Liberty or Death

"A wonderful look at the American Revolution"

Ever wonder what it was like to fight in a war in which you had to retreat from nearly every battle in order to survive? Marching in the chills of winter without a pair of shoes? Attacking some drunken German mercenaries on Christmas in order to score a victory? Liberty or Death brings all of that... well not exactly, to the table.

Liberty or Death is the best war strategy game that Genesis had to offer. It takes place during the American Revolutionary War. You can play either side in the war, Americans [Colonists] or British. You will get two turns in each one of 53 territories per month. The game can be won in a few different ways; take control of all 47 territories [the ones in Canada and Florida are not important], or if you are the colonists, you can win after several years of stalemate, because the British King will die off. Along the way you will encounter the French, Spanish, and Dutch merchants. Many events that happened in history happen in the game as well. Defecting, mutiny, parades, and many other things will all happen to you doing your course of the game.

In each territory, you can house regiments. You will need to feed them, supply them, train them, and also keep your popularity high. Also, obviously, you can attack other adjacent territories to bring yourself on step closer to winning. While this sounds easy, it requires a unit known as body to do any of these actions. Body comes back far too slowly. As most districts have only a pair of officers. This makes training and simultaneous supplying a very difficult task. Because of this, the game can drag on for a very long time. If both players are good, the game will generally end with one of the Commanders in Chief losing a vote of confidence. In order to minimize the amount of time spent doing very routine things in well protected districts, the game was fortunate enough to give an authorize command, allowing the computer to do basic actions. Sometimes it does really dumb stuff, but for the most part it saves a lot of time.

In battle, there are a few different types of units; cavalry units, artillery units, guerrilla units and standard infantry units. Each has benefits and shortcomings. If you battle too near an ocean or bay, you can expect to see a naval unit or two come in. Some units can also hide themselves well inside forests, giving you a sneak attack advantage. Nearby villages and forts can provide cover as well. Each battle lasts up to fifteen days, any longer and the attacker retreats.

The battles are fought in a turn based strategy format, attackers all at once, then the defense. This occurs six times per day, for a total of ninety turns. Damage is done in the form of deaths. When a regiment is down to zero men, that unit is removed from the map. Regiments fare better or worse in combat based on the stats the officer has and how well trained/armed the men in the regiment are. Terrain also has some factors. Fleets own ground units, so stay away from the water. Each unit type has a special ability it can use in battle, often quite useful. Do not underestimate some of the seemingly pointless ones such as a fireboat or entrenching.

Liberty or Death does not use any anthem native to either country as far as I know, but nevertheless, the music is pretty good. The sound effects are on the weak side, as most of them are gun shots or cannon barrages. Liberty is also a bit low in the graphics department, as most of the layers are just sprites on a two dimensional square battlefield. For such un-intense graphics, the game takes an obscene amount of time to load the three sets of colonies; northern, central and southern, every time someone moves from region to region.

My biggest quarrel with Liberty or Death is its grasp on history. It is part of the Koei historical series, so I expected more. It has the main events, the Declaration of Independence, various foreign powers joining the war, Nathanial Hale's martyrdom and many others, but the game lacks balance. Colonial forces start out nearly as well armed as the British forces. Colonial Officers almost religiously have better stats than the British ones. The British start out with a lot more units, which means if they intend to win, they have to do it quickly. The longer the game goes, the harder it is for the British to win. The ways in which the British get extra regiments, while potentially accurate, is very absurd. Rather than a buy gunpowder option, where is the buy shoes option? When the colonists score a victory in battle, their morale would realistically shoot way the hell up, as such things seldom happened. As the game works, it has the same limited effect as a British regiment winning a battle.

If you play the game as accurately as possible with respect to what really happened, you will quite often lose, as officers, especially British ones, do not have enough body stat to perform the said actions. In addition, illness and lousy weather are too damaging to regiments and their officers. But, aside from these minor balance and realism issues, the game is fairly accurate with the main events of the war.

Scores: For those who prefer numeric data.

Sound: 8/10
Graphics: 6/10
Control: 9/10
Gameplay: 10/10
Story: 10/10
Replay Value: 9/10
Overall: 9/10

This is a great game. I doubt you will be able to find a copy of it though. I spent 40 dollars this past year getting a copy of the game. I feel it is worth the cost.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 05/11/02, Updated 02/09/05