Romance of the Three Kingdoms series

Group Description

Story
The "Sam Kok" (2 A.D - 3 A.D?) saga describes after the fall of the Han Dynasty after the Yellow Turban Rebellion in Ancient China. The saga originally existed via oral stories and was eventually made into official history. The Romance of the Three Kingdoms version was later popularized by Chinese writer Luó Guànzhōng between 1330-1400, portraying Liu Bei as the hero of the series and Cao-Cao as the antagonist. The game series is heavily influenced by the romantic version rather than the official version.

After the fall of the dynasty, new warlords came to the call of the weak Han emperor to crush the peasant rebellion. The warlords themselves became powerful and created new kingdoms of their won, turning the land into a constant battle of chaos and power between those warring warlords.

The "Three Kingdoms" title itself refers to last years of the chaos where a famous scholar in that period prophesied that the warring clans would eventually end with the formation of 3 remaining Kingdoms:

• The Kingdom of Wu, initially ruled by Cao Cao
• The Kingdom of Shu, initially ruled by Liu Bei
• The Kingdom of Wei, initially ruled by Sun Jian

Gameplay
The Romance of the Three Kingdoms is a turn-based strategy game that focuses on:

1. Top-down political map strategy-type gameplay where you control provinces and their natural resources; managing armies and their generals; conducting plots and schemes between yourself or rival kingdoms. The Koei type strategy game familiarizes generals with individual portraits as well as unique character skills and statistics.



2. Top-down perspective turn-based style combat, where you position armies led by selected generals against attacking or defending opponents. Later editions introduced "personal combat" (duel) where your generals can challenge other generals in hand-to-hand combat.