Sengoku: Way of the Warrior Preview求高手翻译...

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Managing Editor Richard Cox takes the demo for Sengoku: Way of the Warrior for a spin to see how this feudal Japanese strategy title stacks up.

Chances are you’ve experienced this story before… You’re the head of one of the many families in feudal Japan, and you want to become Shogun. Except in this case, we’re not talking about the Total War Shogun games. This time, we’re taking a look at Paradox Interactive’s take on feudal Japan. You’ll notice the difference right away, which isn’t a bad thing. Sure, the Shogun games are great, but there’s definitely room to tell the feudal Japan story in multiple ways, so let’s take a look at how Paradox does it.

While bot工口GAMEs start off pretty similar; by having you pick one of a multitude of different families to play as, with different families having different difficulty settings, that’s about where the similarities between the games end. The Shogun series is a lot more about the action and the combat. Sengoku on the other hand is all about the strategy and diplomacy. If you’ve ever played a Paradox game, such as Crusader Kings, you know what you’re in for.

So anyway, back to the character/family selection. As you mouse over all of the different options, you’ll see a difficulty rating for each one, which range from a baby’s pacifier (easy) to a skull and crossbones (hard). But there’s a lot more to it than just what that bar tells you. Other factors will come into play such as the different benefits and penalties each family may have, who you’re immediate neighbors are and what your relationship with them is like, even your location on the island will be a huge factor in how difficult your campaign to become Shogun will be. And to top it off, some of the families you don’t even start off as the head of the clan, you have to work your way up to that before you can even begin your journey to take over enough of the land to become Shogun. And of course, some families are older and more powerful; some are newly formed, young and weak.

Once you’ve settled on a family to control, you have three advisor slots you can fill: Master of Ceremonies, Master of Armies and Master of the Guard. Basically they cover diplomacy, warfare and defense. They’ll help streamline some of the functions of controlling your empire, which trust me, comes in very handy.

A good chunk of what you’ll be doing to expand your power seems like it will come more on the diplomacy side of things, rather than the combat side as with Shogun. You’ll be sending your advisors around to different regions to improve villages and armies and such located there. You’ll be interacting with other family leaders constantly, sending gifts and other interactions to make them like you and assist you on your quest for glory and power. Of course, everyone else is out for the same thing, so naturally they’ll only help you so much.

Everything seems to be balanced and kept in check by the honor system, which is one of the resources you’ll build up as you play. Any aggressive action will cost you honor. Some more than others. Attacking a neighbor which you have a friendly relationship with could completely wipe out your entire honor and be a suicidal move on your part, since even if you succeed, it will be nearly impossible to work with the other families around you, since they’ll view you as dishonorable scum.

When you first boot up the game, it can be very overwhelming. The screens and windows and even the map just seem so convoluted and confusing at first glance. However, after spending some time playing, you may be surprised how quickly you get the hang of everything. Paradox has done an amazing job with the tutorials and tooltips to explain things. It’s actually quite refreshing to see someone put out such a complicated game, but make sure the learning curve isn’t too steep. It seems these days most people either take the easy way of dumbing down the game, or if they don’t, they don’t take the time to adequately explain things. Sengoku also seems to flip-flop back and forth between “waiting for something to happen” and “omg I don’t have enough hands to handle everything that needs to be done RIGHT THIS SECOND”… The pacing could definitely use some work in this regard.

Overall Sengoku is definitely a game to put on your watch list if you love some great indepth strategy. This definitely isn’t one of those games where you’ll be starting a new campaign every 10 hours of gameplay or so. You could easily invest hundreds of hours per campaign, which in my opinion is a great thing. If you’re looking for an action-packed fast paced combat frenzy, you’ll be better off looking elsewhere. But if you want some diplomacy and scheming in your feudal Japan, Sengoku will definitely be the game for you.