Total War: Rome II coming in 2013

Total War publisher Sega has announced Total War: Rome II for launch next year. The PC game, sequel to the lauded 2004 strategy title Rome: Total War, remains in the hands of The Creative Assembly.

Sega's announcement promises the series' signature mix of real-time and turn-based action in Ancient Rome, with "tens of thousands" of troops clashing in "bone-splintering detail" as you helm the vast war machine of the world's first superpower. There's a new graphics engine crunching the numbers, and new unit cameras to let you see the battlefield from every perspective.

The first couple of screenshots of the game respectively reveal a large-scale naval invasion and swarms of soldiers in a detailed, smouldering cityscape. We spy a squad of battle elephants on the far left of the latter.

The Total War series last brought gamers its brand of historical fracas with Total War: Shogun 2 in March 2011 and that game's Fall of the Samurai stand-alone expansion in March this year.