One thing I've realized from playing this game is that I don't know jack shit when it comes to Japan's history, outside of America's perspective on WWII at least.
I've always been focused on themes/symbolism with J-Horror. I've never really looked into Samurai/Ronin, etc. I love politics and foreign policy though, it's actually the degree I have and my main goal when I was younger was to be a diplomat of all things.
What I'm getting at is that this game has forced me to do brief amounts of research so I can grasp the weight of Matthew Perry, what a Ronin is, etc. It's so damn cool. Now I'm much more invested in my choices when it comes to alliances and parts of the story have much needed context for my personal benefit.
Matthew Perry in particular, I really need to read up on this guy. I'm somewhat familiar with the name but I didn't realize the standing that he had/has in Japan. I read somewhere that 90% of school-aged kids know his name, his image and are familiar with his impact on Japan. I started the game thinking he was some obvious villain but that clearly doesn't seem to be the case.
The fact that we got a historical, though loosely focused I'm sure, epic from Japan themselves, it's just so cool to me and something that I'm damn glad I'm able to experience. This is a really cool game and I've said it before but it deserves to be applauded by the gaming community. Too many people allow themselves to get bogged down by technical issues and graphical benchmarks.
It makes me think of the argument of videogames as an art form, clearly they are. I wish more people would be willing to embrace more games, warts and all, and see past the headlines and meet a game at it's level. This game will find its audience in due time but it's always a bummer to see a game release and it's immediately written off by a large segment of the community.