Total War: Rome 2's paid and unpaid content plans detailed
Three new factions for free. Three more cost money.
Total War: Rome 2 developer Creative Assembly has detailed its upcoming content plan for its highly-anticipated strategy sequel.
The game's Greek States Culture Pack DLC can be obtained for free by pre-ordering from participating retailers, while the Pontus playable faction will arrive as a free update on day one. Come October, the developer will add the Seleucid Empire as a free playable faction as well.
There will be other free updates too, but these will be smaller tweaks mostly focused on optimisation as opposed to substantial new content. "As with Shogun 2, we will continually improve the game's compatibility, optimisation and integral features such as AI and gameplay balancing post-release, and plan to add to that with new control schemes and additional free formats on other operating systems," explained lead designer James Russell, "We are also very proud of how Shogun 2 is our most moddable Total War to date with over 500 user-made mods on Steam Workshop alone. We hope to support Rome 2 in a similar fashion."
As far as paid DLC goes, Creative Assembly has plans for the Nomadic Tribes Culture Pack, which features the Royal Scythians, Roxolani and Massagetae, though no price has yet been announced.
Russell further explained that paid DLC will consist of: "Culture Packs that add more playable factions and unique units, Feature Packs that add gameplay or wide-ranging aesthetic changes, and Campaign Packs that add entirely new story-based campaign expansions."
"Rome 2 will be the biggest game we've ever released, in terms of scope, gameplay features and sheer weight of content," said Russell, "but even then we're just scratching the surface of the Roman period, an era so rich in diversity that it's easy to foresee releasing relevant content for years after Rome 2 has shipped."
Total War: Rome 2 is due on 3rd September for PC. For now, check out this new footage of multiplayer gameplay.
