Europa Universalis: Rome - Q&A Feature

Following last year's Europa Universalis III, Paradox Interactive is due to take a trip back in time for the fourth incarnation of this classic strategy game. Ancient Rome is the new destination for a series which has traditionally been set during the Early Modern period, so will a couple of millennia make all the difference? TVG caught up with the Head of Development and Project Leader, Johan Andersson, to talk about the game.

TVG: Rome: Total War already offers an in-depth turn-based strategy element to its epic RTS battles, within the era of the Roman Empire. As Europa Universalis: Rome doesn't provide the same RTS gameplay, what elements of its gameplay will better Rome: Total War's offerings and attract strategy gamers?

Should I answer this humbly, or arrogantly? Well, the thing is, Rome: Total War is a very good game for playing battles, but the strategy game feels a bit more like 'how to get to the next battle'. What we're trying to do is make a strategy game, in the Roman era, where battles are part of the strategy and not everything that the game is about.

Of course, wars are fun in games - people seem to think that - but, for us, war is a means to an end, not the end. So, we're trying to create a deep strategy game where there's more to it than fighting in a war.

TVG: Previous Europa Universalis games, EUII for example, have placed a strong emphasis on real historical events running alongside the progress of a game. It seems like you're going away from this with EU: Rome...

We wanted it to be more open-ended in that you're creating history, not re-living history. You also have characters that live and breathe - well, obviously not breathe... they're computer characters - but they have lives of their own in the game. The characters, the rulers, the families, rivals and friends are driving the game forward.

They're not acting 100% as it happened in history because you're making different choices with many permutations. What we're trying to do is make a plausible game flow of what would happen if other choices are made when you play the game.

TVG: We've heard about how civil wars might crop up from time to time. How exactly might this happen and what will result?

We're talking about characters, and characters have statistics - their popularity, corruption, abilities etc. - but characters also have friends and rivals. So, let's imagine this: one character who's the current ruler and is kind of popular/semi-popular, has powerful friends but also has many rivals. One of his strongest rivals is from a bunch of guys who're friends together and have some popularity and troops connected to them. If one of these rivals thinks that the ruler isn't the best in the world and says 'Let's face it, I would be a better ruler,' he may start a civil war - that's one of the ways a civil war might start.

Then he and his friends could proclaim a new faction - a new country. If there are any provinces near them, that are loyal to them, they will switch. Then you'll have a civil war which is balanced and you'll have to fight a total war to defeat the other side. If you lose the civil war, you lose the game.

TVG: While we're on that, what are the various winning conditions for the game and how can you lose?

The easiest way to win the game is to conquer everything and rule the world - that's one way. But also, if you're playing a minor power, victory for you may be surviving through the game, or making your own modest empire - you may have your own goals to define for victories.

The only two ways to lose the game are 1) lose a civil war or have your country completely conquered by someone else. If barbarians take over your country, that's not the end of the game. It's a severe set-back if barbarians take over and reduce your civilisation, destroy your property and so on... but you can still continue afterwards.

TVG: You've mentioned how the challenge is different depending on the empire you're playing as. With the Celts, for example, is it going to be a challenge just to survive?

Yeah, because there's plenty of small Celt states and, even together, they're not a match for the Roman's because the Roman civilisation levels are much higher. The Celts are low and they don't have as big of a population base.

TVG: So, they all have advantages and disadvantages that reflect those of the ancient world?

Yes, because we've made a setup that is historical.

TVG: You've talked about the characters in the game, but will there be a Roman Senate which is historically reflective?

Well, there's not an actual senate because that would require 300 characters in Rome and that's too much for a game. However, there are thousands upon thousands of Romans for the time period and there are also political advances that create or simulate a senate in a kind of 'under the hood' way.

TVG: You told us about some of the politics with ambassadors. For example, if you've got an ambassador who's a political thorn in your side, you can send them over to an aggressive country and they may or may not see their demise. What other types of political strategy will there be in EU: Rome?

There are plenty of events in the game like arranging for a rival to have an 'accident', but that can also backfire on you. You can also start smear campaigns and even the Romans did that kind of stuff. What we've done with the game is make it so that you don't get loads of options all the time - the interfaces don't do that. It's more event driven in the game.

TVG: Going back to the characters, you start with Julius Caesar if you're playing with the Romans. In terms of the other characters, are they computer generated?

We have a few thousand characters that are historical and then you get those that are generated. You've seen the characters faces and, of course, we have Caesar as one of those, but our system that generates faces can have billions of those and the DNA is inherited so his kids will have similar faces and so on. We also have different looks, so the Germans will have beards and the Persians will also look different from the Romans.

TVG: You've shown us the 'National Ideas' feature, imposing forms of governance such as 'republic' or 'militaristic'. How many different types of governance are there in the game?

I don't have the exact numbers, but there are three styles of government (monarchy, republic and tribes) and inside these there's between three and eight sub-categories. All of those have different slots for the different 'Ideas' that you want. Of course, you can make 'Ideas' that don't match the slots, but then you don't get the bonus for matching, and the bonuses are pretty nice. Different ones have two slots, some may get four etc. These are the long-term things that define your countries style, while the 'Omens' are the short-term things.

TVG: Are we going to see a greater stress on units in EU: Rome than what we've seen in previous EU games?

Some of the looks are different, but not too much. We're a small studio; we don't have 20 artists making every type of unit. Different countries get different attributes for their units but there are not any visual differences really.

TVG: Do you think it's fair to say that the depth of EU: Rome comes in the spreadsheets and all the calculations that are going on behind the scenes?

The stats obviously matter and it depends on a lot of choices. But we will not have any burning war dogs or German Janissaries. It's stats, basically.

TVG: What can you tell us about the role of religion?

The stronger your religion is, the greater the chance that your 'Omens' will work and the more powerful they are.

TVG: How do the 'Omens' work exactly?

Currently (and this is still under debate - we had a discussion about it yesterday), every six months you'll decide which 'Omen' you want to invoke and there are 10 of these that you can select that give various bonuses. If you fail on the invocation (it's a percentage chance), you get penalties of the same magnitude.

So, you really want a successful 'Omen' before you start a war. That gives a bonus of morale to the troops.

TVG: How many religions are there?

I think it's five groups. We have monotheists (Jewish), Semitic pantheon (Carthaginians), Greek pantheon (Romans and Greeks), and Germanic.

TVG would like to thank Johan Andersson, Head of Development and Project Leader on Europa Universalis: Rome, for taking the time to talk to us about the upcoming strategy title, due out on PC during Q2 of this year.