Taiko Risshiden IV (Japanese)

Taikou Risshiden IV is one of the most important turning points in Koei’s Sengoku-era ambition series. Unlike the earlier entries, this game dramatically expands player freedom by allowing you to choose from roughly 600 characters as your protagonist. It is also the first entry in the series to let players move beyond the traditional samurai path and pursue other lifestyles such as becoming a ninja or a merchant, which gives the whole game a much broader “live your own Sengoku life” feeling. A card-collection system was also introduced, adding a strong sense of long-term growth, discovery, and personal achievement beyond simple battlefield success. Because of that design, the game feels less like a tightly guided rise-of-Hideyoshi story and more like an open-ended warlord-era life simulation. Public descriptions also note that battles are divided into several layers, including personal duels, field battles, and siege warfare, while character abilities and skills help differentiate how each playthrough develops. The result is a title that combines role-playing, strategy, and social mobility in a very distinctive way, and it is often remembered as the entry where the Taikou Risshiden series fully embraced freedom of role selection and self-directed play.