Europa Barbarorum - Gameplay

Gameplay

In the original Rome: Total War the player took control of an empire, or "faction", of classical Europe, North Africa or the Middle East, with the aim of expanding their faction's territory and eliminating rival empires through military conquest and city-building. Europa Barbarorum retains this basic gameplay mechanic and sets itself in a similar time period and geographical area to the original game. However, as a total conversion the mod replaces the particular factions, military units, buildings, and other elements present in the original game, and adds a new soundtrack and several brand-new gameplay mechanics not present in the original, such as the installation of puppet rulers. The modification's development team's stated aim in making the changes that they have to Rome: Total War is to make the player's experience of the ancient world more historically accurate. For this reason, numerous parameters of the game at the start of the campaign in 272 BC, such as generals' names, the diplomatic relations between factions, and the particular understanding of the outside world that each faction has, have been set to correspond to the actual political situation in that year.

Also for reasons of historical verisimilitude, factions, provinces on the campaign map and factions' family members have been given vernacular names in Europa Barbarorum, rather than having Latinised or Anglicised ones, as in Rome: Total War. So, for instance, the original game's Armenia faction is known as Hayasdan in Europa Barbarorum, and Germania as the Sweboz. Instead of having to play one's first campaign as a Roman faction and only subsequently unlock playable campaigns as non-Romans by defeating them in the Roman campaign, all twenty of Europa Barbarorum's playable factions can be accessed by the player from the start. Furthermore, the one unplayable and three playable Roman factions of the original have been combined into a single playable faction in Europa Barbarorum, the Romani. Dissatisfied with the homogeneity of the factions of the original Rome: Total War, the Europa Barbarorum development team have sought to differentiate the playing experiences of the game's different factions. So, for example, Rome: Total War's trait-acquisition system, where the player's faction's family members acquire certain characteristics and talents which make them more or less adept at certain tasks such as city management or military leadership, has been made more faction-specific in Europa Barbarorum, with Hellenic characters' traits, for instance, being based on Theophrastos' Characters and Aristotle's teachings on the Golden Mean, and Romans' traits being partially based on the moral tales of Valerius Maximus. There are sometimes additional requirements for a family member to be able to gain a new trait: in order for them to compete in one of the Panhellenic Games, for instance, the player must ensure that they are stationed in the appropriate city on the campaign map in the year that the competition is scheduled to take place. One reviewer has commented that Europa Barbarorum's expansions upon the original Rome: Total War's trait system have served to add a role-playing element to the game.