This is a difficult recommendation. If you really like Nobunaga's Ambition and been a fan of the series? You'll probably hate this game. If you wanted to like the series but was turned off by all the micromanagement and complexity of the battles? You'll probably love it.

For the most part, it's Nobunaga's Ambition as you expect; building your provinces to provide exactly what you need to support your economy and troops, seeking out powerful ronin to lead your armies, managing alliances and attacking clans at their most vulnerable, meanwhile story bits of the heavily romanticized version of Sengoku era Japan comes in to fill you in on all the drama.

The issue at hand is how it does all this. After the SNES-era tactics-based system, Nobunaga's Ambition has always tried different things with its systems; Rise to Power had city/castle building elements, Iron Triangle was played like a tower defense. Sphere of Influence focused more on combat and diplomacy, it's update in Ascension re-added the town building elements, and Taishi added a bunch of bugs and a bad user interface. But it's always been a series that wanted you to get involved with its mechanics and rewarded you for it. There was nothing quite like playing a clan from a very small province and building up and uniting Japan. But doing that required mastering the intricacies of diplomacy and combat. Its core audience are ones that generally enjoy the depth and complexity of its systems.

Which is why it's so weird that Awakening has taken such a shift in gameplay. It seems to be trying to aim for an audience that gets turned away and overwhelmed by having to account for everything by streamlining and automating a lot of the process. In fairness, it genuinely does a decent enough job at doing that. Retainers generally give helpful advice in regards to what your next move should be. I gave my best Warrior his own province and he basically took over Japan for me. Combat no longer requires deep understanding of the battlefield's various terrains, the movement of your troops or when to time the use of your skills, the game for the most part manages it for you in a Pac Man-like predefined paths, with very blatant goals that the AI automatically changes to after they complete their objective. The key to success is just managing all these elements effectively.

The very obvious issue with that is that it seems like a very major step back in every category for long-time players. If you liked the domestic aspects? You get some basic upgrades and a list of things to choose into limited slots. The combat? It's all automated and set on paths. The diplomacy? Send someone out to fill a meter, and occasionally sacrifice a fief to please someone. Managing your nation? That's gone, replaced by a bare 'set and forget' management. Even the grand strategy aspects are undermined by your retainers who typically have better options than yourself, leaving you dependent on them bringing it up. Everything has been so cut back that everything feels shallow and the game effectively plays itself. What agency you do have doesn't end up being fun and mostly involves you setting up retainers, just to give away agency to the A.I anyway. The combat, what has usually been the game's highlight, loses its appeal once you quickly run into the same 5 field battles with very little in the means of actual agency over battle since the A.I does the optimal move for you.

But for new players? While it might be more streamlined, it's still not easily accessible. As a person who had been playing since the NES days and is *very* aware of the very steep learning curve; the game doesn't do a good job at explaining how to actually play it. The tutorial comes at you so quick and often, showing you the process of doing things but doesn't explain to you the importance of it, and it leaves out a lot of important information that is useful. I had to restart the first run three times because had learned something on my own that wasn't explained clearly, or at all. (like how setting your A.I. to automatically builds buildings but limits your labor unless you get a specific policy). Overall I can't imagine there are there is an audience who wants a game like Nobunaga's Ambition, but is turned away by its complexity. Assuming there was this small subset of players that do, it's likely they aren't going to find anything here that interests them otherwise; the systems available aren't engaging, they aren't particularly satisfying, the game still has a lot of menus and slow-build up and nothing feels immediate, and it's still a 20+ hour game. Nobunaga's Ambition: Awakening really feels like it's trying to please everyone, fans old and newcomers, but really only manages to appease a very tiny cross section of both.

That said, it's very much playable and it is easy to pick up, which the same can't be said for some English releases. It looks and sounds good, and there are minimal bugs.

I would recommend it to newer players who wanted to get into the series to see the idea of what its about, with the insertion that if they do enjoy it to consider Sphere of Influence or older versions of the series for more depth; but I definitely wouldn't recommend to core players who enjoyed older titles.