Rule a warlord's house in 190 AD China.

Play Cao Cao and hold the centre with the finest minds in the north. Play Liu Bei with one poor city and three sworn brothers. Play Dong Zhuo, holding the Emperor and Lu Bu, and watch the whole coalition come for you.

Dynasty Divided is a turn-based grand strategy game. Seasons are turns. Cities are governed, armies are raised and marched, and every officer on the map has a face, four stats and a memory of how you treated him.

Officers who remember

Forty-eight historical officers with painted portraits and four stats: War, Intellect, Politics, Charisma. They grow with use and fade with age. They resent unpaid seasons and lost cities. Jail them and they may turn. Execute one and his kin never forget.

War you can see coming

Armies march for a season before they strike, longer for distant cities. The defender watches the column come and can reinforce, sabotage its granary, or incite its commander. Walls matter. Commanders matter. Send twice what they hold or don't send at all.

Battles you can lead yourself

When your house fights, the game opens the hex field: spearmen, cavalry and archers against a walled city with two gates, ten rounds to break the garrison or hold it. Lead it yourself, or hand it to your generals and read the result.

A living court

Lords die of age and pass their seat to an heir. Young officers arrive as the years turn: Zhuge Liang in 197, Sun Quan in 198, Cao Pi in 203. Reward the loyal, raise the able to Captain, General or Marshal, and watch the ambitious for signs of leaving. A house with no heir ends.

Diplomacy with teeth

Alliances, gifts, refusals and betrayals. Every house tracks its standing with every other. March on an ally and the treaty breaks the day you leave, and every court in the land hears of it.