The fierce competition between Chen Shui-bian
What's more, the rapidly approaching elections are expected to bring about a political reorganization which may well twist Taiwan's political scene into something even more closely resembling that historic era.
And the computer game industry is cashing in on the occasion. Releasing several games based on this period in China's history, they have struck gold among the legions of war and strategy computer gamers in Taiwan and China.
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Among the host of games that have been developed based on the age of the Three Kingdoms, however, The Romance of the Three Kingdoms
The defining feature of these games is largely the same: Govern a city where you train and maintain troops, then wage war to unite the whole country. They are all real-time strategy games that turn gamers into warlords, often in unique circumstances.
"The games take players back to historic scenes in China, where they themselves become the legendary heroes, generals, politicians or descendents of emperors. They command troops and charge at their enemies in a virtual Chinese landscape -- they work hard and fight hard. Their ultimate goal is to unite all of China," said Allen Lin
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Fate of the Dragon, whose first edition hit store shelves last year after raising more than a few eyebrows at the E3 electronics exhibition, has since been tailored into a humorous version which satirizes current political strife. Entitled Battle of the Red Cliff
But it's not immediately clear which of the three political figures corresponds to which of the ancient heroes.
Some people prefer Liu Pei, who has the royal blood of the Han Dynasty. But arguments have arisen among players as to whether Lien or Soong more closely resembles the ancient character.
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"Some say that Soong has talent and magnitude like Tsao Tsao and that Lien, like Liu Pei, is the mild-mannered successor to the throne -- albeit the weakest of the three," said Third Way's director of digital entertainment, Tseng Yi-cheng
And what about Taiwan's incumbent "emperor?"
"Chen can be compared to Sun Chuan, the leader of opposition forces who emerged from the south of China to subdue Tsao."
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No easy task
Revising the original game was no easy task. Apart from changing the characters' dialogues to reflect the political speeches of the trio of politicians, other contemporary political figures had to be written into the history of the Three Kingdoms.
After a year of action-oreinted games like Counterstrike riding a wave of popularity in Taiwan's gaming market, strategy and history-related games are now finding their way onto more hard drives. The new Three Kingdoms series satirizing the December elections, the long-awaited Civilization III and Empire Earth are all heavyweight games sure to make an impact in the market.
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The Romance of the Three Kingdoms (三國演義), a historic Chinese novel mixing fact with fiction, has been of great inspiration to dramatists, literary figures and history researchers in Chinese societies for centuries. It's a novel known in most every Chinese household and most everyone of Chinese descent can speak of one of the anecdotes or heroic figures from the Three Kingdoms era.
During that time -- around the end of the Han dynasty -- China plunged into political chaos, with commoners living in misery and poverty. Rebellions by peasant leaders, wealthy local families and feudal princes occurred one after another. Each wanted to seize the throne and establish a new dynasty.
Among them, prime minister Tsao Tsao, the emperor's nephew, Liu Pei, and Sun Chuan, who came from a pirate family in the south, were the three leading competitors. They each had tens of thousands of troops, splitting China in thirds, and vied for absolute rule of the nation. The three men had their respective high and low points, and the constant changes in power yielded many brilliant tales as well as a few golden rules about politics and warfare.
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Reality reflects art
The Romance of the Three Kingdoms is a novel written by Lo Kuan-chung (羅貫中), who lived during the Ming dynasty. The book is a fiction based on The History of the Three Kingdoms (
Now the novel is being used to conquer the computer game industry, its many plotlines becoming themes for games released to hordes of Chinese fans.
In action games, players become the daring generals of the Three Kingdoms, such as Chao Yun (
From the first boxes of Romance of the Three Kingdoms sold in Japan 10 years ago, to the eighth generation of the game released last month, millions of units have been sold in Japan. Another 250,000 units have been sold in Taiwan, and that figure does not include the game's most recent version.
"There is a solid base of consumers who play this kind of game. Last year we sold 70,000 units of the seventh generation," said Sammy Liu (
Imagining oneself as a historic general commanding hundreds of thousand of troops and battling in the ancient world has become a favorite pastime of game enthusiasts throughout much of Asia.
Whether it's the "age of the Three Kingdoms" in China or another civilization, they are the ideal companions with which gamers can "kill" the last couple months of the year -- until the new versions hits shelves, at least.
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
The following three paragraphs are just some of what the local Chinese-language press is reporting on breathlessly and following every twist and turn with the eagerness of a soap opera fan. For many English-language readers, it probably comes across as incomprehensibly opaque, so bear with me briefly dear reader: To the surprise of many, former pop singer and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) ex-lawmaker Yu Tien (余天) of the Taiwan Normal Country Promotion Association (TNCPA) at the last minute dropped out of the running for committee chair of the DPP’s New Taipei City chapter, paving the way for DPP legislator Su
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