Martial Kingdoms

Martial Kingdoms
Developer(s)	T-Time Technology Co., Ltd.
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows
Genre(s)	Strategy
Mode(s)	Single player

Martial Kingdoms (simplified Chinese: 天下霸图; traditional Chinese: 天下霸圖; pinyin: Tiān Xià Bà Tú) is a single-player wuxia strategy video game developed by Taiwan's T-Time Technology Co., Ltd. The game was released in 2003.^[1] It has a sequel, Martial Kingdoms 2, which was released in 2007.^[1]

Gameplay

The player chooses one from 13 martial arts sects to play as, and must conquer the other sects to rule the wulin (martial arts world) and win the game. At the start of the game, each sect controls at least one duo (or base), out of about 20, all located on a map of China. A sect is considered conquered when it has lost all of its bases to the attacking sect. To achieve the ultimate goal, the sect needs to become more powerful first and ways to increase its strength include: recruiting and training new members; collecting more natural resources (such as gold, iron ore and wood) by conquering other sects' bases; upgrading its factories to produce weapons, equipment and medicine of better quality; discovering and learning more powerful skills through studying and gaining experience from battles; forming alliances with other sects. The player can manage the sect's members and arrange their daily schedules, determining how much time the member spends on each task (collecting resources, training, producing items etc) and what skill the member will be learning.

Plot

The game is set in the Ming Dynasty during the reign of the Jiajing Emperor. The emperor is deceived by the treacherous chancellor Yan Song, and he fears that the wulin (martial arts community) may pose a threat to his rule over China. He sends the Jinyi Wei (secret police) to stir up conflict among the various sects, hoping that they will destroy each other.

There are four storylines that the player can choose from. In each story line, the number of bases occupied by each sect at the beginning is different and certain sects only appear in certain storylines. In addition, the player has the option of creating a new sect if he/she does not wish to play as any of the 12 default sects.

The 12 default sects featured in the game are:

Name	Storylines	Main base	Specialties in martial arts / others
Demonic Cult (魔教)	1, 2, 3, 4	Dian Lake (in present-day Yunnan)	Palm, finger, sword and spear styles
Beggars' Sect (丐幫)	1, 2, 3, 4	Yingtianfu (present-day Nanjing)	Palm and staff styles
Shaolin Sect (少林寺)	1, 2, 3, 4	Mount Song	Fist, staff, palm and finger styles
Wudang Sect (武當派)	1, 2, 3, 4	Wudang Mountains	Sword, palm and fist styles
Emei Sect (峨嵋派)	1, 2	Mount Emei	Sword, palm, finger and kick styles
Mount Hua Sect (華山派)	1, 2, 3	Mount Hua, Mount Heng (only in story line 3)	Sword and palm styles
Mount Wu Sect (巫山派)	1, 2	Mount Wu (in present-day Sichuan)	Saber, kick, sword and staff styles; Poison-based secret weapon attacks
Dongting Sect (洞庭幫)	2, 3	Dongting Lake	Staff styles; Qinggong
Taiyi Sect (太乙教)	1, 2, 3	Mount Huang	Saber, sword and staff styles
Baoxiang Sect (寶相寺)	1, 2, 3	Mount Tiantai	Finger styles
Heroes' Gate (英雄門)	2, 3, 4	Qilian Mountains	Spear, saber, sword and fist styles
Shennong Sect (神農幫)	1, 2, 3	Changbai Mountains	Saber styles; Production of medicine and antidotes

See also

• List of organisations in Wuxia fiction
• Xuanyuan Jian
• The Legend of Sword and Fairy
• Jade Empire
• Bujingai
• Heavenly Sword
• Heroes of Jin Yong
• Dragon Oath

References

1. ^ ^{a b} Products page of T-Time website (Chinese)

External links

• Official site for Martial Kingdoms 2 (Chinese)
• Martial Kingdoms on Baidu Baike (Chinese)
• Martial Kingdoms 2 on Baidu Baike (Chinese)