My legions of bloodthirsty warriors line the battlefield, anticipating the bloodshed of the conflict about to ensue. Personally, as their barbarian leader, I couldn't give a damn - they're cannon fodder to hold the enemy in place until my cavalry charge their ranks from behind. I may be a callous leader but I'm a damn good tactician, and the death of my infantry is only going to keep the squalor down in my cities helping extend my empire without revolts.

The might Roman Empire lies in ruins across Europe; they have divided into western and eastern Rome, poor and rich respectively. Their generals are so disloyal to their factions that they stand a hair's breadth away from revolt - and more often than not, there are revolts. The expanse of their empires is neither rich enough or confined enough to hold their people together and the recent introduction of Christianity to the world only divides their people, generals and the world even more.

Barbarian tribes now rule the majority of Europe and as the leader of the Saxons (I felt I should be true to my Saxon roots, hence my barbaric leading skills) it's my duty to push the Western Roman Empire back to their homelands and unite the Western territories under my rule. There have been many misfortunes in my expansion, the Western Romans invading my territory, and I have had to turn on my fellow Germanic tribes for expansion.

The biggest threat is the Franks - traitors! - allied with the Western Romans and a knife in my back, their constant invasions and their mysterious non-pagan rituals disturb my people. The war between the East and West allowed me to forge an alliance with the Eastern Romans, their rich trade lines my coffers with gold and the recent revolution in the West of Rome has severely weekend the Frankish position. This is why my people line the battlefield, opposing the last horde of the Frankish people.

The horde is a new gameplay element in Rome: Total War - once a tribe loses its homeland, if they're still close to their nomadic roots then the whole town goes up in arms. I sent a force in chase of the Frankish horde after I uprooted them from their settlement. They outnumber my now rather pathetic looking army four to one, but nevertheless, retreat is not an option.

As their men charge, my spearmen hail their front lines with javelins and dive into the action, splitting their line. As the heavier infantry move in behind, I order my cavalry to make a charge into their back lines, just as no less than a thousand flaming arrows rain down into the enemy lines. The enemy general orders the rest of his infantry into the fray, which is an especially bad thing for me, so I move my cavalry out of the way and let the battle build up. This is the point I love about mercenaries; although they cost a lot, they always make a difference. I order my mercenary catapults to fire flaming rounds into the battle.

Between the fire, fire and more fire, the enemy flees the battlefield, so I order my cavalry to cut them down on their retreat. This left my expanded empire in much need of upgrades. Since the world in Barbarian Invasion is different, the barbarians now have a lot more technology, including sewers, allowing these less civilised people to actually expand their empires to the point of taking over Rome. The Barbarians are moving up the technology tree in the game but unfortunately it's still very limiting to play as the barbarians, as they don't have much to give, which makes taking difficult and slow. Playing as one of the Roman sides is similar to the original; you still have lots of technology, now including religious buildings that have an effect on the game. Controlling the population is now more difficult too; if your generals aren't loyal they will rebel.

The Religions (Christianity, Zoroastrianism and Paganism) have different effects on people and the surrounding area. Christianity creates strong laws that help people be happy and at the opposite paganism creates stronger warriors for killing people with. If your governor in a city is of an opposite religion, it puts a toll on the happiness of the people, which is similar for the surrounding areas and anyone in the area. If the religion in a city differs from the state religion (the most used one) then the people in the city are likely to get into a revolt.

Choosing your religion takes thought and planning; you'll have to back it up with a lot of commitment and soldiers to keep the peace. Over the years people will begin to change faith and restlessness will settle down, but bad timing on the emperor's part, your part, and it can easily bring down your empire. The best choice for an emperor is to root out the weak generals who are likely to cause you problems and send them off on an insane war, on their own, against your enemy and make sure they die. It'll save you from rebellions, but probably keep the females in the family as widows.

This expansion claims to boast over 100 new units with numerous new abilities, but these are in no way deserving of an expansion. I've played all the Total War games and each one always has a unique feel to it with the type of units you control. However, this expansion is essentially just the same units, except they look a little different, while the new abilities are nothing special. There hasn't even been any significant improvement to the graphics on the units, which is disappointing to say the least, as they could have done something more with the game somewhere!

Once you hit the technology wall, Barbarian Invasion isn't that much fun anymore and starting as one of the Roman sides leaves you just trying to keep your empire from falling apart. When I took command of the Eastern Romans it took me more than 40 game turns just trying to get everything in order, which wouldn't be so bad if each game turn didn't last around 15 minutes. I'll save you the math, it took me around 10 hours before I could even start any wars, because the religion in the empire is completely ad hoc and I spent half my time ripping down pagan alters to build Christian churches and establish some kind of order.

The sound is the same, with some new tunes, nothing special or different, suitably epic but I was hoping for 90% of the music to be different. After all, the title is Barbarian Invasion; I thought there might have been some, well, you know, barbarian music maybe? Something a bit lively whilst having to endure hours of fixing your empire just so you can have some fun playing the game.

Rome: Total War - Barbarian Invasion is a poor expansion, with not much in the way of expanding on the previous. In fact it's possibly made the game a damn sight less playable, although hopefully my love for Total War will return with time. What I can say for certain is that Barbarian Invasion certainly won't be getting reinstalled on my PC, not unless it came with a time-back guarantee and a 'sorry we wasted 10 hours of you life by boring you' message…

Reviewed by Nik Gregory for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).