Just finished my first campaign as Cao Cao, clocked in at 82 hours, manually fighting battles is amazingly time consuming, makes me feel my age too as I come out of them often times forgetting what I was working on at the strategic level.
I’d rate this as the single best Total War campaign I’ve ever played, I’m that impressed by it.
The shifting developments in the court, the assignments you make to run commanderies, the generals you select and groom, all make running your faction fun and the decisions feel like they mean something.
Couple this with diplomacy that makes the strategic layer much more dynamic and the campaign just comes to life. The twist and turns of alliances both for and against you are never ending.
It also feels like the different stages of the campaign work better, forcing you to bring different skills to bear at each phase.
I’m going to put this one down, read Three Kingdoms and then start a new one more knowledgeable about the personalities involved.
Impressive piece of work by CA, I must say I never saw this one coming.