I have a rather long history with Koei Tecmo’s Chinese Three Kingdoms period-based games. Besides the Dynasty Warriors series, I have also grown fond of the more down-to-earth Romance of the Three Kingdoms strategy games that have individual role-playing elements. So when Koei Tecmo announced Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 Remake, I was very excited to see how the new game would play like. While it successfully brings back a classic entry with modern features, omissions in its localization bog it down.
Most entries in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms game series have an exclusive focus on playing as regional rulers who vie to unify China while recruiting officers and managing controlled cities. Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 is one of the few four mainline entries besides 7, 10, and 13 as of 2024 that feature the ability to play as subordinates and unaffiliated officers. The seventh installment may be the series’ first-ever game with individual viewpoints that came out in 2000, but its features were very barebones. Character relationship features like declaring new sworn siblings and marriages were only made available in the 2001 release of 8 and its Power-Up Kit expansion in 2002. And since 8 was more like a direct upgrade to 7, I can totally see why Koei Tecmo chose 8 as a basis for this remake.
The PC version that I got is not only the intended main platform for this game; it also has some exclusive features not in the console releases. While the PlayStation and Switch builds mostly separated each language version to its own SKU, I could freely set the language to English, Japanese, Chinese, or Korean when I boot up the PC game. Furthermore, the PC version also has an exclusive extra program that lets you insert your own character portraits into the game.
The uploaded custom portraits add even more varieties for creating original officers. You can set the character’s starting stats and abilities as you like without any restrictions. You can even pre-determine familial relations and compatibilities with any existing characters. But what caught me by surprise is that the new officer’s biography will be automatically filled based on the stats inputted if you did not write anything there before registering them.
Once you have selected your player character and starting location, it’s time to start the game. But before that, it is worth noting that the original Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 used to let you play as multiple characters, including those who belong to opposing factions. The remake completely removed that option. That means you can only view the world from a single character’s viewpoint.
Koei Tecmo still retains a majority of gameplay elements that the original Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 had in this remake. While the time in 10 and 13 passed on a daily basis, 8 has monthly turns instead. You will be allocated action points every month to perform activities like developing cities or interacting with other officers, and these points will also be replenished in the new month.
While Free Officer has been my favorite starting position, its features are unfortunately very limited here. Unlike in Romance of the Three Kingdoms 10 or 13’s expansion pack, I could not even raise my own militia troops when I am completely alone. The only requests available were too costly, with few rewards to boot. That meant I really had to interact with the townsfolk or other characters to make any progress.
Only after you have been affiliated with a faction, can you enter a Parliament session whenever a new season kicks in. You can gather intelligence on other areas or attempt sabotage plots here, but these sessions will also be the only moments you can launch invasions on enemy cities.
No matter what your position or activity is, building relationships with other characters is of the utmost importance in Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 Remake. Forming Synergetic destinies and close-knit relations, like sworn siblings and marriages will let them provide performance bonuses for your both your domestic and in-battle activities. Unlike the original game, many female officers appear by default in this remake, and some of them are not married by default either. This is particularly very helpful for both finding more marriage candidates, as well as generating children who can also act as your character’s successors. I also noticed in my subordinate playthrough that my liege would often accommodate officers with close-knit relations to move to the same city I reside in. Having such officers nearby really sped up my progression.
The largest change made in Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 Remake is the way story events are triggered. Events no longer run on their own from behind the scenes with the brand-new inclusion of the Tales system. You can now check the exact requirements to trigger the events, and you can even choose whether to actually trigger them or not at all. The triggerable events range from historical stories to job promotions and even finding new spouses. However, one very nifty thing I particularly noticed about historical events is that some of them have fictional what-if scenarios with better endings incorporated as formal branches. This Tales system is, without a doubt, the best addition, and I hope it will also be included in the series’ future entries.
But with all the requirements and results shown, one would expect every side-event to be informed in advance as well. Some of the request events can result in unannounced duels. So when I played as a Strategist-type character, I would have practically no way to get past a decently strong bandit to clear the quest.
Koei Tecmo also brought in Debates—which first appeared in Romance of the Three Kingdoms 10—for Strategist-type characters to compete in place of the Warrior-focused Duels. But for better or worse, both Debate and Duel have the exact same system. Each side must use a numbered card in each turn, and they can add more if the numbers are the same or increment in order.
The advantage rules may get a bit confusing at first, but the amount of cards played will be prioritized over the total number amassed. In addition, later turns will generate larger damage, so you are more encouraged to preserve your deck until you can unleash them all in the final turn. The consequences of losing a Debate usually range from loss in money to reputation, so they are not as severe as a non-casual Duel that can result in an injury or even death if it happens during a battle.
Speaking of the battles, Koei Tecmo has also made some overhauls to them in Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 Remake. The company still retains the basic gist of the turn-based strategy battle system, but the square grids have been changed to hexes. While I am personally more of a fan of square grids, hexes do have more advantages, as they give more slots to surround enemies.
While the game has tactics and stratagems that can deal major damage, most of them can only be used once or twice. I ultimately found out that the best damage contributors are the bonds I have forged with allied officers. Such bonds would provide Links that boost damage when such officers are also within the attacking range, so the best way to win battles here is really to gang up on one enemy at a time with a group of closely related officers.
Most of the gameplay segments in Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 Remake do not involve heavy processing, apart from the 3D-intensive parts like battles and duels. Even then, I could still run everything in 60 fps with an RTX 3070 and a not-so-recent Core i9 CPU. However, the game does not have options to further increase the frame rate. There is also a soundtrack option, which allows you to choose between the remake or the original version. I personally preferred the remake versions, as they are better orchestrated.
While the gameplay system itself is mostly fine enough, there are several issues with Romance of the Three Kingdom 8 Remake’s localization that hamper the experiences if you don’t select the Japanese version. Koei Tecmo used to include a Chinese voiceover option in more recent entries like Romance of the Three Kingdoms 13 and 14. But in 8 Remake, the voiceovers are only available in Japanese with no other language options. The omission of a more authentic and region-accurate language voiceover, when it had been present in prior entries, is a very unfortunate downgrade.
I also noticed very prominent usage of the “they/them” pronouns to refer to individuals in most of the in-game lines for the English localization. This still makes sense for the regular gameplay lines, since there were no pronoun usages in the original Japanese version, but I also found these instances in the historical event dialogues as well. The latter would only make sense if you could gender-bend the characters in Ikki Tousen or Koihime Musou style. But even after I unlocked the feature to edit historical characters, it still would not let me change their genders to justify this decision.
But that is not even the biggest issue I have with this game’s—or rather the series’—English localization. Even though the whole series has run for more than twenty years, Koei Tecmo has still yet to fully commit to implementing courtesy names in the English version. The company does actually make some efforts towards this by retaining references to courtesy names for some of the key characters and historical events. However, it still omitted the input entry for courtesy names that characters could occasionally declare in place of their given names during regular gameplay lines. This feature has been a given in the Japanese and Chinese versions, so those who can only play the English version are still missing a good part of the immersion in the game’s universe.
Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 Remake ultimately did a decent job of bringing back a classic series entry by including newer features from the more modern entries, although it’s still not enough to convert me into believing this to be the best one among the series entries with personal viewpoints. (Romance of the Three Kingdoms 10 still holds that dear spot for me.) But while the Tales event triggers are a highlight, a number of glaring issues in its localization make it rather difficult to recommend this game over the prior entries unless you can play the game in its original Japanese build.
Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 Remake will be available worldwide on PC, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, and Nintendo Switch on October 24, 2024.
Theater of war, infinite drama. A masterpiece of historical simulation "ROMANCE OF THE THREE KINGDOMS 8" is revived after 20 years. Enjoy the greatest military drama in the Three Kingdoms series, with the largest number of officers and scenarios! PC version reviewed. Review copy provided by company for testing purposes.
Romance of the Three Kingdoms 8 Remake successfully brings back a classic entry with modern features, but omissions in its localization bogs it down.
- The Tales system gives you choices to trigger story events as you like it.
- As with prior series entries, the PC version comes with a program that lets you insert your own character portraits.
- The English localization’s inclusion of courtesy names for certain characters and event scenes is a step in the right direction, but it's still far from perfect.
Published: Oct 23, 2024 08:00 am