It’s time for another tactics title and unfortunately I am here to say that it is definitely not a particularly good one. As with the others that I’ve played recently, it takes away all the fun from the concept. The game goes too far in trying to be as realistic as possible and completely forgets about the fun factor. You always need a good balance in order to succeed here and the game completely forgot about that. It’s a shame since I think this could have really ended up being solid but in the end it definitely did not live up to the potential.

When you begin the game you get to pick which event you want to play through. Big history buffs will recognize the differences but to a casual player it all looks the same. Fun enough and all that but nothing to really hang your hat on. They may as well have only had one level for all the difference it would make. The levels can also be quite long as I managed to survive for well over a decade before dying and that’s considering that I had no clue what to do.

Aside from combat you can also make deals among the men, give them food, barter for items, etc. The game lets you simulate almost every part of a real war from back in the day. You definitely have a lot of control this way and I can definitely see someone getting a kick out of it but the problem is that everything takes so long. This is probably unavoidable for a game of this scale from back in the day but it also means that you wish it was not so intricate.

You want to be able to just rush in and start fighting but of course you are penalized for doing that. It puts you in a really bad position because you are meant to do all of the side parts of the game but in that case it will be forever until you see any real combat. The actual combat is slow enough as it is since you can barely move in each turn. It ends up feeling like a real RNG fest. I know a lot of it comes down to skill as well and I couldn’t figure that out either. So as a result everything ends up going sideways here. Not really the way to go about things.

At the end of the day this feels like a war simulation game but without any real hook. It doesn’t help that the graphics are not particularly good. They’re not awful or anything but they also aren’t testing the limits of the SNES architecture. You’ll forget all about them by the end, same with the soundtrack. It’s just very generic and doesn’t do anything to elevate the experience. At the end of the day it means that this is a game that will not withstand the test of time, not even by a little bit.

Throwing in a true story mode would really help for this kind of thing. Adding that in addition to the simulation mode would have been a really good idea. For starters it would give you a way to really identify with the characters as well as make you want to keep playing. There isn’t much reason to play through otherwise since there are no real cutscenes. You just have to absolutely love the gameplay and it feels like that would be a very limited audience. How many people actually enjoy that kind of thing? Give me a classic 3D beat em up instead any day. Then no matter what happens with my allies and the A.I., I know that I can do in and just start taking names. That’s a way more fun experience.

Overall, This is definitely not a game that you have a whole lot of fun with. It was too ambitious for its own good although even in the modern day I’m not sure how good a remake would be. If it can make things very cinematic then that could work but the key will be ensuring that every part of the game is fun. Counting up the money and distributing among the warriors doesn’t really seem like a good idea if you ask me. It’s just not the proper way to play a game and have a blast. Definitely skip out on this title if you can.

Overall 3/10