Total War: SHOGUN 2

Last good Total War made. Both Shogun 2 and Fall of the Samurai offer fun gameplay, a detailed map with points of interests that are fun to fight over, and place realism over spectacle in a way every future Total War title largely failed to replicate. Shogun 2 creates a tense campaign experience where the AI feels like they actually want to win, and you'll quickly be introduced to the historical dominance of gunpowder and mass infantry over pop-history tropes like unstoppable samurai. The gameplay encourages you to use large amounts of common footsoldiers armed with spears (Ashigaru) or firearms over pop-history armies of Samurai. Fall of the Samurai expands the game map adding Hokkaido and railroads. Gameplay is used to teach the player about the unrest caused by Japans transition from a feudal economy to a capitalist one. You'll find yourself having to recruit police forces (absent at the game start), government agents, news agencies, in addition to increased military spending so your rear territories can police themselves against unrest and samurai revolts. The selection of firearms in Shogun 2 is small but historically accurate. 1861 Enfield Musketoons are by far the most common firearm, but alongside them is the Snider-Enfield. Cavalry come equipped with the famous Spencer rifle, a US civil war era lever action rifle. Late game infantry use French Chassepot bolt-action rifles and units equipped with them can easily go through all of their ammunition in 5 minutes. Artillery in Fall of the Samurai focuses on realism over balance. Generals, Samurai Heroes, and conscripted levies alike will die in a single blast from a rifled cannon. When shells explode they send out shrapnel that you can see by pausing the game, and if any shrapnel hits a unit it tends to kill them unless they're wearing armor (blasts ignore armor completely). Overall the game portrays the end of Napoleonic warfare and the beginnings of the types of battles you'd associate with the World Wars and it does it in a way that's fun and uses gameplay, not exposition to teach the player about later 19th century warfare.