Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader, rather than reading blogs or blogging himself, spent a good portion of last night playing Rome:Total War. He finally won the game. He was the Scipii faction of the Romans. He first conquered Sciliy. Then he moved on to North Africa. (He spared the Egyptians because they paid large tribute to keep his armies at bay.) Then he split the conquest of Greece and Macedonia with the Brutii faction. He also made some territorial gains in modern Germany and Austria. Then he started the civil war. He conquered Latinum and Rome herself. Then he crushed the Brutii. Then he drove the Julii out of Italy and central Europe.

Then the game just ended. He had built up his armies and has crossed the Alps. He was prepared to wrest Gaul and Spain from the Julii. He took Massila and then the game just ended with a cheesey pop-up screen that said that Victory was his and he was the master of a great Empire.

When your Maximum Leader clicked on the button to get rid of the pop-up he expected that he would be allowed to play on just for the sake of closure. No dice. He returned to the main menu.

He is more than a little disappointed. He didn’t really care for the Medieval:Total War victory screen either. The cool one was the Shogun: Total War ending with a little movie and all.

He is feeling miffed.

Carry on.