I was hyped by Empire: Total War, and to be perfectly honest I regret buying it, and it's not even because of "bugs" which I myself haven't noticed, what I did noticed in terms of technical "issues" was (yes, was, it ain't really the case anymore) really bad A.I, which has been worked on since its release, now A.I is generally good expect for the inevitable path-finding issues during sieges (which has been in ALL the Total War games) and the obvious lack of cohesive decisioning capabilities when it comes to land invasions from the sea.
But outside of the technical issues that remain, the game is just boring, well I speak for myself here mind you, some people like it, that's fine, to each their own, but for me it's the time period that I don't like, in the end, which I was NOT expecting, I thought I would like it, I really did, but then just watching columns of men firing at each others like little statues and barely moving if not at all, all the while the annoying artillery/cannons fire from the distance shredding your battalions to pieces often before they even get in range of fire of anything... it's just ultimately mind bogglingly boring. I just preferred it (and still do, since I still own and sometimes play Rome and Medieval 2, mostly with mods) when armies clashed against each others like raged animals with shields and swords swinging and bashing left and right with the sound of hitting metal and yells of the men at war... it's something that for me only Rome and Medieval 2 accomplished, mostly due to their time period, obviously, there's just something about that whole concept of ages-old conflicts of medieval times that screams pure war as it should be that can't ever be touched by more modern time warring.
There's something else I don't like, the music, it severely lacks the "humph" and "punch" and it does not create any tension or impressions of intimidating advancing enemy lines, if there's one game in the entirety of the TW franchise that accomplished that with brilliance it was Rome (the musical score for Rome won awards, well, the composer I mean, but you get the point), and to some extent Medieval 2. Also prior to each battles there's no speech given by any officers, any high ranking units, which is something I thought was done right enough in Medieval 2, which helped create some atmosphere.
And, finally, the last thing I don't like about Empire, which for me ain't little to consider is the entire single-player campaign and the way we maintain our empire, I really profoundly dislike the streamlined approach that the developers opted to go for with Empire, their micro-management system was working very well and was (and still is anyway) addicting and simple, to the point, from previous Total War games, but now you maintain provinces rather than maintaining individual settlements/towns/castles. But, in the end, there is one thing I do like about Empire, and it's the naval battles, they feel just right and I don't think any other developers could have done naval battles from the 1700's and 1800's better than Creative Assembly did in Empire, it's true, but other than that... it lacks, a lot.
But, hey, it's just me, keep that in mind, it received some stellar reviews all around, if reviews and scores mean anything to you (it meant something for me prior to buying it, it contributed to the hype, which I admit having felt for, shamefully, and to repeat myself I regret it, especially considering I bought it at full price and that only the following week-end it was on a week-end deal with its price cut in half). To conclude, it's quite simple, in my book both Rome and Medieval 2 are ages beyond and better than Empire could ever manage to be, DLCs or expansions or no.