History in Games Based on the Romance of the Three Kingdoms

Video games have the ability to allow players interaction or participation with historical events to alter the past and play out what-if scenarios. Loose fidelity to historical facts can be advantageous to the game by expanding the interactive experience, but the game’s presentation and execution of a time period could determine if developers’ interpretations succeed in immersing the player in a fictionalized historical environment. Koei’s interpretations of the Chinese historical novels by Luo Guanzhong, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, are provided mainly in the form of two series: Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Dynasty Warriors. As both series cater to a different audience, Koei chooses greater liberties in Dynasty Warriors as opposed to Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Dynasty Warriors bring effective as well as questionable experiences in the representation of the Three Kingdoms era, but ultimately the former succeeds in merging history and fiction through player interaction.

Romance of the Three Kingdoms is a simulation game where diplomacy and battles occur in determined turns. The player governs provinces in an overview map where civilians and military are represented by numbers in a provinces’ statistics. In battle, the player controls several generals who have their own units. A unit may attack another unit in various methods, such as melee or special tactics, but the player remains disembodied from the fray. The player cannot directly control individuals within a unit and must partly rely on the game programming to determine how many soldiers die and whether or not a special tactic works. The close-up combat of the action game, Dynasty Warriors brings the player to the vanguard, and players take a direct role in accomplishing tasks that lead to victory. Dynasty Warriors’ strength comes from throwing the player in the midst of a battlefield. Each soldier, civilian, beast, and siege weapon is represented by a 3-D model, along with a health indicator, so the player can count each head if he or she chooses. By controlling a single general, and having some authority over bodyguards and troops, the individual battles of history become more personal as the player succeeds or fails at tasks. Actually taking the role of a general, rather than ordering a general, gives the player a stronger sense of fighting in the chaos of battle and having first-person impact on the expansion of territory.

The vague or broad description of most generals in Luo Guanzhong’s novels allows Koei to fill in their interpretations in their own creative manner. Romance of the Three Kingdoms presents characters through painterly portraits while Dynasty Warriors use both portraits and full 3-D models. Defining features such as Lu Bu’s strength or Xiahou Dun’s eye patch are faithfully represented in either series. However, the depiction of other characters—Zhang He, for example—considerably contrasts from one game to the other. Zhang He does not appear as the flirtatious, effeminate narcist that he is in Dynasty Warriors in Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Because of his vanity and an outfit adorned with butterfly wings in Dynasty Warriors, players may take the character less seriously, and the real Zhang He’s character, one of the five top generals of Kingdom Wei, is undermined. His portrait in Romance of the Three Kingdoms, along with other generals (male and female), are drawn with helmets. As generals should be, they appear ready for combat, not ready for a costume party.

Extravagant clothing of characters in Dynasty Warriors helps player-controlled characters and enemy generals stand out from crowds of soldiers, but combined with rock music, heroic or silly poses, fantastical weapons, and gravity-defying action moves almost makes the battlefield appear like a cartoon circus. The more traditional Chinese music and the earthen color palette in Romance of the Three Kingdoms does not jar the player out of the environment. In this case, less is more, and Dynasty Warriors character appearances exceed exquisiteness to the point of ridiculousness while the facelessness of numbers representing soldiers in Romance of the Three Kingdoms leaves room for the player to inject his or her own imagination.

Romance of the Three Kingdoms is a quieter game compared to Dynasty Warriors, which is truer to the reflective ancient Chinese culture. Dynasty Warriors aims for a younger audience with colorful superheroes and fast-paced action. Koei’s decision to insert various aesthetics, such as gaudy costumes, becomes a distraction and pulls the player from the game even if for a brief moment. In the end, the overall atmosphere of Romance of the Three Kingdoms remains consistent, more accurately depicting the Three Kingdoms Era while still allowing fiction through player interaction.