Total War has been enjoying its time among the greenskins and the undead, but we’ve been waiting to see exactly which period it’d land in when it returns to its historical roots for its next major installment. Now the answer is here. Total War: Three Kingdoms.
The year is 190CE. China is in turmoil. The Han Dynasty crumbles before the child-emperor. He is but a figurehead; a mere puppet for the tyrant warlord Dong Zhuo. It is a brutal and oppressive regime, and as Dong Zhuo s power grows, the empire slips further into the cauldron of anarchy… Only one thing is certain: the very future of China will be shaped by its champions. Total War: Three Kingdoms is the next major historical strategy game in the award-winning Total War series.
This is both unexpected and precisely> the kind of setting I was hoping for. A mostly self-contained conflict with a clear end-goal and set of factions. The trailer follows.
If you’ve ever come back from holiday to find that your flatmates/children/parents have flooded the kitchen/dyed the cat blue/thrown out all your original Jethro Tull LPs, then spare a thought for the Tomb Kings, Total War: Warhammer II’s first all-new DLC faction. Once upon a time, they ruled a pseudo-Ancient Egyptian empire in which scholars quested for the secret to eternal youth and tyrants went merrily to the grave, confident of resurrection in paradise. Several millennia and a couple of necromancy wars later, the mummified Kings stumble from their pyramids to find their bodies reduced to KFC leftovers, their southern homeland of Nehekhara trashed, and the continent awash with bearded barbarians, talking rats and stupid sexy dinosaurs.
Unfortunately for all the younger races, the Tomb Kings are far stronger in death than they were in life. I spent half an hour getting to grips with their quirks, including a series-first crafting system. Here are my thoughts.