mixes and borrows from several ideas, but it is there. It is not as obvious as Game of Thrones for sure (the battle on the Blackwater and parallels to the siege of Constantinople are not subtle), but that is often because his historical inspiration is historical mythologies. The histories and origin stories societies told about themselves. Which naturally creates a much different feel from a work borrowing from literal history.

But the more fantastical elements you introduce, the more careful and thoughtful of a writer you would have to be to bring that thematic weight. Themes tend to take a beating when the solution is ‘a wizard did it’. Just imagine the violence to the theme of Lord of the Rings if, once the hobbits got to Minas Tirith, Gandalf had just summoned the eagles to do an air drop in Mount Doom.**

There are times when using history may be appropriate, but others when obscuring with fantasy enhances the point. Just take, for example, the conquest of Cortez. Now anyone who has read history will obviously have thoughts about Spanish imperialism, and the actions of Cortez. If the author wanted to cause the reader to think of things in a new light, to consider different perspectives, it might be hard if you come in with preconcieved notions about who was right and wrong, which actions were justified, etc. This is the power of fantasy and sci fi, it enables the reader to consider situations without the baisis of their own biases and prejudices. It is a wonderfully powerful tool.

Also @JoshoB that last reply you wrote up while I was writing mine. Very cool stuff, and I love reading things like that Acropolis story. As someone who has been taking time through podcasts and books to learn more about the ‘dark’ ages, it is fascinating to me how we know what we know about history, and how often the ‘facts’ we are presented are subjective things. Just imagine how different an understanding we would have of Byzantine history if we took Procopious at face value in his Secret Histories! And how those ‘dark’ ages are not how they often were portrayed, but had fascinating changes in their own right, but it is the lack of large centralized states that made them dark. Not because they were a time of loss of civilization or backtracking of progress, but because the time is dark to us for lack of preserved documentation!

*I know, but from the point of view of the characters that was the natural conclusion
**I know about this too. There are answers, but I’d rather not have this be the point you take

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I’d say the problem with “high fantasy” is that it frames things in terms of racial or mythological identities. Orcs aren’t bad because they were cast out from Orcland and have a chip on their shoulder, they’re bad because they’re born bad, nor are Elves sophisticated and lovely because of their exercise regime and vegan diet but because they have good genes. So the stories being told tend to be the same across authors and properties.

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Sure. It’s actually something we’re exploring as part of a new series on Classical reception. Tolkien was a scholar and an expert on the Beowulf, who also drew a lot of inspiration from the Kalevala, etc. But I think @Enigdigm succinctly points out the main difference between high and low fantasy and why one seems, at least on the face of it, more serious than the other:

And certainly there’s room for a more nuanced view, too: Warcraft – of all things – actually does a good job of making Orcs, for example, more rounded and interesting characters than Tolkien ever did.

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Now that we have nuclear weapons, why bother with something so pedestrian as magic?

From a writer’s perspective it’s a hell of a lot easier to make stuff up than it is to do accurate research.

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I loved the article Tom. This was the one Attlia DLC that I skipped, but I may buy it on sale in the future.

There were some comments here about the history of the Attlia and Shogun games and I wanted to address it.

The Shogun games are pretty historically representative of the time period they are taking place during. This history in that game (including the DLC’s) have a strong correlation to actual history. The Sengoku period was an age where all of Japan warred to see who would unify Japan. The game rarely ENDs in a historical way but that is the way of a Total War game.

The Last Roman period is also generally similar to real life, with the one difference that the Emperor did not manage to support his expedition enough and it eventually faded out. Again, Total war to me always seemed to be a chance to “fix” the mistakes of history and do the “what if’s” and not be 1:1 representations.

I am with Tom in the way that the history games resonate with me more because I do understand the historical periods. The Japanese, the Romans, or the Imperial Europeans are all historical periods I have studied a lot so having the background information actually grounds the story. If you feel that they are fantastical, study some history. Truth is stranger than fiction.

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It’s not like “accurate research” will yield an interpretation of the past that everyone will certainly agree with. Regardless of how well you think you’ve researched something, there’s undoubtedly going to be people able to pick things apart, and when it comes to academic controversies you’ll be forced to pick one interpretation of the evidence over another, and there are people who definitely will call you out on it. So I think it’s not easier per se; rather, it gives the writer some leeway.

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Leeway, which makes it easier.

Your conclusion doesn’t seem to be supported by your examples, like you wanted to make a point but couldn’t bring yourself to agree with me. There’s no crime in it, ya know.

Put it like this, there are about a dozen notable works of Science Fiction and Fantasy inspired by Xenophon’s “Anabasis”, and maybe one decent work of fiction reasonably true to the historical account (Michael Curtis Ford’s “The Ten Thousand”, FWIW). Even Yurick’s “The Warriors”, at least sharing the central motif of getting back home across enemy territory, was a work of fantasy, substituting actual research for a view of 60s street gangs ripped from the headlines of the time. Ford had to do the research and then constrain his imagination within the available facts. I absolutely agree with you that that holds you up to more rigorous examination than, say, Jack Campbell who was writing about bringing a divided fleet back home across space. None of this “per se” niggling. Just admit it! We agree.

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Well, I gave an example a little further above regarding the latest cover for Ancient History magazine.

The main problem I had was with your use of the term “accurate research”, which suggests that there is a single Truth to be uncovered through rigorous research. I was trying to point out that even if you engage in serious research, you’re still going to end up with having to pick sides in a particular debate. If we all agreed on everything, there would be little need for the conventional back-and-forth found in academic journals or at conferences.

But if you want concrete examples, I’ll take something from my own PhD research – the issues regarding hoplite warfare in ancient Greece. There are two main questions: (1) what was hoplite warfare like, and; (2) what were circumstances and consequences of the invention of hoplite warfare. There are two main camps: the orthodoxy (now seemingly on the way out) that holds that hoplite warfare can be defined as more or less heavily-armed spearmen fighting in formation (phalanx), which came about ca. 700 BC and was associated with the rise of a farming “middle class” and the emergence of the polis (city-state). Opposite this group are the so-called “heretics” or revisionists who believe that hoplite warfare is not as easily defined, that while the arms and armour developed ca. 700 BC, the tactics of fighting in formation developed later (some saying even after the Persian Wars of the early fifth century BC), and that the introduction of the hoplite wasn’t accompanied by any kind of sweeping socio-political changes.

The hoplite debate has been going strong for at least thirty years and the revisionist ideas have slowly become more widely accepted. But still, if you were to, let’s say, develop a game that modelled ancient Greek city-states in the period ca. 700-400 BC, you’d have to make a few decisions: do you go with the orthodoxy and have your hoplites fight in phalanx or do you pick the revisionist interpretation and have phalanx fighting be something that develops over time instead? You can support whatever choice you make using decent arguments, but you’re still likely to get comments/complaints from people who disagree with the theory you decided to support.

Secondly, I wouldn’t say a priori that simply inventing something is easier than doing actual research. My point in saying that it gives the creator more leeway is that it’s the creator in charge of the world he creates, i.e. the creator lays down the rules. By creating something original (or semi-original if inspired by or based on historical events/situation, like Game of Thrones or older fare like Howard’s Conan stories), the creator will never run into a situation where people will complain about his/her interpretation of the past.

Simply put, I doubt that people like Martin or Tolkien would ever claim that creating their fictional worlds was in any way “easy”. Even when creating a new world, it has to make some form of sense, and that requires thinking about socio-political structures, religions and mythologies, and so forth. History, in this instance, can be a source of inspiration, without the creator running the risk of introducing historical mistakes or picking a particular interpretation that his/her readers/viewers/players might strongly disagree with.

Anyway, I’ve written a blog post about history as a source of inspiration a while ago; it might be interesting to read since it ties into the discussion here.