I have to say, Sengoku Rance is everything people say it is. I am sad to say that it just isn't grabbing me, primarily because it feels much more like a turn-based strategy game than an RPG.

There's nothing wrong with a turn-based strategy game, but it's really overwhelming at first. There are so many things you can do each turn, and very few of them are explained in any detail. The intention, I think, is to learn by trying a bunch of different things out. The game will continue to progress as time goes by, so even if you choose less optimal paths, eventually you'll be forced to confront the key enemies that get revealed over time.

Prepare to get game over a lot at first, and to be confused by the many game mechanisms that aren't explained super carefully. I really felt overwhelmed on my first playthrough, and eventually quit and started over, putting to use what I'd learned on a new playthrough. This isn't a terrible idea, honestly. The game is really designed around replaying multiple times, and in fact it's impossible to unlock every CG and see every possible character and story element with a single play.

I guess I find myself really preferring the more RPG-like Rance games, where you explore a map, accept quests, grind for XP, etc. I'm not a huge strategy fan, even though I recognize that Sengoku Rance is well crafted and well balanced.

There are definitely some RPG elements in the game, and of course there is lots of the trademark Rance humor and wackiness. Rance definitely meets a lot of hot women and gets to know them better, as you'd expect.

I came to the Eroge genre for obvious reasons, I wanted erotic titillation to spice the rewards for competent and creative gameplay. What I found were simpering graphic novels disguised as games, tedious puzzles whose only real redeeming feature was the erotic lure at the end of the rainbow, but then...

Alicesoft.

For fans, I can say no more, for those like me searching through the genre for the best of both worlds, Eroge and Gameplay, this company is amazing. The balance struck in Sengoku Rance is nothing short of superb. Strategy, story, impactful decisions, meaningful tactical considerations and resource management. Honestly, I have to agree with one poster above, it is one of the best games (of any genre) I have ever played.

Alicesoft, well done.

Mangagamer, please get us the rest of the series!!!!! Util I play through every title my every gaming moment will be spelt R-a-n-c-e!

I played the fan-translated version years ago and bought this to support the creators. I didn't expect myself to spend days playing this all over again. There is so much depth in this game that is rare for any type of game.

This game blew away my expectations. Massive amount of content and my first eroge with game play, and it is just a really good game. Have not finished it, it is tough but each play through I get better and better. But the point is thanks to this game, I have no qualms buying eroge and VN's. I own over 70 now. Def give this game a try, they also have censored version just so you can play it anywhere for the game play alone.

while the rance universe is something worthy of your time, this game does not respect your time.

some reviews praise the hundreds of hour you can put in this game, but there is definitely some sunk cost fallacy.

the story is great, the gameplay is fine. but every battle is made to waste your time, ramping up numbers in enemy units just because.

while some may enjoy the "challenge", be warned that even with unlimited money, you can't win easily. the game faces you with enemy units of a power you cannot attain, hence the 'tactical' nature of the battles.

you could be fine by waiting to get beefier unit and explore the many events and cgs of the game, but no. if you do this the game will punish you in the long run for doing so.

the game also isn't gonna help about the different units and stats you can use, it's pretty much figure it out yourself.

the sheer amount of complexity can be fathomed on the alicesoft fandom website, so i wouldnt recommend the game unless you're a die hard strategy games fan.

final verdict is a 2/5, a game too complex for its own good

I've never played this official English release. I actually imported the game and played it with the earlier (unofficial) English translation patch. This review is therefore not a commentary on Arunaru's English patch, which I'm sure is great. As far as the game, though, it's just amazing. There's a lot of strategic depth and weight behind all your decisions, unlockable routes and difficulty settings, and amazing RPG mechanics. You can easily dump hundreds of hours into it. The story is also hilarious, and underrated as a parody of the Sengoku-Jidai era. Some of the H scenes make me a little squeamish, but they're easily skippable if you care about that.

I had a lot of fun with this game. It's surprisingly complex and has a huge amount of replayability with the "What if" routes in New Game +. If you like strategy games, you'll be in love with this. That said, I do have a couple complaints.

The story moves at a very fast pace. If you don't blitz through the early game, the mid and end game will absolutely wreck you with surprise time limits.

The H-scenes are also a bit lackluster. There really isn't much to fap to despite this being an eroge.

Despite these problems, I still rate this 5/5 and highly recommend it.

I've put over 100 hours into this and I haven't even finished all the content available, would recommend

one of my most loved rance games

My life is divided into two.
Before I played Rance and after I played Rance.

Seems decently done. Translation seems pretty accurate. I'm a little disappointed the the drawn in genitalia that I had heard about isn't more detailed and in some cases just wasn't added. That said, the game is still Rance. The fact that they made a streamer patch was a really nice touch btw and sold me on it.

In both playing the fan translation years ago, and playing the official release recently, I find myself losing literally hours to this addictive game! As fun as the porn is (and it is indeed fun ;)), the staying power of this game is in its extremely well-designed and addictive gameplay.
Let's hope MG get the remaining games out a bit faster, because I am hungry for more in this series.

I really wanted to like this game, I loved Eiyu Senki and it seemed so much like it and there are things I really do like about Sengoku Rance, but as a package it just does not work for me. After 7 hours of play I was not even halfway and I did not find it enjoyable anymore.
I felt the game was downright hostile toward my attempt at liking it and I will try to explain.

Let me get what I like out of the way.
I love the spritework, setting and the music, it had no right to be so good.

But other than that the game is kind of a mess.
Many things are left unexplained and you are thrown into the thick of it right from the start, no tutorial or easy starting area at all.
Things are not intuitive and even with a tab with the wiki on the side it was overwhelming. I have no doubt if I invested more time I would eventually grasp the gameplay, but I have sunk several hours into it and find myself no longer enjoying playing after reaching turn 45 and being nowhere close to done.

While tried my way with trial and error I found the time it takes from ending a turn until you get control again takes forever even with the settings to skip a lot of it and I just became frustrated. There can be so many events triggering and long scenes playing that when I got back to gameplay I had to reexamine everything cause I had forgotten my options.

The sex scenes are sadly mediocre and some annoyingly triggered when I was just getting into the gameplay. I ended up skipping through most of them.

The menus are a complete mess. Would have benefited from a general list of available events rather than having to check each territory and events that I am short by some criteria off should show up grey explaining what I lack rather than just being removed.
Events are what control the game, but you get little to no explanation what they are, what they do, how to make them appear and how they work. Save scumming should not be a safety net I have to use so often.
At least I have not found an event like in big bang age where after a new turns it will cause you to face an instant gameover if you do not expend time on a seemingly pointless event.


I should not have to look on the wiki to find out what different stats do or what commander levels are, what they do and how to get more. That is a fault of the game to fail to properly inform.
Or how dungeons work, am I suppose to retreat commanders to call in new ones? Why not let me swap out between floors?

Some commanders were interesting, but ultimately could not save the mediocre story. They did however contrast the bland main character. I just don't get him, is he suppose to be funny? A sort of parody? For a character to be to prominent and yet feel utterly unrelated to the narrative going on on top of his unlikability drags everything down for me.
The possibility of them dying I was not aware of, but I feel like I would save scum if I lost any. An option to remove it would have be nice.

A personal gripe was the point turn tracker, I hate being seemingly punished for not playing how "the game is supposed to be played", I like to explore and it frankly frustrated me seeing it tick down like a timer, another thing I hate. This on top of the forced events which trigger at certain times forcing the story along while I mostly did not feel prepared for them or just wanted to explore what options were open to me at the time.


Tl:dr: The game is slow, a single playthrough taking way too long to complete. It does not allow exploration as events trigger outside your control. The sex scenes are mediocre. The gameplay is not intuitive and there too many elements that needs explanation, but does not get one. The main character is bland and unlikable. And it seems the game wants to be played in a very specific way, but never tells or teaches you what that way is.

If someone got any guide that is an easier read than the wiki I might give it another go, but as it stands I don't think I will play it anymore.

Gameplay! Glorious gameplay!!!

Sengoku Rance was probably the first big Rance game that the English audience could enjoy. It's huge, has lots of content, replayability, great soundtrack and provides a rollercoaster of emotions. There's something to be said about adult games in which you may want to skip through the naughty bits to get to the gameplay.
Hopefully Rance 03 comes some time in the future as well.

I can't recommend this game more. It is so varied that there will guaranty be parts you will absolutely love and hate, predictable and completely unexpected, easy and impossible. Itas an absolute masterpiece (learn how to do battles though, or otherwise you won't be able to enjoy the game as you will struggle to survive, hit: Buff are OP)

A fan translation of this game was my introduction to the Rance series years ago and I have been eagerly awaiting this titles release since you guys first announced Rance 5/6. Thank you Manga Gamer for bringing the Rance series the the English speaking world.

The story is fantastic and there are many routes to take. The replay-ability on this game is very good. The game play is fun and challenging and the erotic scenes are well done. If you are one of the few who have not heard of this game, just go ahead and buy it now. You wont be disappointed.

Looking forward to the rest of the upcoming Rance releases.

Simply saying that this game was the magnum opus for Alicesoft is such an understatement. Between the amazing characters represented from Japanese history, the occasional well thought out H-scenes, the stressful tendencies from it's strategic nature, all wrapped together for a game with many different modes of play and alternative stories, it's not hard to see why player's desire to keep coming back for more from this beloved game series. And Thank you God Howard for allowing games like this to exist.(note: tried to attach lenny face at the end and just got this ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°))

Come for the lewd stay for the game play. This game is what the adult gaming genre should be. A solid game first with adult content as icing on the cake. Few pull this off.

This game deserves your support and if you have never played it this is a must buy!

I am an avid gamer, and Sengoku Rance is easily in my top 5 games of all time. Not top 5 ero-games; top 5 games in any genre. I have spent a ton of hours on this title prior to the Manga Gamer release, and feel I just have to support this release.

It's amazingly re-playable, with a surprisingly high skill ceiling. Buy this game folks.

In a series of RPGs of outstanding quality, Sengoku Rance is a title that especially manages to shine above the others. This game defies concise description, not only bringing quality eroge plotlines that AliceSoft fans love, but the game is generally one of the most intricate and challenging strategy games available for purchase even in modern day.

Those who are enthusiasts of Sengoku era warfare should naturally find this game amusing as a parody of actual Japanese history, with many familiar figures re-imagined sometimes as the opposite sex. Throw the unapologetically brutish Rance into the mix, you have a premise that's perfect for conquering the entirety of NIPPON. While a few areas of context are clarified in previous games, the game itself is still self-explanatory enough to support itself.

A word of caution. It must be made very clear that this is game requires a lot of personal investment to learn how to play due to the sheer complexity of the tactical RPG elements. It will be helpful to look online at the various resources people have compiled on general strategy if you are a new player to this game. The game features a lot of elements that simulate managing your relationships with various generals, and increasing the power of their battalions, as well as attending to various events that happen within your territories, all while warring with opposing territories to conquer them.

That being said, Sengoku Rance is by any definition a game with unbelievable love and effort put into its design. It's the kind of game you are expected to play multiple times to maximize your experience not just completing routes but also uncovering new strategies. For anyone who wants a game that they can truly pour their heart and soul into, look no further.

God bless AliceSoft.

This game has an abundance of strong points, out of which replayability deserves a special mention because of all the ways you can go about completing it.
Field battles aren't necessarily won by routing the enemy army, they were designed so that they wouldn't take you too long, so in case of a stall victory is decided after a certain amount of turns has passed. In some particularly challenging battles this is actually your only way to secure victory.
On the other hand, going in more aggressively lets you sometimes capture enemy units, some of which are not generic and even have sex scenes, so you can recruit them and use them as your own. Note that a loss doesn't spell game over, you just lose a castle which you can conquer again later.
There's also dungeon battles, where your commanders fight by themselves, and despite being able to only deploy 6 at a time, you can call more from the back, and there's no time limit. This is necessary as dungeons have many floors while single units have limited actions, so you need to switch characters when they run out.
When defeated in either type of fight, your units can also die and permanently leave the party. There's actually more non-generic units in the game than you can carry so you don't really need to worry if it happens.
Most of the non-generics, however, come from specific choices you make, and very few just join by themselves when advancing through the story, so you need to be proactive in looking for them. Having a lot of units is beneficial because you can only deploy each commander once per turn rotation, so if you get attacked during the enemy turn but have nobody to deploy the enemy will automatically conquer a castle.
Given that you are left with plenty of freedom to choose where to go first, what countries to subdue or vassal, and most of all what events for bonus units, powerups and CGs to trigger, your character lineup is also likely going to end up being completely different in two different playthroughs.
You'd think balancing a game with this many variables would be and impossible task, but the way Sengoku Rance does it is, and I get a little emotional here, nothing short of perfection. The game also has safety nets here and there to make you fall back on in case things get too rough, and they save you from having to trash your playthrough and start over.
You're allowed to save pretty much anytime and reload a previous file if things don't go your way, but you're probably going to enjoy the game more in the long run if you don't do this. Because the way unforeseen events open up to more possibilities than you'd anticipated is a laitmotif of Alicesoft games.

10/10
Love this game, classic rance at its best.

It's one of those games where you think it's your usual hgame.... but boy I was wrong. At first I was cold towards Rance, but then I cheered him on as he proceeded to use his Hyperweapon on all the maidens of JAPAN.

Buy it, trust me, it's good.

My first truely Eroge experience and i got addicted. This Game is amazing. It is hard to play, but worth to get mastered. The Strategy part of this game was something i can only find in some other Alicesoft Games. What a pitty that mangagamer does no projects of the other alicesoft games like bigbang age/ Daitaikoku etc.

Finally, finally, FINALLY~~!!!
Long nights nearling :D