The game is simply great. It uses very modern, user-friendly game mechanics, it had all the good elements of Rome II rolled into a package that is mostly bug-free and brings back the good elements of the older games. Game balance is comparatively good despite the franchise's history of questionable balance. With 10 factions to start, this game has slightly more base game factions than the Total War average (Rome II started with 9 but got some more free ones later, Shogun 2 had 9, RTW had 9 after unlocking all of them, Napoleon had 4 but on multiple campaign maps, etc.). I honestly have not a single bad thing to say about this game.

However, there is a large community of people who are fed up with the DLC. I don't see what the fuss is about, the culture packs are no different from Rome II ($8 for three factions), which is much better than Shogun 2, which charged $5 for only one faction. If you don't want the DLC, don't buy it--nobody's forcing you to.

The game is simply great. It uses very modern, user-friendly game mechanics, it had all the good elements of Rome II rolled into a package that is mostly bug-free and brings back the good elements of the older games. Game balance is comparatively good despite the franchise's history of questionable balance. With 10 factions to start, this game has slightly more base game factions than the Total War average (Rome II started with 9 but got some more free ones later, Shogun 2 had 9, RTW had 9 after unlocking all of them, Napoleon had 4 but on multiple campaign maps, etc.). I honestly have not a single bad thing to say about this game. However, there is a large community of people who are fed up with the DLC. I don't see what the fuss is about, the culture packs are no different from Rome II ($8 for three factions), which is much better than Shogun 2, which charged $5 for only one faction. If you don't want the DLC, don't buy it--nobody's forcing you to.