Total War with multiple personalities...

A little while ago I had a wee chat with Mark Sutherns, former PCGamer favourite and Associate Producer at The Creative Assembly on Empire: Total War. Amongst other things, and while stuffing our faces with assorted M&S sweet-goods, we spoke about the upcoming, post-release multiplayer campaign beta that's all set to make our Total War glands swell with joy.

The following took place in the hours between waking up and passing out after a massive sugar crash.

How does the flow of a turn work out? Does the same player always take their turn before the other or is there some way to even out the advantage of taking your turn first?

Right now it works as a simple turn-based mechanism with a time limit agreed and set by the players. It’s hard to say just how much of an advantage there is to taking your turn first. Over a grand campaign, I’m not sure how much of an advantage this will be. I’m sure that’s something that we can look to balance over the course of the beta if that becomes a major issue.

While one player is fighting a battle, what does the other player do in the meantime? Can they continue to make decisions on the campaign map, or are the locked into watching or taking part in the skirmish?

Right now we’re looking at the options available. Players will certainly have the option to take control of the AI armies in battle against their opponent. Another option we’re looking at is to allow a spectator mode on battles.

Are there any limitations in the two-player campaign that make it different from the single-player; things that for whatever reason couldn't be implemented across a multiplayer campaign?

The main issue that we’ll be looking at post-Empire is how we handle diplomacy between two players. The current system for player vs AI negotiations cannot be applied “as is” to a multiplayer scenario, so we will be adapting this for the beta and trying a few things out.

Are you looking to expand past the two-player option in subsequent updates?

Maybe but much depends on how the 1v1 campaign works out. The multiplayer campaign will become part of the Total War suite on offer in our games going forward, so the beta is very much the first step.

How does the fog of war work? Can the other human player see what moves you make out of their line of sight, or are you hidden like a standard AI?

Right now it will work as it does in the main campaign against the AI - the fog of war will mask the other player’s movement. However, we may adapt this by making an option available in diplomacy to aid players who are playing cooperatively against the AI in a campaign.

Where does the save game reside? Does each player get a duplicate?

The save game will reside with the host player. This works fine in a 1v1 situation since both players need to be online to play. Ideally players will have more than one 1v1 game on the go and so can have a number of games and opponents to play each time they log on.

What was the toughest part of implementing the multiplayer campaign?

To be honest, we won’t know that until the first phase of the beta is underway. Internally we have version of the multiplayer campaign up and running and we’ve had some challenges with this but I’m sure our biggest will present themselves once a public audience gets their hands on the first beta. That’s fine though – that’s the idea of running this as a beta so that we can refine what we have and introduce new ideas gradually with feedback from those who want this mode more than anyone – our community.