Time Commanders (Total War TV Show)

[Mark Richard]

Imma post this here because it concerns Total War. Usually television shows and gaming are quite separate subjects, but once in a blue moon...

Time Commanders was a British television gameshow back in 2003 that ran for a couple of seasons, and has recently been renewed for another one. I won't go into too much detail since the format changes are somewhat unclear, so let's just say it involves British people trying to work together to win a historical battle on a Total War game. As with all gameshows you'll likely get the pleasure of screaming at a hopeless group whose total knowledge of battlefield tactics only goes as far as some intense Subbuteo sessions. With luck the first episode features a bunch of total berks who think the highground advantage is a new brand of tea.

First episode airs on BBC Four 9pm GMT. It can also be rewatched online on BBCi Player, though you'll have to defeat the BBC's deathgrip on region restrictions first.



http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04jrryf - slice of proper footage

 

[ᚱᚨᚷᛖᚠᚢᛈ]

Ban OP for posting this cringe retardation combo. I was happier not knowing it existed.

 

[anus_pounder]

Isn't that the green grocer from Masterchef?

 

[Burning Bridges]

Someone should send these retards a copy of Scourge of War. It goes circles around the unrealistic crap that is TW. Also, it kind of surprises me that this goes through in the BBPC. In my country such a show would be considered right wing and militaristic.

 

[Jazz_]

Time Commanders was meh but there was a great series on History Channel called ''Decisive Battles'' where they used Rome Total War 1 engine to recreate the battles, this was around the time Rome Total War came out (2004):

 

[Burning Bridges]

I can still remember. That also marked about the end of my total commitment into Total War. Everyone was hyped by the buildup and the TV footage and thought it would be the ultimate battle simulator. The when the demo came out, and everyone had seen what an arcadish piece of crap it was , there was a brief hefty shitstorm and everybody left. People later played on with killspeed mods, but the damage had already been done.

 

[Jazz_]

I can still remember. That also marked about the end of my total commitment into Total War. Everyone was hyped by the buildup and the TV footage and thought it would be the ultimate battle simulator. The when the demo came out, and everyone had seen what an arcadish piece of crap it was , there was a brief hefty shitstorm and everybody left. People later played on with killspeed mods, but the damage had already been done.

The main problem with RTW was the piss poor battle AI for me, it made the campaign too easy, the AI just charged at you without mantaining a line or arranging themselves in a formation. Some mods partially fixed that (darthmod for example) but the result was still kinda meh due to some hard-coding I believe. RTW online with cwb rules was still fun tho.
Also there are some total overhaul mods (like Rome Total Realism or Europa Barbarorum) that go for realism but to be honest I never really liked them, I find that they don't really make the battles more tactical, they just make them endless boring slogs with a cavalry that moves in slow-motion and doesn't even feel like cavalry anymore.

 

[Mark Richard]

I can still remember. That also marked about the end of my total commitment into Total War. Everyone was hyped by the buildup and the TV footage and thought it would be the ultimate battle simulator. The when the demo came out, and everyone had seen what an arcadish piece of crap it was , there was a brief hefty shitstorm and everybody left. People later played on with killspeed mods, but the damage had already been done.

You raise a good point, in that a large part of the appeal to Time Commanders was hours upon hours of new footage for a highly anticipated upcoming game. The show started before Youtube came to be and GameTrailers was still in its infancy, so the high level of access to in-game footage was basically unprecedented for the time. Judging by the episode descriptions this new season appears to use existing games like Rome 2, Napoleon, and Atilla. Presumably they're heavily modified otherwise the battles will be over in minutes.