14 DAY TRIAL // There were a lot of muskets and heavily armored cavalry regiments in the most recent Total War titles, Empire and Napoleon, and the setting, coupled with the awkward Artificial Intelligence, meant that the titles were seen as limited at best by the fans who have been with the franchise since the innovation happy days of the first Shogun.
Now The Creative Assembly and SEGA are set to deliver Total War: Shogun 2. Moreover, to show that the return to faction-riddled Japan is also a return to form for the series, the two companies have delivered a demo, one which can easily take up an hour or two of gaming time and shows off the most important elements of the game.
The feeling I got from the demo is that the series is on its way to finding its north yet again, with a sober yet enticing presentation, beautiful map and battle graphics and a set of gameplay mechanics that seem deeply infused by Sun Tzu and Zen concepts.
The demo includes just one historical engagement, which takes place on a pretty big map, with one ally for each side, and it's here that I tried to evaluate the ability of the Artificial Intelligence to guide their armies.
After three times through the battle, it seems that the computer is pretty capable, managing to rout most of my armies outright on my first try and taking a very close victory second time around, mainly because of a very much mistimed charge of cavalry into ashigaru wielded spears.
I managed to beat the computer on the third try and it might just be that it's good performance is linked to the player being rusty more than the game having good A.I.
Take a look at a clip from the game, showing both the strategic map and a tactical battle.