Agentfred

I'm not sure I understand the point of this.  The fundamental idea behind achievements is being reward for achieving something.  If you're simply using the console to artificially inflate an artificial score, well, that seems kind of useless.  Eh, well, I'll never understand why you guys like achievements in the first place.

"Lol what does RTT stand for? I cant belive I've never heard of it."

Alternatively, you can use Futuremark's system.
http://www.yougamers.com/gameometer/10286/?start=true

"*Edit function not working, so I'll just reply to myself:

I take that back about Sins, I just looked over a review and it doesn't seem like my kind of game. Thanks for the help everyone, I'll probably release the Machiavellian in me into Medieval II: Total War if I get around to it, though that might just be a knee jerk reaction to reading a thought provoking passage. I might just forget about it all together, what with the economy and the spending restrictions I'll have to take on.

Thanks for the help."

So you want it to be historical, recent, have a lot of single player replayability, but it can also be a 4x.
I think M2:TW would be your best bet to fit all of those criteria.
Alternatively, there's always Civ IV.  (There's also Colonization if you're interested in history several hundred years after Machiavelli, and in a different hemisphere)
In response to your other responses
AoE II is an amazing game, but it isn't recent (although it doesn't show it if you ask me)
SoaSE isn't historical, but still amazing.
Civ Rev wouldn't fit your criteria of a long campaign.
BiggerBomb said:

"KindGalaxy said:

"Sins of a Solar Empire"

I'd love that but I hear it only runs on high end computers."

Minimum Requirements:

• Windows XP SP2 / Windows Vista
• 1.8 GHz Single-Core Processor
• 512 MB RAM (1 GB for Windows Vista)
• 128 MB DirectX 9 3D Video Card (Radeon 9600 / GeForce FX 6600 and above)
• DirectX 9.0c Compatible Sound Card
• 3 GB Hard Drive Space
• 
  

• 2.2 GHz Dual- or Quad-Core Processor
• 1 GB RAM (2 GB for Windows Vista)
• 256 MB DirectX 9 3D Video Card (Radeon X1600 / GeForce 7600 and above)

"also, what game do you want to play, how big is your friend list on xbl. if your in the MMO and RTS then the PC is the superior one. Or if you want some game that will never be on the PC (gear of war 2, Street fighter IV, Final Fantasy XIII) then the Xbox 360 is your choice.

the real question is, what game to do want to play?"

I'll be picking it up the first day.

That looks unwieldy.

Isn't everyone excited?