Title: Yokoyama Mitsuteru Sangokushi (trans. Yokoyama Mitsuteru's version of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms)
Release: 06/26/1992
Developer: Tose
Publisher: Angel
Once again we have returned to the bane of this blog: a Japanese exclusive strategy rpg about either the Romance of the Three Kingdoms or the Sengoku period in Japan. This one is about the former: you can see a Zhuge Liang staring right at you with his telltale feather fan and Guan Yu with his beautiful beard right on the box. This will most likely be rather inscrutable.
Background
Yokoyama Mitsuteru was a manga artist who started work in the 1950s, making him one of those stalwarts of the manga industry and a contemporary of the greats such as Osamu Tezuka. He worked diligently in the industry up until his death in 2004, and was known for such works as Tetsujin-28-go a mecha manga, Sally the Witch and Princess Comet, some of the first "magical girl" manga, and most important for today's blog post, manga based on classic Chinese literature such as The Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Water Margins.
While his work never reached international acclaim like Tezuka, he was a much loved manga author in Japan, winning a multitude of awards and with much of his work being adapted into anime, film, and as here, video games. This game is based on the manga of the same name, and is a retelling of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms. For those who don't remember read our earlier blog post on the Koei game of the same name, never played a Dynasty Warriors game, or aren't familiar with Chinese literature or literature, the Romance of the Three Kingdoms is considered one of the great classics of Chinese literature, written by Luo Guanzhong. The Romance of the Three Kingdoms tells the story of the dissolution of the Han Dynasty in China, one of the more powerful early dynasties that existed around the same time as the Roman Empire, and the resultant civil war that erupted between the Wu, Shu, and Wei kingdoms.
The "three kingdoms" break down as follows: you have the Wu, led by the Sun family (of Sun Tzu fame), represented the old guard nobility steeped in family history and tradition (but ultimately ineffectual and callous to the common man and the welfare of China as a state), the Wei led by the despotic Cao Cao, represented military prowess, authoritarianism, and ruthlessness, and the Shu, led by the idealistic Lui Bei and his two sworn brothers, are often considered the "heroes" of this tale, representing the can-do attitude and gumption of the common man in the face of overwhelming odds. It is a much loved story both in China and the world abroad, and many of the people from this tale have been elevated into legends and folklore.
Yokoyama Mitsuteru Sangokushi is Mitsuteru's retelling of the story in a way that is pretty comprehensive; all the various factions are represented, though the story gives special weight to the Shu and Wei factions. The "drama" of the period is especially heightened, and there is a romance subplot built upon between Liu Bei and a girl he saves during the Yellow Turban Rebellion (the inciting incident for this plot). The manga ran for an impressive 16 years and 60 volumes, which speaks for itself it terms of popularity.
As far as developer we have the faithful workhorse, Tose, and the publisher is Angel (later absorbed into Bandai), whom we have seen a couple of times thus far in the blog publishing some other Japanese exclusive games.
Gameplay
Now a quick proviso right up front: once again I do not speak Japanese nor read their written word and there is no working translation available for this game online, so this review will be rather short and making best guesses.
Like Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the story has "scenarios" that you play through, which act as the set dressing for the game itself. Now you can play through this scenario in a whole multitude of different ways and don't need to follow the narrative of the story, but it is there to give context to the different factions. The first scenario starts at what is considered the "inciting incident" of the Three Kingdoms era, which is the Yellow Turban Rebellion. This was a populist and religious rebellion centered around a cult of mystics who wished to overthrow the Han Dynasty, and the noble families and many of the central heroes of the three kingdoms era cut their teeth on the during this revolt. In this scenario it looks like you play the heroes of the Han court in its final days. The second scenario starts right at the actual civil war between the three kingdoms. You can choose who your starting side and build your kingdom from their starting zone.
Sadly, though, there isn't too much more I can really say beyond this. It is a menu have 4X strategy game, and I couldn't figure out how to progress out of my turn, or exactly what actions I was enacting. The presentation is pretty solid: they incorporate the art and styling of Mitsuteru into the game pretty well, which gives your generals and nobles much more personality than in the Romance games. Many of your menu screens will be against splash backgrounds depicting scenes in a city or in the royal court.
Music
The music is pretty solid too!
Manga and Anime
Instead of showing advertisements, I figured I would show off more of the manga and anime this game is based on...
Final Verdict
It certainly is a neat oddity of a game, but one that is inscrutable unless you are a language speaker and reader. And with that, we are done June 1992 EXCEPT for the US developed games.
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