As well as the main story campaign, Dynasty Warriors 7 (the biggest cultural event since Gobots) will feature a Chronicle Mode, a more free-form mode with a light roleplaying flavor to it. I wanted to know more, and so I asked lead producer Akihiro Suzuki about it. That’s how you find stuff out!
“The way it works is that stages are made up of different areas which contain cities and battles,” he explained. “If you clear these more stages will open up and you will be able to access more nearby battles and cities. Unlike the Empires games where there are many strategic elements in the gameplay, this is more straight-forward and does not have much to do with actual occupation.
“The mode is more streamlined rather than being more strategic. The cities and battles are not correlated to the map either and the mode is not so much about making your own story. Once you clear these you can move to the surrounding areas freely and you will have a choice of choosing which battle to tackle next. It delivers a slightly different gameplay experience in the sense that you have an option to freely choose the way your territory expands rather than making your own story.”
The “Other” force characters, such as Lu Bu and Yuan Shao, can only be played in Free Mode and Chronicle Mode, lacking their own story. Why are they restricted to Chronicle Mode? I asked that too, son!
“The reason we have delegated the Other forces is that in the Story Mode of Dynasty Warriors 7 is that we are aiming more for an accurate interpretation of the actual history and the Romance of the Three Kingdoms source material,” he stated. “As the Other forces do not fit into the story accurately we have given them more focus in the Conquest Mode.”
Now that’s interesting. Over the course of the games, Dynasty Warriors has deviated more and more from the history and the novel upon which it is based, so it’s rather cool to see Omega Force attempting a return to more accurate times. Dynasty Warriors 3 actually inspired me to learn about Chinese history, and I’d love for Dynasty Warriors 7 to bring that historical feeling back.
