Shogun: Total War Warlord Edition PC
Metascore
87 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 7 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 7 out of 7
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 7
  3. Negative: 0 out of 7
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  1. GameZone
    95
    Entrancing.
  2. Computer Games Magazine
    90
    Adds so much additional meat to the original design that going back to the old game seems unthinkable.
  3. IGN
    89
    [Review of "Mongol Invasion" expansion only] A crapload of fun! Let's just get to the gist of it here, this is a good expansion pack.
  4. GameSpy
    86
    A great expansion pack. It makes Shogun better, adds new units, modes, and campaigns, and yet doesn't disrupt the sweaty-palmed fun of the original.
  5. GameSpot
    85
    It's the mark of a good expansion like this that you can't imagine going back to playing without it. And The Mongol Invasion renders the original Shogun, an excellent game in its own right, almost obsolete.
  6. ActionTrip
    82
    A well-conceived expansion pack, which offers plenty of new single-player excitement...but the fact remains that I still had troubles positioning my troops exactly how I wanted to.
  7. Gamezilla!
    81
    Graphics don't make a game, but when they are outdated enough to cause a distraction, you know it is a time for an upgrade.

User Reviews

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User Score
8.8 out of 10

Generally favorable reviews- based on 21 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 10 out of 10
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 10
  3. Negative: 0 out of 10
  1. Deadfirefly
    9
    Near perfect! One of the best strategy games available!
    Graphics are still good for a game of its time.
    Captures the intense strategic decisio    ns on the battlefield in feudal japan very well.… Full Review »
  2. thequillguy
    9
    Shogun Total War is one of those games that allows you dream of how to gloriously command thousands (or, at least, dozens) of screaming samurai. By allowing devious flanking tactics, or encouraging heroic frontal assaults, STW was the first game to depict the frantic action of real time strategy with mainstream success.

    Which, when you consider that the game was originally intended as a 2D strategy game, makes this game a definitive milestone of the RTS genre. The strength of game is its simplified unit interaction: like paper (spears), scissors (cavalry) and stone (archers) ever unit beats and counters an other unit. Unlike the expansive RTS units of SupComm or SCII, mastery of unit types should be expected in hours rather than weeks. There's no seeking for the 'overbalanced' unit combination or the perfect build-order in this game; only blood and thunder battlefield fighting.

    Ten years after first release, the gameplay still holds up surprisingly well. The kill rate of units is low (perhaps too low!) but this places a greater emphasis on the paper-scissor-stone principles by which the game runs. Add into this the significant effect of hills (archers will beat infantry with a height advantage in melee) and flanking (even now tying an enemy head-on with infantry and flanking with cavalry is the RTS staple tactic) and you have warfare that is satisfyingly expansive. By expansive I mean there is a real feeling that a smaller army can defeat much larger numbers with superior tactics. Such victories exploit the game's excellent morale model. You don't need to kill every soldier to win a battle. Even now I can remember battles a decade imprinted on my memory - the enemy ushered through a valley to attack my weakened archers; the hidden charge from woods; and the routing of one flank that rolls down the rest of the enemy until a fresh force flees from my emergent (and no doubt grinning) general. The campaign mode itself was pleasingly simplified. I always played as Shimazu (the green ones) not least because they were tucked away in the corner. As always in such strategy games, no-one has yet devised a way to counteract strategic AI. In the end game, I always faced off the Hojo clan who had horded dozens of armies into a few spaces. While something that I accepted at the time, these days such a gameplay facet would (rightly) demand a patch, or simply recognise that the campaign is won when 50% of map is yours.

    The expansion pack (part of this game) goes some way to addressing these problems but it still lets slip with the overpowered brutality of the mongol heavy cavalry. Having spent 100s of battles watching body counters drop a man at a time, the shock at seeing multiple people die at once is enough to make the mongol expansion feel like the challenge of countering a truly warmonging race with what are essentially a civilised people. So should you own and play this game because it defined a genre? The graphics are, admittedly, pixilated with a 680 resolution. The campaign can drag on. Heavy cavalry aren't my first choice when I have infinite money. And the bridge battles are immensely arduous tests of attrition.

    But the immersion is still there. The sound is evocative of the Sengoku period and the battlefield principles are still refreshingly straightforward and effective. If you win a battlefield, you really feel a sense of control. Even more so than a ctrl + A then right click on their general. I've owned three copies of this game - you should grace your collection with one.    … Full Review »
  3. ArekusuS.
    10
    Wow. This game r0x. The onbly problem = Bad multiplayer settings. I can't seem to get it to work.... oh well, this still is one of the best made games I have ever played! :D -----------------------Teh Kekkers has made teh vote.… Full Review »
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