TOTAL War: Three Kingdoms

Turns ancient China into a puzzle book and a battlefield

Certificate 16 Developer Creative Assembly Publisher Sega Released Out now

The child-emperor is a hostage of the tyrant Dong Zhuo. Corrupt eunuchs take power while banditry runs rampant. Warlords make their names putting down the Yellow Turban rebellion, look at the armies and reputations they’ve built, then decide they would make better candidates for emperor. The Han dynasty collapses, and China becomes divided.

Late second-century China provided a dramatic backdrop for Romance Of The Three Kingdoms, a novel as culturally influential as Shakespeare’s historical plays. As well as movies and shows it’s inspired over-the-top action games like Dynasty Warriors, but Total War: Three Kingdoms is a much thinkier version of the story. You choose a leader like devious mastermind Cao Cao or heroic general Liu Bei, and then attempt to unite China by having the best strategies.

There are two halves to Total War: Three Kingdoms. In one, which plays out on a map of

the country and various attached menus, you manage a kingdom – raising armies, constructing buildings, assigning court positions, forming coalitions, sending out spies, and trying to balance the happiness of the people with your generals’ hunger for promotions and your own need for cash. Every season you do the accounting for all these factors, then cross your fingers and press the end turn button.

The other half takes place on sumptuous battlefields, covered in snow or paddy fields or illuminated by paper lanterns lit by the citizens of besieged cities. Here, in real-time, you command troops, ordering blocks of infantry to defend archers while racing your cavalry out to the edges to flank the enemy.

Meanwhile your generals perform exactly as the larger-than-life characters in Romance Of The Three Kingdoms, taking on entire units single-handed or engaging in protracted wuxia duels. There’s strategy here too, whether you order them to charge ahead or hang back and provide leadership bonuses for units. When you make the right choice, victory – especially against the odds – is thrilling.

The battles are palate-cleansers that prevent the hours spent upgrading farms and deciding who to appoint as administrator from feeling tedious. Those choices become ways of ensuring the armies will be well-supplied, positioned and armed. Then each new settlement they conquer becomes part of the management level, adding new resources and income. The two layers of play feed into each other to the benefit of both, until hours have passed, and you still want to play just one more turn.

For anyone interested in the period, Three Kingdoms is an easy recommendation. There are Total War games across history and while everyone has their favourite (personally, Shogun 2) most are variations on a theme. It’s best to find one that appeals to you.

Whether you’d rather sit down at your computer for a weekend pretending to be Attila or

Napoleon, Total War has you covered.

“When you make the right choice, victory – especially against the odds – is thrilling”