It’s difficult for anyone who isn’t a dedicated fan of Creative Assembly’s real-time strategy titles to keep track of all the games in the Total War series. With Total War: Shogun 2, the series revisits its roots — and by roots, I mean the original title on which the seven (!) others were based.
Shogun 2‘s premise lies within the brutal historical period of feudal Japan, with tribal warlords vying for total control of the region. Choosing between eight factions (all of which are based on real clans of the time period), Shogun 2 asks you to complete a campaign varying in difficulty and the number of Civilization-style turns allowed before assuming command of a unified Japan under your shogunate.
As a newcomer to the series, the learning curve proved unforgiving and I quickly found my lean backside served up on a wooden slate. During the crucial early turns in the campaign I dedicated my clan to pursuing what were apparently the incorrect goals, which aren’t immediately clear, due to the varied geographical, political, and military statuses of your chosen faction. It required a great deal of patience and trial-and-error experiments before becoming accustomed to the rhythm of the over-map gameplay.
Accepting your fate as sword fodder for a few hours yields an enlightening tidbit that fans of the series already know: Shogun 2 provides one of the most addictive real-time strategy experiences on the modern PC. If the classic Total War formula of large-scale conflicts was all that existed within Shogun 2, it’d likely be enough. But the fiber that strings these battles together is the heroin-like overworld that displays the entire geography of Japan, along with cities, units, and ships. Your control over their movement, attacks, and upgrades exist within the aforementioned “turns,” which end with a click of a big, squishy button that makes several hours magically disappear without warning.
The first campaign I played to completion (conquering 40 out of 60 provinces, including the capital of Kyoto) lasted about 15 hours. And that’s using just one clan. After gaining control of so many territories, however, keeping track of the various armies and units becomes cumbersome and overwhelming unless you’re a fiend for micromanagement. The minimap assists by displaying special units and generals, who have their own tech trees and special powers, but neglects to show normal units. In a way, it keeps with the notion that a vast empire becomes difficult to manage as it grows (especially when the damn generals betray you or a city is overrun by Christian rebels), but it causes unneeded headaches in the game.
Sounds great so far, right? But now you’re wondering if it’s going to run on your three-year old PC. It’s a good news/bad news situation. Shogun 2 works well enough to run on a medium-to-low end machine, but the extent to which I had to scale down the settings actually impacted the gameplay. During hectic battles it becomes difficult to determine which units are located where, as lower resolutions and textures blurred the field of view and resulted in a feeling of lost control. As with most modern PC titles, Shogun 2 is a thing of beauty on a high-end PC. Rain drips through the trees, fire effects are spectacular (especially during night battles), and each unit appears to animate uniquely.
In the same way Age of Empires 2 provided a basic understanding of the events that led to the Imperial Age and the characters who forged the European world (and therefore helped me pass some junior high history classes), Shogun 2 does a fine job of explaining the historical events and key players in the development of classical Japan. Plus, there’s a rich encyclopedia built into the game, so if something specific catches your eye, there’s a link right to the page for more information.
There are few games in my life that have drawn hundreds of hours of my attention and there certainly hasn’t been one that’s done so for a several years. Shogun 2 looks like the next contender for that mindshare throne at the moment. It’s a treat for those who will give it a chance and utterly rewarding for the people who stick with it. I’m a “one RTS at a time” kind of guy, and this is the one for me right now.
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Things We Liked: Great educational benefits. Classic Total War combat returns with improvements. Wonderfully addicting “one more turn” overmap.
Things We Disliked: Muddled unit differentiation on lower graphical settings. Campaign map can become unwieldy after several dozen turns. Horrendously addicting “one more turn” overmap.
Target Audience: RTS fans. PC gamers looking to push their machine’s capabilities. History buffs or those looking to learn about feudal Japan.
[Author’s note: The multiplayer aspect of Shogun 2 wasn’t operating correctly at the time of this review's writing. If/when it’s patched we’ll post a multiplayer impressions piece and link it back here. But from what I’ve played of it, it seems to be just fine... when it’s working properly.]
(Total War: Shogun 2 – Developer: The Creative Assembly. Publisher: Sega. Available for PC. A copy of the game was provided by the publishers for review purposes. Unfamiliar with CFD!’s review system? Read our newly revised explanation here.)
