Total War (video game series)

• 1. Introduction

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  Total War, a series of strategy games from the British studio Creative Assembly, had sold over 36 million copies by April 2021. Each of those copies asks the player to do two jobs at once. One job is the slow work of running an empire. The other is the sudden, noisy business of winning a battle with the armies that empire has built. How does a game make those two halves feel like one experience? Why did the series keep abandoning the worlds it had just mastered? And what happens when a game this ambitious reaches players before it is ready? The series was built for personal computers, and the answers begin with how it plays.

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• 2. Battle and Campaign

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  Flanking manoeuvres and formations matter in a Total War battle in a way that is rare among real-time strategy games. A unit that is hit from the side or from behind is in a very different position from one that meets the enemy head on. Commanders are rewarded for thinking like generals instead of like players who simply gather a crowd and click.

  Before any battle begins, the player works on a campaign map. The series blends turn-based strategy and resource management there, and then hands control to real-time tactics when armies meet. In Napoleon: Total War, for example, players take the role of Napoleon Bonaparte or one of his major rivals. They move on a turn-based campaign map and then fight the resulting battles in real time.

  The series also lets players choose how historical they want to be. Total War: Three Kingdoms offers a mode called Records, which is the more realistic option. Its alternative, Romance, is seen by some as the more fun and creative way to play, and it gives warlords special abilities on the battlefield.

  Both modes grow from a formula first tried in a single game set in feudal Japan.

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• 3. Japan, Europe, and Rome

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  Shogun: Total War reached players in June 2000 as the first game in the series. Its single-player campaign included interactive videos that showed the possible consequences of a decision, such as converting to Christianity. The game was never a mainstream product, but it gathered a dedicated fan base. The Mongol Invasion expansion later joined the original game in the Warlord Edition.

  Medieval: Total War followed in 2002 and moved the action to medieval Europe. It used the same engine as Shogun. Its expansion, Viking Invasion, was bundled with it in the Battle Collection. Of all the games in the series, this was one of the best sellers.

  Rome: Total War arrived in 2004, set in the Roman Republic, and changed how armies travelled. Earlier games moved forces from province to province. Rome introduced free movement across the map, along with the first 3D campaign map. The first expansion, Barbarian Invasion, came out on the 27th of September 2005. A second expansion, Alexander, followed on the 19th of June 2006.

  The packaging tells its own story of changing technology. The original game shipped on three CD-ROMs. The Gold Edition of the 14th of February 2006 squeezed the patched game and its first expansion onto a single DVD, though a four-disc CD-ROM version was also made. The Anthology collecting everything appeared on the 16th of March 2007.

  Fans kept the game alive with mods such as Europa Barbarorum and Rome: Total Realism. Both set out to make the historical setting more accurate. Rome won many strategy awards for its realistic campaign, its battlefield animation and its interface, and a simplified version was later made for mobile devices.

  Feral Interactive, which had produced the Mac version of the Gold Edition on the 12th of February 2010, also made Total War: Rome Remastered. It was released on the 29th of April 2021.

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• 4. Gunpowder and Empires

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  Medieval II: Total War reached Europe on the 10th of November 2006, and North America on the 14th. It brought much more detailed characters. Its timeline stretched to the Age of Discovery and the colonisation of the Americas, and it also covered the Mongol and Timurid invasions.

  The Kingdoms expansion was announced on the 30th of March 2007 and released on the 28th of August 2007. It contained four campaigns. The Britannia Campaign was set in the British Isles in 1258, under Henry III of England. The Crusades Campaign opened in the Middle East in 1174. The Teutonic Campaign took place in the Baltic region in 1250. The Americas Campaign began in 1521, as the Aztec and Maya civilisations declined. The Gold Edition combining both appeared on the 1st of February 2008.

  Sega announced Empire: Total War on the 22nd of August 2007. Creative Assembly had been working on it in secret since the release of Barbarian Invasion. Players chose an 18th-century faction and sought mastery of the known world through military force, diplomacy, espionage and economics. For the first time in the series, they could fight real-time 3D naval battles. Provinces were also decentralised, so production and technological advancement could happen outside the capital.

  The game came out on the 3rd of March 2009 in North America and the following day in Europe. Its Warpath expansion arrived in October 2009 and let players command one of five Native American nations. Critics praised the innovative gameplay, yet Empire drew most of the criticism ever aimed at the series, mainly over bugs. Sega says nearly all the problems were resolved, and Creative Assembly explained them several months after release.

  Empire was also the first Total War game to use Valve's Steamworks DRM and achievements system, which meant it could only be played through Steam. Feral Interactive released a mobile version for iOS and Android on the 21st of November 2024.

  Napoleon: Total War came out in North America on the 23rd of February 2010 and in Europe three days later. It centres on the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars. The grand campaign, called Campaigns of the Coalition, lets players take Great Britain, Austria, Prussia or Russia on a map spanning Europe. Its Peninsular campaign, sold as DLC, is played as France, Spain or Great Britain.

  The game came in several editions. One of them, the Emperor's Edition, was sold only in Australia and New Zealand. The Gold Edition reached Macs on the 3rd of June 2013, and by then a much older Japanese setting was already waiting for a second look.

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• 5. Second Looks and Stumbles

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  On the 2nd of June 2010, Creative Assembly released a full preview of Total War: Shogun 2. The game takes place in the middle of the 16th century, during Sengoku Jidai, the warring states period of Japan. Its battle engine supports up to 56,000 soldiers in one fight, which is significantly more than Napoleon allowed. It was also the first game to carry the franchise name as its main title, a choice made to raise brand awareness. It was released on the 15th of March 2011.

  The stand-alone expansion Fall of the Samurai came out in March 2012. It jumps about 300 years ahead to the Boshin War, when the last Shogun faced the Imperial throne. Traditional samurai culture meets modern weaponry in it. Britain, the United States and France appear in limited roles, and each can be traded with or asked for marines. New features include railways, ironclad warships, Gatling guns, and offshore artillery support. Players can also control two armies on the battle map at once.

  Total War: Rome II was announced on the 2nd of July 2012 with a live-action trailer asking, "How far will you go for Rome?" Work on it had started while Shogun 2 was still being built. Creative Assembly promised a bigger map that would "go more to the east", new camera views from almost every angle, and dynamic facial expressions made possible by a new programming system.

  It was released on the 3rd of September 2013 and set a record for pre-orders at the studio. A Greek States Culture Pack unlocked Sparta, Athens and Epirus as a pre-order bonus. Yet the launch suffered from significant performance issues and many bugs that seriously affected gameplay.

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• 6. Warhammer Changes the Rules

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  Total War: Warhammer was announced on the 22nd of April 2015 and moved the series into high fantasy. The setting comes from Games Workshop's Warhammer Fantasy. Real-time battles and turn-based sandbox campaigns, the staples of the series, remained. The playable races include the men of the Empire and Bretonnia, the Orcs and Goblins known as Greenskins, Dwarves, Vampire Counts, the Warriors of Chaos, Beastmen, Wood Elves and the Norscan Tribes. Sega revealed that it was the first of a trilogy, and the game was released on the 24th of May 2016.

  The conclusion came with an announcement on the 3rd of February 2021. Total War: Warhammer III added factions based on the four Chaos Gods, Khorne, Tzeentch, Nurgle and Slaanesh. It also brought in the human civilisations of Kislev and Grand Cathay, while the Ogre Kingdoms were offered as a pre-order bonus. The game was released on the 17th of February 2022. It is not technically a live service game, but the long life of the Warhammer trilogy brings it close to that genre at times.

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• 7. Sagas, Dynasties, and Pharaohs

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  Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia was released on the 3rd of May 2018 and is set in 878 AD. The death of Ragnar Lodbrok and the arrival of the Great Heathen Army have sent Vikings across the British Isles. Playable factions include the English, Welsh and Gaelic peoples, part of the Great Viking army, and the Viking sea kings. Critics were generally favourable, but users were mixed. Metacritic gave it a Critic Score of 75 and a User Score of 54. The Saga label was later applied retroactively to the Fall of the Samurai expansion.

  Its DLC reaches across time. Eight Princes is set almost a hundred years after the original campaign. Mandate of Heaven is set eight years before it, in the wake of the Yellow Turban Rebellion. A World Betrayed is set four years after. The major expansion The Furious Wild adds the Nanman people, with four playable factions in the southwest.

  Two more games were announced in December 2025, both in early development. Total War: Medieval III was announced on the 4th of December. Total War: Warhammer 40,000 followed on the 12th and will be the first Total War game on consoles, including Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5.

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• 8. Spin-Offs and Side Battles

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  Spartan: Total Warrior came out in 2005 for the PlayStation 2, Xbox and GameCube. Creative Assembly built it as a hack-and-slash action game meant to bring large-scale Total War battles to consoles. It drew on Greek and Roman mythology instead of strict history. Players take the role of a Spartan warrior guided by Ares, who must defeat the invading Roman Empire. The campaign runs over 14 levels, and an arena mode tests survival against increasingly hard assaults. An indirect follow-up, Viking: Battle for Asgard, arrived in 2008 without the Total Warrior name.

  Total War: Arena was a free-to-play game that was discontinued in February 2019. Total War: Elysium is an upcoming free-to-play strategy digital collectible card game in which players command generals from across history in head-to-head battles.

  The third entry, Total War Battles: Warhammer, is still to come. NetEase is developing it for Android and iOS under licence from Creative Assembly and Games Workshop.

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