Those who know strategy games as a genre by heart and have played them through, but still crave a new experience, will find it at Steam where there is a sale from KEOI TECMO: “Romance of the Three Kingdoms XIII” (PS3, PS4, Xbox One, PC) is available for €18. This corresponds to a discount of 70%. Our author Schuhmann reports on sleepless nights with the Chinese mix of strategy and role-playing.
Why is the game not known?
- “Romance of the Three Kingdoms” is something like the counterpart to the Trojan War or the Arthurian legend: It is a semi-historical epic that shapes the cultural circle of a country to this day. It is almost unknown in Europe, but huge in China. The epic has been adapted over 30 years into large game series like Dynasty Warriors or “Romance of the Three Kingdoms”.
- If one knows “Romance of The Three Kingdoms” here, it is from “Total War: Three Kingdoms” or from movies like “Red Cliff” (cover image). Strangely enough, the strategy series seems to be more popular on PlayStation than on PC – when thinking of “strategy games,” one does not immediately think of Sony’s console.
- The games of the series seem foreign to us in Europe and run under the radar. Romance of the Three Kingdoms XIII has only 4 reviews on PC at Metacritic. The 13th part of the franchise (from 2016) is a special game in the series as it emphasizes the role-playing aspect even more than its predecessors and successors.
Mix of Civilization 6 and a role-playing game with hundreds of characters
This is the idea of the game: Romance of the Three Kingdoms 13 is similar to Crusader Kings 3, a mix of role-playing and strategy game:
As in Civilization 6, it is actually about “world domination”: You build cities, conquer provinces, engage in war or diplomacy. The goal is to conquer all of China. You have the option to start with various historical scenarios, as one of several “powerful” factions: You can not only play the 3 titular kingdoms, but also bandit leaders, Taoist sects, or “wild barbarians” who ride elephants.
But this world conquest happens with a strong emphasis on role-playing, because for every action in the game, you must deploy “officers”: These are leaders, bureaucrats, warriors, or strategists.
The special thing about Romance of the Three Kingdoms: All these characters are “crafted historical figures” with special abilities and traits. They are not randomly designed NPCs like mostly in Crusader Kings 3, but actually characters with their own biographies: For almost every warrior, there is a note in his biography about how he lived in the novel and how he died.
Fun fact: Surprisingly many were killed in battle by one of the epic’s famous heroes, beheaded for treason, or hung out of shame after a defeat. It was a rough time around 210 years after Christ in ancient China.
You can take on any role: Warrior, merchant, ruler, or errand boy
The twist about Romance of the Three Kingdoms: You can play each of these hundred different figures and thus your role changes.
For in Romance of the Three Kingdoms 13, you do not have to play a “ruler” who, like in Civilization 6, governs his land and gives all the orders.
You can also play a general or simple warrior in this universe who just does his job and sees where he ends up. You can thus be a part of the immense machine and take on the role of the historical Lu Bu: You are the most powerful warrior in the world but will fail due to betrayal and the allure of a young woman after you have slain two adoptive fathers.
Or you play a part of the heroic trio, who are presented in the epic as “the good guys”:
- Liu Bei – a smart, charismatic leader
- Zhang Fei – a constantly drunk brawler
- Guan Yu – something like “the super hero,” who was such a great warrior that he is still revered as a war god in China today
The counterpart to the three is “Cao Cao” with his clique of generals, strategists, and thugs.
To this day, his name is used in China as we use the devil. A Chinese proverb says, “When one speaks of Cao Cao, he comes.”
This is how I perceived it: Currently, Romance of The Three Kingdoms is available for €18 on sale on Steam, for €28 you get the game along with an expansion bundle.
I have already spent over 70 hours with the game in the last few days, and from a Western perspective, it is a foreign and extremely exciting chunk.
The most important thing in the game are the officers and that you “get the best”: For with strong generals and strategists, you can win battles and conquer. Good bureaucrats help the cities grow and ensure that you have enough money and supplies to keep the war machinery running, which is ultimately what it’s all about.
You actually want to eliminate “strong opponents” to capture their top people, recruit them, and have them work for you.
A popular strategy is therefore to quickly eliminate Cao Cao or Liu Bei with each faction and grab their top people while their empires are still relatively small.
In Romance of the Three Kingdoms, a small empire with top figures can surpass a large empire with weak personnel.
In this context, it is crucial to stay within the framework of the respective historical scenario, as only then certain events are triggered that are based on history and lead to certain empires breaking apart: Just like in the epic, first the Han Empire collapsed, and then the tyrant Dong Zhou fell.
A “classic gameplay style” with rapid expansion often leads to these events not happening, the empire remains stable, and rolls over you with its strong troops: In the beginning of the stories, many later
