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far this year, I have had a plethora of strategy games to review, with settings ranging from Napoleonic Europe to a near-future fictional war between Syria and the U.S. With Takeda 3, I can now add one set in feudal Japan. It brands itself as a strategy game wherein you take control of one of 25 historical clans, engage in diplomacy, manage castles and territory, and command armies. With both broad strategic elements and tactical battles, Takeda 3 follows in the footsteps of its predecessors in giving you a taste of the Sengoku Jidai (“Warring States Period”).Strategically, Takeda 3 combines some basic resource management with a substantial number of historically specific

concerns that need addressing. Each of the 25 clans in the game owns one or more castles, which represent not only the fortifications proper, but the surrounding farmlands and towns. The lands owned by your clan produce rice, which acts as both army supplies and the basic building blocks for most structures; gold, which can be used to purchase special items, hire ninjas and bribe the emperor; and sometimes teppo, which are Portuguese muskets. Your castles also produce various kinds of troops, based on the structures you have built. Managing these things is not too difficult, though as time progresses, your need for teppo will begin to outstrip your ability to acquire them. The historical aspects of the game include various real clans and people. It also involves historically accurate setups for each of its three scenarios, not unlike Europa Universalis 3: In Nomine, meaning that the difficulty of the game is as much influenced by the settings as it is by which clan you choose to play.The strategic portion of the game is also taken up with diplomacy and espionage. Marrying off daughters to secure alliances with other clans is a useful and popular pastime in the game, but the ninja make the best spies. These ninja don’t resemble the characters of film and legend with familiar powers such as invisibility, but instead perform more mundane and useful tasks. While assassination and spying are obvious actions ninja can perform, they can also burn down the gates of castles, destroy the supplies of armies and spread rumors. These actions have very practical tactical effects, making what would otherwise be an unstoppable army with brilliant commanders far more vulnerable to attack. Ninja also perform counter-espionage duties; they will often inform you that either your armies have been sabotaged or that your defending ninjas have killed someone attempting to subvert your forces. Given the fickleness of your subordinates, the abilities of ninjas and the limited resources available, you can’t just win battles tactically while ignoring the administration of your clan.While Takeda 3’s graphics are on par with what you might expect from an engine using DirectX 8, it is in its tactical battles that this game really shines. The best adjective I could use to describe them is ‘elegant.’ Tactical battles include the opportunity to choose realistic and historical formations in organizing your forces, as well as realistic weather, climate and time-of-day effects. Historical figures are available to command your forces and those of your enemies, substantially affecting gameplay. For example, I have yet to win a fight against Oda Nobunaga without outnumbering him substantially or sabotaging his army. The most interesting facet of combat, however, is that battles are not fought to the death; they are instead fought until one side or the other has completely fled the field. As there are a large number of factors that contribute to whether or not a division and its commander flee, most fights are not won by tactics that increase casualties. Instead, they are won through the use of properly timed flanking actions that make it possible to quickly demoralize your opponent’s troops.With my praise of the tactical aspects of the game, it would be easy to assume that Takeda 3 is a shoo-in for the Avault Seal of Excellence. However, I found myself disappointed by a number of problems with its design and optimization. First, the interface for the strategic portions will give you headaches until you master it. There is practically no right-click functionality and various important functions are buried in the Palace menu. For example, if you see an army whose supplies you want to burn, you cannot just right-click on the army and send a ninja. Instead, you have to remember whose army it is and who is commanding it, then go to the Palace menu, browse for the clan and army in question, and then send the ninja. Similar issues affect diplomacy and building improvements at castles. There is also the problem of loading times for the tactical battles. Even if your rig blows away the system requirements for the game, tactical battles can take up to two minutes to load. This can be mitigated somewhat by fiddling with settings, but I found myself very discouraged that I had to wait so long to play out the battles.Takeda 3 is a bit of a mixed bag. The battles are truly enjoyable, and the strategic portion of the game ensures that you’ll be kept happily busy between them. On the other hand, the interface is needlessly clunky and crude; we know how to build better interfaces these days. The optimization problems also substantially reduce my enjoyment of the game. If what I’ve said still interests you, take a peek at my video review and pick up the demo before purchasing.