Kingmaker

Kingmaker is a quaint game that is based on an old board game of the same name. Like in the board game your historical period is the War of the Roses, England’s sporadic civil war that took place between 1450 and 1490. The two sides, Lancaster and York both sought to gain the throne for themselves and this game depicts that struggle.
When making a game based on a board game, the company has the choice of staying strictly loyal to the game (think Monopoly) or merely using the concept to further their own aims of exploring the idea in a new medium (think Warhammer 40,000K).

Kingmaker is almost too close to the board game. Even the unfortunate element of luck is still needed in a certain quantity here to succeed.
Each player is given control of a particular house or faction. They must then use their armies and political wits to move about the map securing their position to the throne. This can be done in several ways including the necessary capture of various “neutrals”. The majority of the players work is assembling lesser nobles to ones side and strategically increasing the size of their army by assigning them titles and roles. One major problem of the game is the propensity for large armies to be split up by seemingly random events that happen each turn. Factions in your army will be called away leaving you in the lurch before attacking. Also, leaders have a large tendency to die in combat. These titles are then reincarnated as various lesser heir which you must again acquire to your side and increase in strength.
While the initial fun of adding factions and building a strong collaborative force of minor nobles is fun, the game can get rather boring to actually win. Smaller factions are hard to eliminate even though they pose little threat. Random events continue to occur dragging a game out in which you will inevitably win.