11/18/20 The Ancient Art of War (1984)

The Ancient Art of War (1984) by Dave and Barry Murry of Evryware, published by Brodebund for DOS, Apple II, Atari ST, Amiga, and more. More than a few Broderbund titles recently, hm. This can be considered an early example of a Real Time Strategy game, an ancestor if you will of the likes of Total War and Crusader Kings. You have a selection of scenarios which aren’t exact historical battles, but more themed around certain engagements or made-up tales. There’s one based on Custer’s Last Stand, for instance, but also one where Zeus and Loki play a game to see whose summoned human will reach the flag first. There’s quite a bit of depth on display, with lots of customizable options and even the ability to make your own maps and campaigns– a feature way ahead of its time. There are four types of units, Knights, Archers, Barbarians, and Spies, which have a Fire Emblem-esque rock-paper-scissors advantage over one another, with Spies being more of a utility class. Once you move your units on the overworld to engage with an enemy’s group, you can zoom in and issue commands to your troops. The commands are pretty basic, being not much more than attack and retreat. Even so, the makeup of a squad is important, as just having a bad formation can spell defeat. Your individual soldiers’ performances are even affected by stats like morale and hunger. There’s even more to go over, like terrain, distraction battles, and other tactics, but suffice to say that this title has a lot more going on than you might expect from a title of this era. I don’t know if I would recommend it over a more modern historical strategy game, but it’s worth a look for it’s achievement alone.