The glory that was Rome has long excited the imagination of gamers the world over for many years. How a small and insignificant city-state could rise to be the premier empire of the Western World is a story epic in its grandeur and makes the ideal subject of a computer game. There are of course no shortages of games that try to portray this era of history, and the latest is another in the long line of Paradox’s historical game, EU: Rome.

Europa Universalis – Rome is a real time strategy game that places players in the ancient world as it existed at the rise of the Roman Republic, and has scenarios to play through into the Imperial period. Players can select to be any nation in existence at the time, be it a small barbarian tribe, a long established empire such as Egypt, and of course Rome itself. The choice of nations gives the game heavy replay value as the resources and feel of the game is different depending on the nation selected.

Players familiar with EU-III will be right at home with this game as it is essentially the same game with some elements of paradox’s ‘Crusader Kings’ thrown in to add a human element to the game. This game system is somewhat free form in that there is no real set victory conditions a player must achieve, but instead players can set their own goals.

Each nation in the game is historical at the start, but once the game begins history is rewritten as there are no historical events. Instead events are put in place that allow some historical things to happen at random in the game. Using this kind of system will disappoint the historically minded - but will please the game player - and this seems to be the focus of Paradox in its last two major releases as they abandoned accurate historical events for logical "what ifs."

Play of this type in a game is quite difficult for the newcomer as there can be a tendency to be overwhelmed with the large amounts of data as well as the many tools, charts and sub screen to view and make decisions for. Fortunately there is a tutorial that introduces the basic concepts, and if you have played Paradox games before you will have no trouble here as it’s all straight forward.

Gameplay revolves around guiding your nation through the ages in war and peace while making decisions on troop levels and diplomacy as well as trade in the ancient world. Units in the game can be grouped into large armies and navies, which are lead by officers the player appoints for his leadership pool. The number of people available at a given time varies as people grow old and die and can be assassinated in the game by rivals.

Players must balance their budget and pay for the recruitment of armies and navies; they must pay to maintain them if they want to keep them. Disbanding them will increase manpower, but this comes at a cost in money, as the soldiers and sailors must be paid off.

That being the case, you might ask why there is a need to keep active armies since movement in the game does take quite some time. The answer is that if you have no armed forces you are a prime target for more aggressive nations and far worse, the hoards of barbarians that appear at random and can often defeat powerful professional armies through numbers alone. You can try to talk to the barbarians, but usually they are intent on plunder and this will hurt your nation.

In order to maintain a powerful nation you can build improvements in your provinces. What you can build is limited to what your nation has discovered as far as technology goes, so early on you will have nothing to spend money on, but you will reach a point where your funds will diminish to nothing. Running a deficient nation is dangerous as the game will start to sell off your province improvements at random and a poor nation is often the target of diplomatic dirty tricks. The Diplomatic sub game has many options including demanding and paying tribute, improving relations, and of course spy missions. These include attempts to kill prominent citizens as well as military leaders, and can also be used to desecrate religious improvements that can lower the stability of your nation severely.

There are blank areas on the map that can be colonized by your nation but this is not easy. You have to meet the civilization level criteria, have a high enough population, and the area must have a low population level. If you can do this you can open a colony with your culture and religion and this helps avoid revolts and other bad things in the new colony.

Culture and religion are very important in the game. The power of your religion helps stability and lowers revolt possibilities, while culture helps increase your populations and their loyalty to you. Over time, if you build the correct improvements and appoint wise governors, the population and religion of a province will change in your favor and after a time an area will be a core province of your empire. Core provinces are areas that your nation considers part of its homeland. If an enemy controls one, you can suffer adverse effects on stability, and you in turn have a Cassus Belli (Cause For War) with the power doing it. The Cassus Belli is important because if you start wars for no reason you will lose stability, which will increase revolt levels and lower revenue. Each war you start and nation you takeover gives you ‘bad boy’ points, which make other eager to attack and destroy your trade.

Trade is carried out in your empire by setting routes and building improvements in your provinces. They provide items that help other areas and generate money for you. You can trade with foreign powers if they agree to allow it and the greater the distance the more money you earn. Graphically the game is very similar to EU III. You can view terrain maps, political, religious and other options while you play, and you can change the speed at which time flows to make the game go faster. The music in the game is quite suitable to the time period and the game interfaces are easy to use and well laid out.

Overall this is a fine effort with few nits to be picked. I could have gone on about the lack of historical leaders, as the game generates fictional ones for you, but this really doesn’t matter much. As a game it is fun and interesting, and that is all you can really ask for, so if you like Rome and the ancient world, you should pick this game up.

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