Review: Total War: Pharaoh Boasts a Rich Campaign Map Befitting a Ruler

When Shogun: Total War charged onto the scene in 2000, its unique mix of real-time strategy battles and turn-based campaign map formed the foundation of one of the most prolific and long-running series in gaming. The Total War franchise has grappled with many periods of history, from medieval Europe to the Roman Empire to the formation of the United States. But this is the first time we’ve had the chance to unite Ancient Egypt and become a pharaoh.

The battlefield experience will be instantly familiar to series veterans, and there’s a decent tutorial for newcomers, but developer Creative Assembly Sofia has overhauled the campaign side with well-themed mechanics and strategic challenges. Conquering the land of the pharaohs requires careful resource management, Machiavellian plotting in court, and the favor of the gods.

After 2,000 years of unparalleled power and wealth, the Late Bronze Age collapse marked the beginning of the end of Egypt’s dominance. Its empire began to crumble under the weight of mass migration, climate disasters, and frequent incursions from the aggressive Sea Peoples. Egypt and its long-term enemy, the Hittites, fell into decline, abandoning or losing cities to unrest and relentless external threats.

You can play as one of four Egyptian contenders for the throne (Ramesses, Seti, Tausret, or Amenmesse), Canaanite outsiders (Bay or Irsu), or potential Hittite kings (Suppiluliuma or Kurunta). Most folks will start as the youthful Ramesses, but you have some big sandals to fill if you want to match the achievements of the real Ramesses III, considered the last great monarch of the New Kingdom.

I was impressed that Total War: Pharaoh offers a fully customizable experience. Beyond your campaign and battle difficulty levels, you can tweak all sorts of elements, including resources, attrition, gods, campaign movement, and lots more. You will likely need a game or two to figure out what you want to change, but this level of fine-tuning is welcome.

A gentle start may lull you into a false sense of security, but when the reigning Pharaoh Merneptah shuffles off this mortal coil, Egypt swiftly descends into civil war. To throw your hat in the ring, you must build legitimacy, mainly by conquering sacred lands. Taking cities is one thing, hanging on to them is much tougher, and balancing resources is key. Each city specializes in one resource, and you need a steady supply of food, wood, bronze, stone, and gold.

Regions with large cities and smaller towns will be familiar to series fans. Workers and resources are required to build anything, but unhappy populations revolt. Total War: Egypt adds another layer with outposts. These smaller building slots are dotted around the map (cities have three outposts), and you can erect monuments to increase your influence, construct trading centers to boost resources, or build military forts or watchtowers to tighten your grip. Your armies can reap benefits by interacting with your outposts to gain extra movement or buffs to their ambush chances, but these are a double-edged sword because invaders can pillage them too.

Once the game starts, several vital decisions will impact your progress and decide the shape of your game, but these are staggered, only triggered as each campaign passes through distinct stages. First, you must decide whether to follow the path to pharaoh or Hittite king. Most folks will obviously choose pharaoh, but the other option, and all that follow, offer some replay value.

Ancient legacies tied to great pharaohs of old are a clever way to work in some history and select buffs to suit your play style. Choose Akhenaten to combine gods into the monotheistic worship of the sun or Hatshepsut to boost your economic fortunes with trade. I had a lot of fun following in the footsteps of Thutmoses III, which allows you to target cities and undermine them, weakening their defenses or persuading insiders to join you before you invade. But this mechanic requires a lot of forward planning to use successfully.

The cyclical nature of ancient Egyptian life is reflected in the rise and ebb of the Nile and mirrored by Shemsu Hor, which breaks court intrigues into a six-turn cycle. The royal court of the pharaoh includes subordinates with unique powers, and you can plot with or against them to improve your fortunes and increase your legitimate claim to the throne.

The court intrigues are a great idea, one I’d like to see developed further in future games, but it feels half-baked in its current incarnation. Options are limited, and it’s weird that the court is not influenced by what’s happening on the campaign map. For example, I can be at war with one of the other members of the royal court but still conspire with them in plots, or blackmail one of my allies without affecting our relationship outside the court.

Diplomacy can be shallow in Total War games, but I found deal-making to be crucial in Total War: Pharaoh. Bartering is often the only way to get the resources you need, and there are so many factions that allies are essential if you want to survive. Unfortunately, non-player factions make a lot of dumb moves. More than once, my relatively weak ally insisted on declaring war on the pharaoh, pitting him and his allies against me.

Achieving peace with factions that are naturally inclined to fight you is also a burden. I sued for peace with one Canaanite tribe to try to create a buffer in the north, but even after agreeing to trade deals and signing a nonaggression treaty, they continued raiding my lands with impunity. Attacking them meant breaking the treaty and incurring the worldwide penalty of being untrustworthy, but there’s no way to ask them nicely to stop.

To claim the throne, you must conquer, build swiftly, and navigate the potential pitfalls of court positions and alliances. But heavy sits the crown. As pharaoh, you will face a relentless influx of Sea Peoples, who pop up anywhere along the coastline and sail down the Nile to attack your cities. With the right outposts, you can sometimes move stacks quickly enough to catch the invaders and prevent your cities from being sacked, but it does feel like a game of whack-a-mole.

Throw disasters like drought, famine, and earthquakes into the mix, and things get frustratingly difficult. Luckily, you can tweak these mechanics in your next playthrough and turn off anything you don’t enjoy, reducing or snuffing out natural disasters, for example, or changing the levels of unhappiness that trigger a revolt.

In the Warhammer games, Creative Assembly brought variety and spice to the battlefield with fantastical units. Total War: Pharaoh returns to realism. Your armies are made up of infantry (swordsmen and spearmen) ranged units (archers and stone throwers) and cavalry (chariots). Using terrain effectively and flanking your enemies is crucial if you expect to rout larger forces.

The option to set unit stances to advance, hold, or give ground adds some depth, but the impact of weather is probably the most striking change. Sweltering heat saps strength and prevents tired units from recovering, rain and thunderstorms reduce the effectiveness of ranged units, and sandstorms slow everything down. This intriguing addition can reduce the dominance of heavily armored units if they’re facing off against speedy, lightly armored Egyptians, who are used to desert heat.

Despite the tweaks, the battle experience feels much like other Total War titles. Early battles are particularly stale because they feature basic conscripts. Things get spicier when you can afford to field expensive chariots and other veteran units, but even highly trained royal bodyguards are mortal. If you’re used to wading in with a hero or monster in Warhammer, be warned: A single unit will rarely turn the tide of a battle here.

Although the combat feels familiar, it looks great. If you zoom in, you can watch hand-to-hand face-offs play out. And if you choose to auto-resolve battles, you are treated to an animation of your general sword-fighting the enemy before exacting the fatal blow. As always, city sieges require battering rams and ladders. Victory points provide a reason to target different areas of each town or city. The grandest cities of Egypt, with pyramids and other great monuments, make resplendent backdrops for these set piece battles.

Ultimately, Total War: Pharaoh successfully captures the grandeur and wonder of ancient Egypt. The game’s styling, thoughtful mechanics, and rich history will draw in anyone inspired by this iconic civilization. Strategy fans with only a passing interest in the period may find the battles stale, but the fleshed-out campaign map and fresh mechanics make for a gripping challenge that should persuade even the most jaded veteran to dust off that armor and pick up the sword once more.