A great, fun, and addicting game - though AI bugs in campaign and battle can be annoying
The game is very complex but surprisingly little info is given to you either through the tutorial or the manual. I spent quite a bit of time sifting through forums before I felt like i actually understood the basic principles of the game and even then you still have to play a campaign or two before you start getting the hang of whats going on.
That being said - this game is about running an Empire with two parts - campaign mode and battle mode. In the campaign mode you control your cities, move your armies, and set policies. In the battle mode you... battle.
Surprisingly most of your time is spent in the campaign mode and its also prob ably the funnest part of the game. You can spend hours tweeking and thinking about what is the best move to make.
Battle mode is pretty fun but its hard to carry out actual strategy against your enemy. your troops maneuver too slowly, artillery is inaccurate, and your cavalry are difficult at best to control. You end up just sending mass amounts of infantry toward your enemy and hope your guys are a better shot.
At the end of the day, Empire total war is a great game. The replayability of the game is off the charts - theres always another faction to play or another strategy to try.