The Creative Assembly has begun pulling the curtain off its upcoming Total War: Attila, albeit very slowly. The developers today revealed the first faction, the Eastern Roman Empire, giving fans a preview of one of the game's biggest players.
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The Eastern Empire is one of two splintered factions from the former Roman Empire, in control of the extremely influential Constantinople and at the greatest threat from Hun invasion.
"While the Western Roman Empire ails and withers, the Eastern Roman Empire is an economic powerhouse, and reaps the benefits of this through treasury interest and trade tariffs," the official faction page reads. "Militarily, she begins the campaign in a reasonably capable position, but with a clear and immediate threat as Alaric leads his Visigoth armies into Roman-held Thracia and Macedonia...mere regions away from Constantinople itself."
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This is all enjoyable for history-lovers (the page has even more background info), and more profiles are to come. The unveiling is void of any game mechanics or unit details, though, and doesn't show much about how the faction will operate. The added image does show the starting region of control for the Eastern Roman Empire, which is something fans will want to know, but that's about all the in-game relevance the post brings.
I suppose part of the reveal should be the existence of a faction in-game itself, but in this case the faction was already assumed given its importance to the period. The more obvious inclusions are revealed, the more interesting the announcements will become-stay tuned to see who else you'll be able to play as when Total War: Attila releases next year.