Panzer General - People's General 1998

People's General (a.k.a. Dynasty General) is a turn-based strategy computer game developed by Strategic Simulations, Inc (SSI). It was released in August, 1998 in North America and in September, 1998 in Europe. The game originally focused on early 21st century warfare in Asia but both the time-frame and geographic coverage have been expanded by gamers.

People's General, or PeG as it is commonly known, followed SSI's successful 5 Star General Series of World War II war games (Panzer General, Allied General, Pacific General) and their sequel, Panzer General II (PG2). It uses the same game dynamics as these earlier games—turn-based movement & fighting with military units on a hex based map.

PeG uses substantially the same "Living Battlefield" game engine as PG2 but features higher quality (16 bit) graphics and many new features.

Game premise

People's General focuses on modern conflict in Asia between 20 countries, principally the USA, China and Russia.

In the original game the countries are organized into an Eastern Alliance and a Western Alliance. China, Mongolia and North Korea comprise the Eastern Alliance. The USA, Russia, 13 other countries and the United Nations comprise the Western Alliance. Vietnam is included as an un-allied country.

Gamer created campaigns and scenarios have expanded this premise to include different regions of conflict, different alliances and other countries.

The original campaigns and scenarios expanded on this premise with a more detailed background story provided by SSI via an introductory video. The video narrated hypothetical "future" events occurring from 2000-2004, i.e., after publication of the game and before the start of the campaigns and scenarios.

According to this video, both the USA and Russia reduce their military spendings. Russia is in turmoil from food shortages and other internal conflicts. China grows stronger militarily. After invading Taiwan it initiates a plan to dominate all of Asia from Sakhalin Islands and Vladivostok in the east to Volgograd and Kazakhstan in the west; from Siberia in the north to Southeast Asia and Singapore in the south. China justifies this as "reclaiming traditional Chinese territories".

The USA sends its 7th Fleet to the Taiwan Straits to force China to withdraw. Chinese air attacks sink 7th Fleet's flagship USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72), claiming it was in Chinese waters. United States denounces this as an unprovoked attack and declares war on China. The US is joined by the United Nations and most of its members.

Many campaigns and scenarios created by gamers diverge from this background story.