Paradox Interactive, publisher of the Mount & Blade series and Sengoku, have released a new strategy game called Crusader Kings II. In Kings, you play the leader of a royal family in Medieval Europe. Your goal is to lead your family through Perilous middle ages, and wrestle control of as much land as you can before 1452 (when the game ends). Crusader Kings II plays a lot like Sengoku (or perhaps it is more accurate to say that Sengoku plays like the first Crusader Kings and therefore a lot like this game). And like in Sengoku, the player has several tools at their disposal to accomplish this goal. Plots and arranged marriages are just some of the non-combat methods you can use to further your lord's ambitions.   The Game: Players will build up their castles and villages, raise armies and send those armies to capture other factions territories. Battles are fought automatically and are resolved via dice rolls that the player can watch but not participate in (think Risk). Arm-chair generals who like to directly command their forces in battle may not find anything particularly interesting here. You can upgrade your provinces with Castles, Temples or cities. Each of these options affects the tax rate coming from the region differently. Castles are the most defensible (in case of a siege) but provide the lowest tax rate. Cities are the most poorly defensible but provide the highest tax rate. Temples are the best of both worlds but will only surrender taxes to your lord if they like your lord better than the leader of their religious order. The political aspect of the game materializes in the form of "Plots". Plots are centered around throwing feasts, summer fairs or going hunting with your best hunters to gain prestige. Time is controlled via an interface at the top right corner of the screen and can be speed up, slowed down or stopped at any time by the player. Rather than presenting a tactical advantage, the ability to control time simply allows the player to keep track of the myriad of changes that can happen in an instant in Crusader Kings II. Another way that the game tries to help the player keep track of important changes is through a message system; located at the top right corner of the screen. Everything that affects you directly is tracked in this area of the interface and messages are separated into two categories: normal and important. Normal messages can be things like "your forces have arrived in x province" or "you have appointed x person to x position". Important messages can be things like "your heir has died" or "x has declared war on you". Important messages will pause the game and allow the player to react accordingly to them. Players can choose to start the game from one of several perspectives. Players who are new to the game can start off as a count under the control of a Duke. Counts, only control one province on the map and have few interactions outside of their Duke's realm. As their honor and prestige increases, their Duke can offer them landed titles which gives them more provinces to control. Adventurous players can skip straight to being a king. My thoughts: Crusader Kings II, like Sengoku, looks like it will be rich with historical detail and period correct source material. In the preview copy I played, the music sounded authentic and the names of the people and places looked historically accurate . Like with Sengoku,the in-game tutorials didn't seem to go far enough in explaining the political functions of the game. I still found myself confused even after going through the advanced tutorials. Some of the tutorials seemed to end prematurely (literally being a couple of sentences on one pop-up dialog box). I am not sure if this is how it will be when the game ships or if the tutorials weren't finished on the preview copy I was given. Hopefully the later is the case and not the former.  By now, you might be wondering why I keep mentioning Sengoku in this review. Well, there is a simple explanation for that. After playing both games (Sengoku first, then Crusader Kings II) I get the feeling that Crusader Kings II is just a might just be a re-skinned Sengoku. Many of the screens look similar and the menus are eerily similar. Having played both games I was definitely having a severe case of deja vu. For those of you who really liked Sengoku and are looking for more of the same (albeit in a different part of the globe and time in history), don't miss Crusader Kings II when it is released. Hopefully we will get a full copy of that game to review later.