Europa Barbarorum - Reception

Reception

Europa Barbarorum was featured and reviewed in a number of video game magazines. It has been reviewed in PC Gamer (UK) twice, in March 2005 and February 2008. The 2008 review was overwhelmingly positive, saying that "EB feels like a whole new Total War game", and going on to praise the modification's "stunning" scope and the "striking" extent of the differences between it and Rome: Total War. The review was somewhat critical of the modification's graphical user interfaces which "" had a "home-made" feel to them, as well as its lack of accessibility and steep learning curve, although it adds that the second point is not a large problem as the modification is largely a "master's challenge for accomplished Rome players". The review finished on a positive note, summing Europa Barbarorum up as a "superior game". In 2010 the same magazine's website named Europa Barbarorum the best mod of any Total War game.

A number of non-English language magazines have also reviewed Europa Barbarorum. The Italian PC Gaming magazine Giochi per il mio computer reviewed the modification in April 2005 and March 2008. The 2005 review reported that the modification, whose development team included two historians, was to replace the "economic system, equipment and the provinces" of Rome: Total War; the latter review praised the mod for having "altered and deepened" the gameplay of the original title, and wrote that Europa Barbarorum was the best substitute for a Rome 2: Total War game prior to the actual release of such a title. Dutch magazine PC Gameplay, reviewing the mod in March 2008, also wrote that the mod was "perhaps the best candidate for the title Rome: Total War II" "until the official announcement" and went on to note that the list of changes that the modification had made to the original game almost constituted "a history book of its own". The German magazine GameStar wrote in April 2007 that the Europa Barbarorum team had "banned all historical mistakes from the game"; in January 2011, another German publication, PC Games, also noted the mod's historical accuracy, singling out its "more realistic, more " battles for praise, although it did note that the mod was squarely aimed at experienced Rome: Total War players. Reviewing version 0.74 of the mod in November 2006, Romanian publication LeveL concurred that the mod was aimed at experienced players, adding that the modified version of the game put greater demands on the player's computer than the original Rome: Total War, requiring 512 MB of RAM, up from the original's 256. Despite this, the reviewer praised the mod's complexity, the "painstaking detail" that went into making the units and the mod's soundtrack.

Europa Barbarorum has also received several online reviews. The modification received a review early into its development process on gaming website HeavenGames, which said that it was an "ambitious" project and praised its commitment to historical accuracy, even stating that the Europa Barbarorum development team was going to use satellite imagery and climate change statistics to accurately portray the world as it was in 272 BC. Later, in 2008, the modification has been reviewed on Boomtown, which praised the modification's "incredibly well-researched and -devised" unit stats system, as well as its "legion of historians". The modification has sometimes been mentioned as a recommended complement to Rome: Total War in reviews of the original title – for instance, by Norwegian gaming website Gamereactor in 2007.

In addition, Europa Barbarorum was singled out for praise by the Creative Assembly themselves in 2011, when they called the mod "breathtaking" in an official statement.