Warriors: Legends of Troy is Dynasty Warriors for people who hate Dynasty Warriors

by Jem Alexander on Jun 9th 2009 9:30PM

Koei has a reputation for being a Dynasty Warriors factory and, considering people in the West don't get the series, the company's offerings largely go unnoticed. Eager to change that, Koei discussed with us their plans to release a new game, Warriors: Legends of Troy, which will be a part of the Warriors series developed for PS3 and 360 by western developers with a western audience in mind.

The project is being handled by Koei Canada, a relatively new developer which started out life as a CG only studio, before becoming a software house in 2005. The company developed Fatal Inertia and ported Warriors Orochi over to the PSP, but Legends of Troy is their real coming out party.

Targeting a release around Spring of 2010, Warriors: Legends of Troy shifts the setting from the classic tale Romance of the Three Kingdoms -- which is far more well known in the East -- to the Trojan War. Koei Canada is hoping that this change in setting will make people in the West a lot more interested in the title. But that's not the only thing that makes it different from a Dynasty Warriors title.

Warriors: Legends of Troy

Not only is Warriors: Legends of Troy a Dynasty Warriors game for people who hate Dynasty Warriors, it's also by people who hate Dynasty Warriors. Koei Canada wants to reinvent the Warriors franchise with Legends of Troy. It wants a more strategic gameplay mechanic, rather than mindless hacking and slashing. At the same time the developers are intent on making the game accessible, whilst still making players think.

Legends of Troy will cover the entire length of the 10-year Trojan War, taking influence from mythology and contemporary literature such as the Iliad. There will be supernatural elements, such as interference from the Greek Gods, but these will handled appropriately. The characters you take control of, including Achilles and Odysseus, will find the Gods appropriately terrifying, should they appear to them.

Koei Canada's ability is unproven in the 3rd person action game genre, but even so we're actually quite intrigued by the title. We haven't seen any gameplay footage, so Koei Canada's Michael Bond's posturing is all we have to go off right now, but we're not hating the idea of seeing more of this game closer to its Spring 2010 release. Considering it's a Warriors game from Koei, that's a pretty big compliment. This might be a game to keep in your periphery for a while.

Tags: e3-2009, koei, koei-canada, legends-of-troy, Microsoft, warriors-legends-of-troy, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (39)

Koei makes activision look like an upstart indie dev

"Warriors: Legends of Troy is Dynasty Warriors for people who hate Dynasty Warriors"

What happens if your mildly entertained by Dynasty Warriors. Would you be mildly annoyed then?

This looks pretty awesome, but a year away? that sucks.
Also, if they dont put online multiplayer in, then fuck then and dynasty warriors. I understand no online in 5 empires, as that was the first next gen game, but come on, nothing in 6 or 6 empires?

I have to agree, the games are so perfectly built for co-op, it seems embarrassing that they still don't include it as an online component. Playing in co-op adds the strategy element that people seem to diss the series for lacking, and its far more fun to strategise with someone who can react and provide feedback than simply ordering troops around.

Well, I may be in the minority but I love the Warriors games. Sure they don't change much, and they really need to make one that makes use of this generations consoles, but I just cannot help but love the full battlefield, take out out whole armies feel.

The Ancient mythological setting seems to really fit with this style of game as well, sure they say they are changing a lot, but as long as they keep the big battles and a fairly large character list I'll be happy. It may be a game for those who hate Dynasty Warriors, but I'm betting those who love it will still find this new game as entertaining as they always have.

I bet they will... mostly because I think the idea is they just hate the "Dynasty" part. Not the game itself, but the chinese historical background. So the whole concept is a Warriors game where the characters are more familiar to westerners, probably keeping the beat 'em up mechanics and adding a whole lot of blood (yay!)

Hmm, sounds interesting. I had DW4 for awhile but well it's Dynasty Warriors. Same as DW2, DW3. This will be on my radar.

I am going to wait for gameplay videos... CG can make any game look good but the fact remains, while CG is a nice touch, gameplay is the difference.

Hopefully they'll keep the guitars.

Dynasty warriors Strikeforce is kinda repetitive and boring. I liked the PS2 versions better

Too bad most people won't buy this title because of their negative views on Koei's "Warriors" series.

It's not my fault that I am open-minded when it comes to video games.

for some reason i just can't stand dynasty warriors. but i love samurai warriors. it's like an intangible difference that makes all the difference but i can't explain it. i picked up warriors orochi 2 used, because the lure of all those characters in one game was too much to handle. unfortunately, the game is missing whatever it is that i love about samurai warriors. gamestop used game return policy for the win.

I can say the same thing, but in my case, there's a reason for that.... I just happen to like Japanese history better. For me, characters from the japanese feudal era just feel more natural, interesting... as I grew watching anime and playing games with samurais and ninjas on them.

I will only get this if Diomedes is a playable character. If you read the Iliad, then you know that he's the REAL badass of the story, while Achilles spends most of the war sulking in his tent ala Hayden Christensen in the Star Wars prequels.

I mean, he severed a guy's tongue by throwing a spear through his throat. Now that's hardcore.

Toasty - you are a man of my own heart! I've only posted on Joystiq twice in the past, but I came just to say exactly what you just said.

Diomedes is my fav warrior as well...even Achilles doesn't get an action sequence comparable to Diomedes in Book 5.

I've wanted a DW-style game based in Troy for about 5 years already. It's great to see my dream come true.

Hopefully it'll be like Xbox 1's Kingdom Under Fire but with easier controls :) KUF was fun! I loved how they censored the word "Pope" too!

Another Dynasty Warriors fan here.

Coop and versus modes for Warriors: Legends of Troy were confirmed at E3.

14th century? HISTORY FAIL. Try 3rd century CE.

I hate to tell you, man, but it's you who fails history today. The Romance of the Three Kingdoms was a 14th century Chinese Historical novel ( a bit like the Sharpe or Aubrey/Maturin books today). The author used the late Han dynasty (3rd century) as the book's setting.

Wikipedia FTW!

"Koei has a reputation for being a Dynasty Warriors factory and, considering people in the West don't get the series, the company's offerings largely go unnoticed."

More like they refuse to buy 7 iterations of button mashing with different skins.

But I guess GH and RB are exceptions to the rule(see sarcasm), its okay for the west to do it, but the far east does it , and everybody bitches about it.

The only change they should make is on-line co-op.That is all.

@Marc
No the west is just as stupid. A few years ago Guitar Hero brought music games to America. Now the market is inundated with shitty sequels and a million shitty plastic instruments.

Not totally on topic, but holy christ, if they (Koei, someone ... anyone?) could make a port of romance of the three kingdoms II to XBLA/PSN, I would be extremely grateful. Even Romance III would be fine, but II was what I played back in the day. I used to love that game, and the damn NES rom that I found was corrupted ...

I like DW6, but it has many areas to improve. It's not because it doesn't have Caucasians (or is it?).

IMO, there's too many western-obsessed games coming from Japan. Most of the JRPGs have European themes, MGS is so western loving, and most characters in various games look Caucasian. So, we have westerners making western games and easterners making western games. Come on.

Yakuza 3 and Shenmue 3 please.

I've always been a fan of the warriors games and also now the Gundam Musou series as well. I'm not sure how I feel about this game though. Being made by a different studio and it's set in Greece.

Since a lot of Dynasty Warrior games are dubbed pretty badly in English, it would be fair for this game to be released in the US with a Cantonese dub. =P

In "Warriors Legends of Troy" there will be Online multiplayer coop and competitive play for up to 4 players.

Blood? In a warriors game? HOW DARK AND EDGY!

Japanese publishers seem to think that "Western tastes" is simply "Eastern tastes with gore.". Then again, maybe it was all koei canada's idea. Bleh, whatever. At least we got shadow of rome out of that train of thinking. That game was awesome.

Isn't there a new Dynasty Warriors coming very soon?

I'm not much on the Greek thing.... reminds me a bit of 300 meets Troy. I was waiting for Brad Pitt to come jumping across the screen with his spear.

Well if they're gonna do Europe they should just go forward and do the other continents too like Ancient Africa and the Ancient Americas

Legends of Troy seems to be promising albeit a lack of gameplay footage (which is expected seeing as how it's slated for a spring 2010 release). Hopefully it's more entertaining than the mildly amusing but super repetitive 'n' boring DW series.

I remember trying a DW game once. I placed myself in the thick of battle, trying to slay as many enemies as possible while preserving the lives of friendly troops, but couldn't grasp how to fight while preventing damage to myself. I slowly died to chip damage after multiple engagements. Trying a second time, I kept myself out of combat and let my men do all the fighting. Our side won, and I never had to use my weapon.

Since the mechanics seemed to be "not fighting = winning", I decided that not playing the game at all made me the ultimate winner.

I don't know how you ended up winning a battle in a DW game without fighting. Even if your allies did manage to win, all the games require that it's the player that puts in the killing blow to the head general...

Anyways, the strategy for any DW game is: Run around killing as many generals as fast as possible. Close off enemy gates (spawn points) to prevent your side from being flooded by soldiers. Avoid Lu Bu (he will kill you with one combo). Keep an eye on your camp/leader. If you kill enough generals fast enough, this shouldn't be a problem but some levels love throwing surprise ambushes of powerful generals who just make a beeline for your camp. And finally, remember that the main goal to win most of the battles is just kill the lead general. You don't have to kill everything else on the board, but it gives you more bonuses. If things start to look bad, just finish off the head general and call it a day.

Yeah, I've been a fan of the series since its appearance as a launch title for the PS2. I still prefer Samurai Warriors but only because I'm more familiar with Japanese history than ancient Chinese history. My wife is embarrassed by the fact that most of my knowledge of Chinese history comes from a video game.

Was it "online" coop and versus modes announced at E3? because they've had versus online before just not coop. I'll only buy koei sequels from now on with online coop. I'll purchase this since its a new game but they'll most likely rehash it 4 times at least with not much added.

Achilles confirmed. Now give us Heracles Ajax and Diomedes! We might have us a game here.

well i disagree with rhamsey up above. the dynasty warriors franchise is a historical game. it's not meant to be played with 16 people. in truth, i think that 2 players are a bit much for the game series itself. i know people downsize the franchise alot, but they truly are great games. if you want an online game, go with cod5, or halo: recon when it's released. don't hammer down on games that truly aren't meant for the online experience. simply find an online game, play it and be pleased. =)

-History lesson for those of you who are fighting. Luo Guanzhong, the person credited for the first historical novel of ROTK lived between 1315 and 1400. so yes the book was probably released during this time (yes it's the 14th century) however, it is a historical novel. what he did was take historical references from the late 2nd century ce and early 3rd century ce, and combined it into one large documentary novel. some of the material in the original volumes of the books was removed because of the author's personal opinion of certain people or events, not breaking outside the lines of historical to fiction, but he elaborated on things the readers wouldn't care for if it was only an opinion.

-There was one writer before Luo Guanzhong who had the first published ROTK novel. his name was Sanguozhi Pinghua who published his version of the book sometime between 1321 and 1323. however, his version of the novel combined many unhistorical themes of magic, legend and morality simply to gain favor with the peasants at the time.

-ROTK, the game and the dynasty warriors series, are meant to be lived by one person in the eyes of each officer and general. You, the player, is supposed to engulf yourself with each chars thoughts and opinions of each event. You play as say, Zhao Yun, then you are Zhao Yun. but, i do see the capability of multiplayer/online cooperation. But if this was done, one person would say be playing as Zhao Yun and Shu, while another would be playing as Ziahou Dun from Wei. since they would surely fight one another in a battle, if the person who was playing Dun was more skilled than the person playing Yun, Dun would win. If Yun and Shu were supposed to win the battle according to historical documentation, but instead, Wei won the battle because of that one player, it wouldn't be accurate anymore.

-Not to mention, in the game, when you die to the enemies, the battle is over and you lose all your progress for that level (if you do not save) if there were multiple players killing each other constantly, some people would play for 5 minutes and couldn't play in that level anymore because they would be dead. now where is the fun in playing for 5 minutes, dying, and not being able to play for say the next 20 minutes or so? It's not forged to be an online game. maybe a cooperative online, but certainly not if the players wanted to play on different sides. It simply wouldn't work out at all.

-Also, many people discredit the game's AI. in most cases on lower difficulties, yes, the AI does seem quite lacking. However, if you put your game onto say chaos mode, well run into the center "thicket" of troops and stand your ground without dying. and by thicket, i mean officers, generals, and normal troops all together. the game, as obviously seen, has horrible AI capability at low difficulties. but it greatly improves as your difficulty (novice, easy, normal, hard chaos) and the level's difficulty increases.

btw in my above post, it's Xiahou Dun not Ziahou.

The Iliad is not contempray literature about troy.!!Its the first written refferce in history about the trojan war,written by Homer.Its the original script for everything we know about that war.Not contemporary.For god shake people

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Warriors: Legends of Troy is Dynasty Warriors for people who hate Dynasty Warriors