Romance of the Three Kingdoms XI Preview
By: Chris Best |
Thursday August 14, 2008 |
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KOEI will re-emerge with another chapter in a renown strategy series |
| It is fitting that the year we see the Olympic Games first held in China is also the year that we will witness the return of Koei's simulation of China's national epic to North American PCs. Romance of the Three Kingdoms is a combination of historical record and heroic myth that tells the tale of the fall of the Han dynasty and the ensuing wars of succession that followed, centered around the events that led to dividing Han China into three factions of Wei, Shu, and Wu (the 'Three Kingdoms' of the title). In many ways the story can be seen as China's version of The Illiad, Beowulf, or The Song of Roland, a way to preserve history as myth and show by example what was expected of virtuous individuals in the time it was written--loyalty to friends, family, and superiors in the case of Romance. In the process of taking oral tradition passed down for generations and rendering it to a written form, the characters of the story eventually morphed into super-human warriors often blessed with supernatural abilities. This huge cast of larger-than-life characters set against a backdrop of war and political intrigue has been incredibly fertile ground for modern day creative types to base their work on, spawning television series, anime, comics, and even video games. Most North American gamers will probably be most familiar with the characters and storyline of Romance from Koei's Dynasty Warriors series, an over-the-top action oriented treatment of the Romance storyline, where players find themselves playing as prominent individuals from the epic cutting down wave after wave of nameless cannon fodder with their super-human abilities and really cool posing. Dynasty Warriors, however, is merely a spinoff of the much more widely known and more successful Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Where Dynasty Warriors allows you to slug it out on foot in scripted battles vaguely reminiscent of historical confrontations, Romance of the Three Kingdoms eschews button smashing melee combat for empire building, political machinations, and strategic deployment of armies. Playing as one of the historical leaders of the three kingdoms period in either a pre-defined scenario or an epic "What If…?" simulation, it will be your job to try to unite all of China under your banner and finally bring peace to the war-torn country.  As mentioned before, it is possible to play as practically any of the major military or bureaucratic leaders from the Romance novel, each with their own stats, special abilities, familial ties and pre-existing alliances and nemeses fully fleshed out. Or, if none of them tickle your fancy, you can create your own leader using a detailed editor which allows a player to detail not only their ruler, but spouses, parents, and even several generations of descendants whose dates of birth match up with the time they will appear in the simulation. What we have now is an entirely new dynasty of heroes and/or villains created to allow the player to truly ask "What If…?” Based on Koei's previous excursions in the turn based strategy simulation genre (series including Nobunaga's Ambition and Ghengis Khan in addition to the previous Romance games), you can expect a detailed, deep, rewarding simulation available that allows both the civic micromanager and armchair generals amongst us to find the style that interests them most. Based on prior experience, however, those with addictive personalities, such as myself, should be warned that a single game can easily eat up over one-hundred hours of playtime, and then only to find yourself finally defeated by the AI. If you're like me, however, that just increases your interest. Romance of the Three Kingdoms XI is due out for PC in the US on September 9th, 2008. Check back after then for our full review of what looks to be another great entry in Koei's epic strategy series. |
