Total War: Pharaoh Campaign Preview: We attempt to conquer Egypt

We've known for a while now that Total War is focusing on Ancient Egypt in its next game, slated for release in October this year. In an earlier preview of Total War: Pharaoh, we were only able to try out a couple of battles, and back then, we liked the added weather effects and addition of armour degradation, among others. This time, I was able to try out the first 60 turns of the game's campaign. Playing as Ramesses III out of a number of possible factions, I was able to get a good impression of what it's like to rule part of the New Kingdom of Egypt on the eve of the invasions by the Sea People.

My first impressions of the campaign map are that it looks and feels much like it's predecessor, A Total War Saga: Troy. That's a good thing. Instead of just gold from older TW titles, there are multiple resources to balance throughout your regions: food, wood, bronze, stone and gold. Buildings mostly cost stone and wood, while an army requires food, bronze and gold. Different regions have different resources, meaning you might have a lot of food but no access to stone, unless you barter with other factions. Additionally, you now need idle workers in your cities to start construction. In all, it's a good system that encourages diplomacy to trade resources and forces you to pick your targets for conquest strategically.

The campaign map stretches all the way from the Nubian lands south of Egypt to the Sinai Peninsula, the Levant and to a large part of Anatolia. This corresponds to the main factions in the game: there's the Egyptian factions in the South, Canaanite factions in the centre and Hittite factions in the North. Besides Ramesses III, there's the Canaanite Irsu or the Hittite Suppiluliuma II to choose from, among others. Additionally, there are two courts that players can aim their ambitions towards: you can try to conquer either the Egyptian or Hittite thrones. Once you've picked one, you enter that court and will need to conquer regions central to the court to become either Pharaoh or Hittite King.

In my first 60-turn campaign on easy difficulty but with all settings set to default, I started out in Ramesses' default location in the Sinai. Here I tried to keep the other Egyptian factions friendly for the most part, focusing on conquering the neighbouring Canaanite factions instead. I had some success initially, but quickly ran into trouble. I had a structural shortage of food, meaning I decided to trade other resources for more food with friendly factions. Slowly, but steadily I managed to capture most of the Sinai, with invasions by Sea People often spoiling my plans, and because armies require a general and a lot of upkeep, I only managed to have one big army at a time, which I had to shuffle around my sprawling empire continuously.

Besides focusing on my conquests, I wanted to explore the other mechanics in the game. Creative Assembly has ditched the mythic elements from A Total War Saga: Troy and instead, has added more historical depth to the campaign. It seems agents, like assassins and diplomats, have disappeared entirely as well. Instead, at the Royal Court it's possible to claim one of the court positions by scheming, for example, putting one of your people in the position of Treasurer allows you to embezzle money, while the First Commander has access to elite units. Alternatively, you can gain favour with the people in these positions to temporarily gain access to these benefits, and to complicate things further, there's an event called Shemshu Hor every six turns when the positions can get reshuffled.

During my preview time, I haven't really been able to understand the use of the Royal Court and Shemshu Hor. Gaining favour with the people in court felt a bit like a chore, where I just ended up clicking the same intrigue option to spread rumours almost every turn without really understanding why. If spreading rumours to get access to some elite units temporarily is all it is, then it's quite a one-dimensional addition. Moreover, I also didn't see how I could have claimed any of the positions. Perhaps I've just been unable to grasp its full use because I couldn't progress past the 60th turn, though.

Other things to keep you occupied besides building and conquering are an excellent tech tree with researchable technologies. You can choose to invest in things like more XP for certain army units, better relationships with Hittite or Egyptian factions, cheaper construction, and more along those lines. It's also necessary to worship Gods for additional bonuses, though they play a far smaller role than in A Total War Saga: Troy. Then there's also a 'Pillars of Civilization'-mechanic. Here a balance between war, natural disasters and Sea People invasions versus peace and construction of monuments influences crop yields and other things. Again, because of the 60-turn limit, I wasn't able to see much of that in action. However, supposedly when civilization breaks down due to civil wars, Sea People invasions will increase, as will natural disasters, and that should make for interesting additional challenges.

One other thing that triggered my attention is the ability to choose an Ancient Legacy to follow. I tried out a legacy focusing on trade initially, but found it hard to understand and without much benefit. I decided to pick the legacy of Ramesses' conquering ancestors instead, after loading back a few turns, choosing the city of Ashkelon as my target for conquest. The Ancient Legacy screen allowed me to build up local support by investing gold every few turns, which should have given me a huge local army to support me in case of a siege. They would even open up the gates for me. Sadly, I didn't get the climax I was hoping for. I already had my army besieging the city, constructed siege weapons and was ready to start the assault. However, the AI attacked my besieging army from outside the city, forcing me to do battle. This meant that the Ancient Legacy bonus failed to trigger and I had to fight the battle with just my own units. I still won and took the city by auto resolving the battle, but saw none of the things I was supposed to see using the Ancient Legacy system.

Speaking of battles, I found the AI hard to beat even on easy difficulty. Gaining access to elite units such as Khopesh swordsmen or Canaanite chariots on the campaign map feels like you're finally putting together a powerful force, but you'll still need skill and an understanding of the rock-paper-scissors principle to defeat the AI. Movement on the campaign map also impacts your army in battle, with only some units able to move through deserts without suffering from attrition, for example. I marvelled at some of the bigger cities during sieges, which have really nice-looking temples, marketplaces, city walls and other fortifications that even provide bonuses when you capture or defend them in a siege battle. In any case, both the battles and the campaign map look wonderful, with all of the detail that we're used to from Total War. There's a day and night cycle on the campaign map, and there's now also an option to zoom out further onto a coloured map in the style of a Paradox game, like the Crusader Kings series. This makes it easier to envision your empire and diplomacy in the game.

A final thing to touch upon has to be the campaign AI. Based on my experience, the AI seems rather intelligent and an improvement compared to A Total War Saga: Troy. I did not see any bizarre diplomacy in two 60-turn campaigns. The only slightly strange decision was when the neighbouring Canaanite state called Hetch declared war and raided some of my outposts and then sued for peace a few turns later, offering a modest amount of food. That might be a questionable decision, but it's certainly not as irrational as the AI in some previous Total War games. Previously, the AI could offer vast sums of money to request peace after starting a war one turn earlier, and do it all again a few turns later. In any case, I was happy to accept the ceasefire because I was fighting other enemies. Shortly after, I was ready to punish Hetch for their earlier raids. At that point I liked that the game's diplomacy system warned me that restarting a war shortly after a peace treaty would impact my faction's credibility a lot, lowering my relations with all other factions immediately. It forced me to reconsider, much like how diplomacy keeps states in check in reality.

In all, playing Total War: Pharaoh for 60 turns was enjoyable and made me curious for more. There are many things left I haven't (fully) experienced yet. For example, civil wars trigger when factions gain enough legitimacy to become a pretender to the throne. I wasn't able to progress far enough to try that out for myself, unfortunately. There are also some points of criticism. I'm not too thrilled about how the Royal Court works so far, and I was disappointed at how my carefully-planned use of the Ancient Legacy system failed to trigger at all. What I do like is the return to a purer form of history, away from myths. Coupling solid and familiar campaign mechanics and added layers of historical immersion like the Ancient Legacies and Pillars of Civilization-mechanic with the new weather effects and other additions to the battle system, there's plenty of novelty to explore for fans of the Total War games. At the same time, it means it's going to be harder to get into if you haven't played any of the previous games before. Total War: Pharaoh will be released on October 11th on PC.