New console RTS from Total War team

By Robert Purchese Published 10 July, 2008

Stormrise for PS3 and 360 next year.

SEGA has unveiled a brand new real-time strategy game built solely for Xbox 360 and PS3.

It will be built by Total War developer Creative Assembly and be in the shops some time next year.

Dubbed Stormrise, the big idea is "verticality", where you control your troops underground, on the ground, on rooftops and in the air from the front line. No sitting back and ordering people around.

We're promised a console-focused control system that will be simple, fast and precise on a pad, so you will be able to carry out your plan without screaming.

Stormrise is set on a tattered earth ravaged by an ancient war, where the Echelon and Sai factions still battle to survive. The Echelon are clever and have fancy technologies, while the Sai are tribal and have learned to live with the harsh environment.

The cumulative effect will "revolutionise the genre on consoles", promises the marketing blurb. We've never heard that one before.

Creative Assembly most recently delivered us Viking: Battle for Asgard, which struggled to meet the critical acclaim usually attached to the Total War instalments.

We'll be seeing the game at E3 next week. So look out for our thoughts soon.

Head over to our Stormrise gallery for the very first screenshots.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

You may also like...

Comments (17) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • AaronTurner #1 4 years ago

    Crappy mech shit!

  • MrChuckles #2 4 years ago

    I'll stick with Empire:Total War thanks very much.

    Why they haven't done a fantasy TW for geeks like me, i'll never know.

  • Doctor_Hellsturm #3 4 years ago

    FANTASY TW! FANTASY TW!

    The plebs (including me) demand it!
    Ps: preferably with the warhammer license

  • MrChuckles #4 4 years ago

    Warhammer, Lord Of The Rings, Game of Thrones, jeez, get a license and get on with it.

  • Physically_Insane #5 4 years ago

    RTS on console = FAIL

  • Machetazo #6 4 years ago

    Heh. That would be lazy and regressive. One of the best parts of this, is that they're not relying on licenses. New IP. We've yet to see it in action, but I'm going to give this a chance, to show what it has to offer, at least.
    (See also: Section 8, for another example of trying to innovate on an existing genre.)
    Edited by 1 at 10/07/08 @ 17:46

  • zuljin #7 4 years ago

    Loved the others in the series, and will defo be watching this one closely. Looks great so far!

  • MrChuckles #8 4 years ago

    Fair enough on the license...

    What i mean is TW with spells, new unit types (Monsters, special abilities etc). Stuff you 'can't' do in a historically accurate game. It would give you a hell of a lot more tactical options in the battles and strategic options on the map, and that is what these guys are great at implementing.

  • bioreit #9 4 years ago

    I love the Total War series and I'm really holding out hope for this as being a good console RTS (well, and Halo Wars).

    I was playing some kind of other console RTS recently and the control system was really slick and well-implemented - best ever for a console. Shame the actual game was boring, ill-thought out and poorly executed. Oh and ridiculously unbalanced, too.

    *Don't press me for details - if you have a clue about what I'm referring to, good for you. If you don't - welcome to the mushroom kingdom!*

    Edit: Also, the descriptions of the Echelon and Sai (hi-tech/lo-tech) for some reason really made me think of KKND. Now THERE was an RTS that knew how to have fun. Heh - used to keep an old Win95 machine hanging around just for that, the original Z and War of the Worlds. Good times.
    Edited by 1 at 10/07/08 @ 18:02

  • Scimarad #10 4 years ago

    "Crappy mech shit! "

    And you decided we wanted to know that...why?

  • RandomTerrain #11 4 years ago

    Looks interesting, I look forward to hearing more.

  • Badtonio #12 4 years ago

    Looks like they've just uploaded the trailer - I have to say I'm now interested

  • AaronTurner #13 4 years ago

    I didn't decide you wanted to know that, I decided I wanted to type that.

  • Ryuken #14 4 years ago

    @bioreit: KKnD yeah, Survivors vs Evolved. Great stuff, just non-stop land attacks all the time and it was so nice to be able to really put infantry together in a tight group of five everytime, creating large defensive buffers while doing so with multiple groups. It had the most hilarious game manual ever too if you ask me. The sequel was somewhat less good though.

    A game like KKnD was all about blowing shit up with mammoths wearing bazooka bikini's and that seems the way to go for console RTS's as well (not the mammoths part probably). Console RTS's, not the PC-to-console ports, are moving more towards the Real-Time Tactics (RTT), ditching the basebuilding/grand strategy stuff. A shame imo but if that's the only way to properly experience something resembling a strategy game on your TV then so be it.

  • Gnort #15 4 years ago

    Well, I'm pleased to see another top studio developing a console-only RTS. I'm still not sure if the genre will ever work properly on consoles, but we'll see if this, Halo Wars or Endwar can convince me. At least it's not another attempt to port a PC-centric RTS, as we've already discovered that that doesn't work.

  • NorfolkNClue #16 4 years ago

    @MrChuckles I'm pretty sure there is a lord of the rings mod for TW series.

  • hiddenranbir #17 4 years ago

    It struggled cause you under-rated it!

    I don't want a console RTS. I want a new Total Warrior.