Each character in the game has a "troop strength" number. Instead of selecting a single character to go into battle, you need to select an entire squad. The second part, if you choose to, will be going into battle to try to conquer an adjacent territory. There is a lot to think about here as ever move is critical to success, a wrong move and your squad might not have enough strength to carry out an attack. When starting out, you usually get two actions you can take and if you aren't sure about what to do, you can have the computer do it for you, but of course this may screw you over if you aren't careful. Of course taxing your people will not earn you any brownie points with them and can lower your fame, and fame is important since it decides how many of these political actions you can take during the planning turn.
The decisions made here can range from shifting your Warriors around your various castles for the next battle, trying to form an alliance with enemy clans, trying to recruit new members, or you can impose a tax on the people you rule over to bring in some extra cash. Here you need to decide what actions you want to take to help your camp. There are two parts to every turn your camp has in the game. From strategists, military, personnel and development, putting certain characters in these roles will give your overall camp a number of stats including troop strength, fame, and loyalty, and these stats are extremely important because they all come into play as the game goes on. Let me tell you, there is a ton of stuff that you need to take into account before you even get into battle. Then you need to appoint your political staff. You can select any clan you wish to play as but the game does suggest that certain ones are used. Think of it like the start of a game of Risk. Once a scenario is selected, you will be taken to the map screen with many areas of Japan populated by the various clans in the game.
I think the first scenario I finished in about three hours, but you do get the option to end the game and start a new one, or continue playing. Most of these scenarios have a single objective that needs to be completed. When you first start the game you can select one of three scenarios, with more unlocking over time. The biggest difference you will notice in Empires is that it's as much of a strategy game as it is a hack and slash. Samurai Warriors 4 Empires takes the hack and slash action that you love and adds strategy elements to the game to become a pretty fun and unique title.
Sure there are some fan-service type game modes in the One Piece games and Hyrule Warriors that appeal to fans of those franchises, but for the most part, the meat and the potatoes of these games is the story mode, so when I was asked to review Samurai Warriors 4 Empires, I was expecting it to be the same thing that I have played multiple times before.
For the most part, the story modes in these games usually involve being placed on a map, killing all of the enemy bosses, taking over the map, getting a short cut scene in between and then you move onto the next map. Obviously they are similar in their gameplay, but also in what they offer for game modes as well. Taking out hundreds of enemies with ridiculous over the top moves, taking over bases, it's fun, but the one thing I have noticed about a lot of these games is that they are quite similar. Sure they are monotonous but they are incredibly fun. I have also played a ton of Hyrule Warriors and long story short, I really enjoy these games. I reviewed Warriors Orochi 3 and two of the One Piece, Warriors games. I have reviewed a number of games in the Warriors franchise here on Gaming Nexus.