Game of Thrones, China

[Huberto]

Interesting longish interview with CA's studio director, Rob Bartholomew.

https://venturebeat.com/2018/06/03/how-total-war-developer-pushes-its-games-forward-and-fans-can-push-back/

He confirms that Three Kingdoms will be based on the Romance of the Three Kingdoms stories, mixed in with history. He says they must make the game this way to appeal to Chinese consumers:

It is first and foremost a historical game, but it’s based on the Romance of the Three Kingdoms literary works, which are near to the period. What Three Kingdoms represents for us is a fantastic opportunity to engage with the Chinese market.

Actually RoTK was written over a thousand years after the actual events dramatized in the novel. So it is "first and foremost" fiction that takes place in a historical setting. I wonder what is the matter with the Chinese consumer that they can't tolerate their proud and distinguished history in game form without the fictional overlay? Or is it CA being afraid or in the thrall of fantasy now?

You have this incredible cast of characters from the Romance of the Three Kingdoms works that the Chinese audience, and some others as well, is intimately familiar with. We talk about the subject matter as if it’s a kind of Chinese Game of Thrones to our Western audience because it’s so brilliantly stacked with larger-than-life, colorful, heroic and villainous characters.

Inevitably there is a clear Warhammer tie-in, and 3K is being designed and sold with Warhammer fans in mind (as well as the Chinese market):

Something the Warhammer games have taught us is that people connect really well with those big, bold characters. Obviously, we have this fantastic cast of heroes and villains in the Warhammer world that we’ve tried to do justice to with our games there. That’s something our fan base and the players of those games have connected strongly with.

I can't say I connected very well with the "Warhammer world" which I found asinine but maybe that's just me.

While CA/SEGA will be marketing 3K as a historical title, it appears that history will be heavily blended with fictional elements, as many of us suspected. So we'll have "characters" like in Warhammer. Next obvious questions are whether 3K will go for ahistorical fighting, weapons, heroes, magic -- will they be in 3K as they are in Game of Thrones or Dynasty Warriors?

I'm starting to see the logic of Saga/ThroB -- it was supposed to be something authentic for the history nerds. Too bad it was so superficial.

[zoner16]

There is already a thread for this.

[Abdülmecid I]

To be honest, I don't think there ever was a doubt that the game would be based on the Romance, instead of the Records. The former is much more popular (and consequently profitable), so there was no chance CA would sacrifice its revenues for the sake of historical "authenticity". The trailer was not the only hint, by the way, since, during a visit of some Chinese fans in CA's studios, it had been confirmed that the game would be orientated towards the mythical legends of the Romance. Meanwhile, the successful Warhammer trilogy provides the company with a very useful platform (heroes, RPG trait system and etc.). Personally, I don't care much, because, as a very casual (and pretty bad) TW player, I always avoid the games whose timeframes do not particularly fascinate me (ThroB, Charlemagne, Shogun, Spartaaa! and etc.).

On the other hand, it's interesting to notice CA's comparison with Game of Thrones. ThroB was clearly inspired from the TV show, in what concerns the title, the trailer's music and the sprawling cities, so that statement further enforces my suspicion that CA definitely aims to launch a GoT TW game, at least before the current trend gradually evaporates. After all, we all have our dreams about the ideal TW period, but the truth is that CA's business policy is solely determined by popular culture (Orcs!, Romans!, Spartans!, Vikings!, Knights!, White Walkers!). If someone wishes to convince CA (or another potential developer) that history-based games are worthy of investment, then I am afraid that mature customer behaviour is obligatory. Vote with your wallet. If we didn't, I doubt that the Scythians and Augustus would have been free in Rome II.

[zoner16]

To be honest, I don't think there ever was a doubt that the game would be based on the Romance, instead of the Records. The former is much more popular (and consequently profitable), so there was no chance CA would sacrifice its revenues for the sake of historical "authenticity". The trailer was not the only hint, by the way, since, during a visit of some Chinese fans in CA's studios, it had been confirmed that the game would be orientated towards the mythical legends of the Romance.

Just to clear up some misconceptions, the visit to CA headquarters gave some mixed results. You can read the transcript here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/totalwar/co...munity_member/

Some key quotes:

Although the artistic work would take reference from TV drama, the core of the game is still historical where CA is good at it. CA will still stick to the historical aspect of the game (there will not be Zhuge Liang sitting on a giant armor car and casting huge fireball like in Warhammer.)

To sum up it will be an orthodox total war game with Chinese style.

The novel is slightly deviated from history to push the narrative but it don't really have fantasy things like in warhammer.

The author clarifies some of the odd contradictions that seemed to pop up in the post in one of the comments. Essentially, he said that the game is presenting the events of the Romance in historical style, so the mythical elements of some of the Romance retellings (i.e. Dynasty Warriors and whatnot) aren't present, but the historical fiction elements (Hulao Gate, the weapons of Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, and Lu Bu) are present.

This is all really vague and I'm hesitant as to how much of the Romance I'm willing to stomach in Three Kingdoms, so I'm going to wait until the E3 reveal before I do any more speculating.

[Mantis42]

Every Total War game draws from the pop culture depictions of their respective era. The aesthetics of Rome and Medieval get just as much from Hollywood as they do from history, Shogun draws on Kurosawa epics like Kagemusha and Ran, etc. As long as the battle system has a solid foundation in real world tactics, at least as much as the previous games do, then there really isn't a problem for me when it comes to using the novel for the world building fluff. Basically any version of a Three Kingdoms game is going to have to have a strong emphasis on characters ​necessarily​, because it was a civil war, not a clash of civilizations, based around the forces of individual warlords, where personal ties of loyalty played an important role. Yea, yea, I don't want to see superpowered hero units either but I'm cool with the Romance stuff. It's not as over the top as Dynasty Warriors makes it seem and some interpretations of it have been pretty grounded.