That was something we hadn't done much before. You are in a losing situation to start with, and have to decide what to sacrifice first – contract to be able to expand. I also like, for similar reasons, the Western Roman Empire in Attila. It's a real challenge and super-interesting.

They have an absolutely insane starting position – you are the biggest, you're the strongest, but you always feel that you're behind the curve, and there's a lot of running around after rebels, and the British are just sending in troops. I like the French in Napoleon's Peninsular campaign. Janos Gaspar - game director on Total War: Three Kingdoms, lead designer for Attila That's quite a formative Total War experience, for me. I love that thing where the tech breaks up in that fashion. You're fighting through and establishing yourself before everything breaks back down again, and you have to deal with the other Romans. Because I always like when there's a technological divide between factions, like swords versus muskets, I love that whole concept - and it's really great to be the Romans, and have these high-ranking Hastati and Triarii as your bulk troops along with your family tree and your generals, fighting Germanic and Gallic barbarians.

If I had to pick any one, because as you say there are like a couple of hundred, I really liked playing as the Julii in Rome 1. Simon Mann - senior designer on Three Kingdoms, designer on Attila and Warhammer

At a recent hands-on event for Total War: Three Kingdoms, a heinous idea occurred to me: why not confuse and upset all the developers in attendance (plus a couple more over email) by asking them to pick a favourite faction? The results, which involved surprisingly few headbutts, are below. This is providing, of course, the answer in each case is “between 100 and 200, depending on whether you include the DLC and think Sicily is a real country.”įrom stinky hill tribes through trim Teutonic phalanxes to bawling rivers of undead, Total Warring has certainly come in all shapes and sizes. According to an ancient Sussex proverb, there are as many factions in the 20-year-old Total War series as there are sand grains on a beach, as there are angels dancing upon the head of a pin, as there are grenadiers in the armies of his Imperial Majesty Napoleon I, Emperor of the French, King of Italy, Protector of the Confederation of the Rhine, Co-Prince of Andorra.

Total war attila playable factions