This time around, the campaigns are each rooted firmly in a particular epoch. The main problem was that just as you'd get stuck into the units and technologies of one era, things would arbitrarily advance to the next. The original game's solitary campaign started at the dawn of civilisation and ended about now. What you're really paying for in Thrones And Patriots are the four new single-player campaigns. Unless, of course, you use the pause function - but pausing in a real-time strategy game is for pussies, right? Juggling a campaign in enemy territory and keeping up with the Joneses on the technology and infrastructure front is now even more of a head shag. The flipside to the Senate's new options is that RoN was already in danger of becoming a frenzied upgrade-fest in the larger missions. Here, you research political systems, with each regime style subtly affecting the mechanics of your economy and fighting units. Governments are managed through the new senate building.
