Total War series sale on GamersGate!!! Which Total War game is best?

Medieval 2 Is a good one to start off on.

I have no idea how fun the first Rome would be to someone new to the series, it's an awesome game and all but, and i say this as someone who put hundreds of hours into it over the years, it's mechanics have become dated over time and, if you care about that sort of thing(i don't but i know others do), so have it's graphics. Empire was terrible at launch and while it has improved a lot you still have to mod it heavily to get the best out of it and even then i for one can't play it for very long, might be because i don't really like the time period.

I'd recommend you either get Medieval 2, it should be fairly easy to get into, it has more depth than the original Rome and it has some amazing total conversions like Third Age Total War and Call of Warhammer. If you're looking for something newer buy Shogun 2 and Fall of the Samurai, it should be VERY easy to get into, it does a great job of explaining everything, it's visually better looking than Rome 2 and it has the best combat, in my opinion as someone who's played them all except Rome 2, i'v ever seen in a Total War game.

RTW with mods like EB or RTR is very good indeed, MTW2 is also very good and u have plethora of very good mods for MTW2. After this i would recommend u STW2+FOTS, FOTS is imo best thing CA made in last 4 years.

Following these titles comes NTW and last is ETW which i would't recommend anybody at least not vanila.

The original Rome and Medieval II are still the finest of the series. Both play great vanilla and have some fantastic mods as well with a strong community.

rome total war and medieval2 are best but shogun2 is too good

I think it's between Rome 1 and Medieval 2, which one depends on which one you play first.
Personally I'm a rome fan, you start off as one three roman houses: Julii, Brutii, Scipii (not exactly sure how they are spelt) you perform missions for the senate and slowly gain favor and build your house's control, when the time comes you rebel against the empire and take rome for yourself.
On the second playthrough you can play as more factions (I think it depends on which civilizations you had a hand in destroying) you can play as the Britons, Gauls, Carthagians, Greeks, Thracians etc. In a word it's awesome.
Medieval II is very similar, a few minor differences but because I played rome first it has always been my preference.

I played Rome 1, Medieval 2 and recently Empire: Total War and I really loved them all.
What I didn't like about rome was that it was rather hard to satisfy the happiness of your cities later on, when they were far away from your capital. But the fights and playable factions where really cool.
In Medieval 2 I didn't really like that you always depended on the church. You had to go to crusades if they told you to (which was kindof stupid in my opinion) and they kind of told you who to ally with. Otherwise they excommunicated you which meant everyone was fine to attack you.
Can't think of much I didn't like about Empire. The diplomacy system seemed way better than in the old games. Also sea battles, yay!

Maybe you should choose the part of history you want to play in?

There is no definite unanimous best TW. I would suggest choosing the one covering the history period that appeals to you the most.

Mods are highly recommended, they fix many issues present in all vanilla TWs.

I would suggest starting with the older ones available on steam (RTW and M2TW), because:

1. They are really cheap, so you won't regret investing money on something you could not like
2. They both have lots of mods to choose from, covering many themes, locations and periods in history

Shogun 2 RLZ, ROME 2 is very buggy and simplify many features present in ROME, MEDIEVAL and SHOGUN. The best for my taste are SHOGUN 2, ROME, MEDIEVAL 1/2 and SHOGUN, keep away from Napoleon and Empire (or first try a demo or pirate copy and if you like it them buy it) but Rome Collection and Medieval 2 (are oldis) but dont dissapoint.

I really like Shogun 2, mostly because I love Japanese culture to be honest. But beside of that, smaller map means not as time-consuming as others in the franchise, so I could finish it quicker.

Rome, Medieval 2, Shogun 2

Pick the time period that interests you the most.

As far as napoleon total war is concerned i'd discard it in favor of histwar.

Shogun 2 is the most polished game in the TW series. Empire is decent, the shooting just feels a bit odd. Napoleon feels a bit better, but Empire is way bigger. You can't go wrong with any of them.

for me I like medieval 2, then rome1, then shogun 2 I nthat order, empire and napoleon are fun also but for some reason medieval is the one that keeps me playing the longest

Empire is still the best. Anything after that feels too damn arcady and are dlc cash traps.

I would say Medieval TW to get started, Napoleon TW because it's an improvement over Empire then Shogun 2 TW if you want a good looking game with good gameplay as well.

Tried Rome 2 TW at a friend of mine, don't care much about that game, it's drifting away too much from what TW used to be so i will be skipping on that one, waiting to see if they get back on track with the next one they will release

Keep them all, they are all good.