Creative Assembly removes Total War: Shogun 2 – Complete Edition from Steam following a shameful launch
Creative Assembly apologises for Total War: Shogun 2 – Complete Edition’s terrible launch
Creative Assembly has announced it will remove Total War: Shogun 2 – Complete Edition from sale. The game has “fallen short” of both player expectations and Creative Assembly’s “standards”. The Complete Edition launched on October 13th and received “Overwhelmingly Negative” reviews on Steam.
Between graphical issues, unresolved bugs, shoddy (and undisclosed) AI use, poorly implemented new factions (Island factions have severe trading limits), and other issues, it is easy to see why opinions on the game are so negative. As many fans have already said, it’s “a shameful display”.
I am a huge fan of Total War: Shogun 2, especially its Fall of the Samurai expansion. I am very disappointed that the game’s Complete Edition didn’t fix issues that modders fixed long ago in the original. It is also disappointing to see the game’s unit cards sloppily upscaled by AI, turning the game’s original artwork into higher-resolution AI slop.
Below is Creative Assembly’s official statement/apology;
We’re aware that Total War: Shogun 2 – Complete Edition has fallen short of both your expectations and our own standards. We’ve seen your feedback, comments, and reviews. We agree that the current experience is not where it needs to be.
As a result we are working with platform holders to remove the game from sale and to reinstate the original game while we investigate the issues. Existing owners will still be able to access and play the game.
We are working closely with our development partner to identify the causes of these problems, deliver improvements, and ensure Shogun 2 – Complete Edition meets the quality standards players expect from Total War.
SEGA & Creative Assembly
It feels like this new version of Shogun 2 needed playtesting by someone who knows the original’s flaws and how the Total War Community has fixed many of them. While many of the Complete Edition’s upgrades are welcome, it also brings too many flaws to be a worthwhile upgrade.
Creative Assembly are right to remove this new version of Shogun 2 from sale. Hopefully, they can re-release it as the quality product Total War fans deserve. Honestly, I wonder how Creative Assembly signed off on this re-release. It clearly wasn’t release-ready. If this game did not meet Creative Assembly’s “standards”, why did it launch? Why weren’t longstanding bugs squashed? Why was it not adequately playtested? Total War fans deserve answers. If nothing else, Total War fans deserve better. We’ve had far too many apologies from Creative Assembly and deserve much better.
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