Sangokushi 12 is the 12th installment of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms series. The management phase and the fighting phase are the two main parts of the game.
In the management phase, you construct structures in your cities to generate resources, food, renown, and troops, or to improve your defense, enhance your army's strength, defense, range, and speed, develop special plans, and construct siege weapons. The management phase is based on a turn-based system.
The war phase is where you deploy all of your newly obtained officers, troops, siege weapons, and researches in the hopes of winning additional territory or avoiding territorial loss. Fights are real-time, although they may be halted at any point to give commands or employ special powers. A free-to-play game titled Sangokushi 12: Taisen Ban which contains online battle mode only was released as well.
6 years since the release of its direct predecessor Romance of the Three Kingdoms XI, the game was designed to target low-specs hardware like tablets. As a result, in addition to traditional mouse controls, touch controls are also supported in the Windows version.
Sangokushi 12 was released on Wii U on December 13, 2012. The game's design resulted in some criticisms due to its simplified gameplay system and reduced officer and city numbers compared to its predecessor.