Kongming’s Archives: 2002 Updates (1/2)

6/30/02: added a new Romance of the Three Kingdoms VI screenshots page with full-resolution English PlayStation screenshots send in by Sean Williams. Created a new set of Sanguo Qun Ying 64x76 avatars due to popular demand, enjoy.

6/29/02: the Romance of the Three Kingdoms VII items page has been updated with a large amount of new information (new translated names, item buy and sell prices, item types, and item effects). This page will also receive aditional updates as information is gathered.

6/27/02: Romance of the Three Kingdoms VII was released today in the United States. So far the game looks awesome. It revives many strategies and features that vanished from more recent games in the series.

6/25/02: the Dynasty Tactics page has now gone online with some significant content including screenshots, stop by and check it out. Sitewide navigation has been slightly improved and now also offers consistent links to the forum and to the new Dynasty Tactics home page.

6/24/02: Han Mingdi (Liu Xang), a new historical ruler biographies by Jonathan Wu, is now online. New Sanguozhi biographies translated by Lady Wu: Lady Pan, Lady Wang (of Langya), Lady Wang (of Nanyang), Lady Wu, Lady Xie, and Lady Xu (all Wu biographies). New officers added to the Sanguo television series page: Jia Xu, Ma Chao, Xu Chu.

6/18/02: new Sanguozhi biography translated by BattleRoyal: Lu Meng. New Sanguo Zhi biography translated by HolyMan: Xiahou Dun. New officers avatars and portraits added to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms television series page: Pang Tong, Zhuge Jin, and another Zhou Yu.

6/17/02: 64x64px versions of the current Dynasty Warriors 3 avatars have been released for use in The Scholars of Shen Zhou and other forums.

6/14/02: The Kongming’s Archives forum, The Scholars of Shen Zhou, has just gone online. If you want to discuss Romance of the Three Kingdoms games, novel, and anything else on your mind please stop by, register, and participate.

6/11/02: new officers avatars and portraits added to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms television series page: Lu Su, Liu Xie (Emperor Xian), Huang Gai, Zhou Yu, and Sun Quan. New historical ruler biographies by Sean Williams: Sima Yao (Wudi), and Sima Dezong (Andi). 8-Bit Theater is making a wonderful Dynasty Warriors comic series. Go take a look (added to the links page).

6/10/02: the new Romance of the Three Kingdoms television series page has just gone online. At this time it include portraits and avatars for several officers from various kingdoms. In the future it will include many more officers and additional content. This new section is made possible by Sean Williams, who is providing me with all the screenshots to run through Photoshop.

6/8/02: New historical ruler biographies by Sean Williams: Sima Rui (Yuandi). Sima Zhi, Sima Zhong, and Sima Lun have been updated. New screenshots for Romance of the Three Kingdoms VII PlayStation2 have gone online. A complete set of Romance of the Three Kingdoms VII item graphics has gone online, English names will go online as they are made available. I forgot to announce it earlier, but there are all new screenshots pages for Romance of the Three Kingdoms the original, II, III, and IV with large screenshot selections. I took them myself to make sure they are high quality.

6/7/02: the Final Fantasy avatars have been drastically improved (64x64) and many new monster avatars have been added. Take a look. There has also been quite a bit of site cleanup over the past few days.

6/2/02: I have added large collections of screenshots for Romance of the Three Kingdoms the original, part two, three, and four. They have not been compressed from the game originals. New historical ruler biographies by Sean Williams: Sima Zhong (Huidi), Sima Chi (Huaidi).

6/1/02: many new layout improvements have been made – a new Kongming’s Archives home section menu has been added to the top of all pages. To accommodate this layout update a new portraits home page has been made to serve as a hub for all other portrait pages. Sima Lun, a new historical biography by Sean Williams, is now online. Minor errors have been corrected; some text has been improved in several areas. You can now get e-mail@kongming.net with us (professionally hosted POP3), see news for more information.

5/30/02: new Sanguo Zhi biography in the novel and history section by Lady Wu: Zhang Zhao. new Romance of the Three Kingdoms VIII wallpaper in the wallpaper section and new content on the Romance of the Three Kingdoms VIII page. We also now have a complete set of Romance of the Three Kingdoms VIII item images. And, for no reason at all whatsoever, we have snazzy new images in the Feature Menu; I hope you enjoy them.

5/28/02: several good sites have been added to the links page, two on Romance of the Three Kingdoms games and one on Dynasty Warriors 3.

5/27/02: the Kessen II avatars have now been named. I have also created a new series of Suikoden avatars (100x100, 64x64). Enjoy. Many people write me about our web host and ask me if they are good. I have added their link to the bottom of the page along with my thoughts.

5/26/02: the recent CSS update, I have learned, caused problems for several Netscape 4.x clients by disabling links. This has been fixed and I am sorry about any inconvenience that may have been caused. I may not support layout in Netscape 4.x, but I do intend to make sure its users can access the content on this site. The novel and history page and the home page have been completely revised and now sport a new layout.

5/25/02: new historical biographies by : Wang Mang and Liu Xiu. Empress Dowager Lü’s biography has been updated.

5/24/02: the complete Kessen II soundtrack has been added to the music page (thank you very much, Kim, for making this possible). The novel and history section now includes an online book section in the right-hand menu (featuring free versions of popular related books). Read Zhuge Liang’s “The Way of the General” online here at Kongming’s Archives. Emperor Hui-di (Liu Ying)’s historical biography is now online at the biographies page.

5/23/02: the complete Romance of the Three Kingdoms IV soundtrack and four songs from Dragon Throne: Battle of Red Cliff have been added to the music page (thank you Chicken+Ribs Combo for the Dragon Throne songs and 11 from Romance of the Three Kingdoms IV).

5/22/02: presenting a new chronology of major events (SGYY) by in the novel and history section. New Dynasty Warriors 3 wallpaper by FC Chan at the wallpaper page. New Romance of the Three Kingdoms VI screenshots (just about the only good ones on the Internet). I have also gone though the whole site again for another cleanup (layout, formatting, etc.) and now that I have taken care of that I will be working on the novel and history page for a little while. The Coming Soon section will also be getting regular updates from this point on, keep an eye on it if you are interested.

5/21/02: I have made several major improvements to the CSS files that control the site’s layout (see site news for more information). Emperor Liu Jizi’s unfortunate and short historical biography is online.

5/20/02: all new avatars page has gone online. It includes the content we already had available for four Romance of the Three Kingdoms games in addition to Final Fantasy II and Final Fantasy III (yeah, I know they are not related, but I suspect you will get over it). New Chrono Cross avatars page is online. Liu Bang’s biography in the novel and history section has been updated. New avatars page has been completely revied and the whole section has been made much easier to navigate. Not in the web ring at this time (the other Rot3K webmasters don't seem interested in it).

5/19/02: new feedback section that includes contact information and a poll you may use to rate Kongming’s Archives. New Sanguo Zhi biography in the novel and history section by Sonken: Zhang Fei. New Romance of the Three Kingdoms V wallpaper added to the wallpaper page Thanks to Sain Cai (website) for the original image file. Fate of the Dragon wallpaper link on the wallpaper page has been fixed.

5/18/02: new Sanguo Zhi biography in the novel and history section by Sonken: Guan Yu.

5/16/02: the home page’s layout has been drastically improved (new CSS layout rules) and all permanent text has been rewritten to convey more information in a more concise manner. Novel and History section: new Sanguo Zhi biographies by Lady Wu: Cao Zhi, Cheng Pu, Han Dang, and Jiang Qin and new Sanguo Zhi biographies by Sonken: Huang Zhong, Zhao Yun. And elsewhere: 10 Sangokushi Senki avatars have been made and uploaded.

5/15/02: Liu Ying (Han Ruzi)’s biography by Jonathan Wu uploaded. fixed some various errors reported by my buddy Sean.

5/13/02: added Kessen II avatars and Kessen II officer portraits to Kessen II page. Added Dynasty Warriors 2 ending music to music page. Revised layout and appearance of music page. Liu Zhe’s historical biography has been updated in the novel and history section. Added 10 new (and very cool) Dynasty Warriors 2 wallpapers to the wallpaper page (check them out even if you don’t like Dynasty Warriors 2). Added all 9 wallpapers made by Koei for Kessen to the wallpaper page, they are no longer available on the official sites. Uploaded a new higher quality version of the mp3 Circuit, the ending music from Dynasty Warriors 3, to the music page. Added new history link, Imperial China: A Legacy, to the links page. Added review link to IGN.com’s new Rot3K VII English PS2 review to the Rot3K VII page. Lots of work done today, eh?

5/12/02: the new Han, Three Kingdoms, and Jin Officer and Ruler Biography page has gone online. This page will be updated regularly with officer and ruler biographies.

5/11/02: added Jack Yuan’s Three Kingdoms Chronicles to the links page, a great source for some high quality translated Sanguo Zhi bios, an excellent read and a Web page to keep an eye on.

5/10/02: added a new Chinese History link to the links page, started pre-HTML layout work on the forum with , started creating dynasty links and information page (offline) for the novel section (will be instrumental to the navigation system). Updates layout of site update archives page.

5/7/02: our Dynasty Warriors 3 FAQ has been completed and is now version 1.0.

5/5/02: new site navigation and layout have both been completed and implemented throughout the whole site. I think you will find that the changes, once you get used to them, make navigation much easier. Moved credits from individual pages to a new credits page. Created a new Web site requests page (if you want to help Kongming’s Archives this is how to do it). Added Fate of the Dragon and Dragon Throne: Battle of Red Cliff to the new site menu. Added many new (and very attractive) desktop pictures by the developers of Fate of the Dragon. I did a lot of work on Kongming’s Archives today, I hope you enjoy the changes. :)

5/4/02: well, Kongming’s Archives is growing quickly and that means it is time to rework the navigation system to accommodate a significant increase in content. As a result I have completely updated the navigation menus on this page. A new site menu page has been created to work with the new menu structure I have in mind. I have also removed the drop down menus from the right-hand side; they are no longer necessary. If you have any related thoughts, concerns, or commendations please send me and e-mail. Also fixed some minor Mozilla issues.

5/3/02: added Jiang Wan and Gu Yongs’ SGZ biographies to the novel and history page (thanks to Chen Qiang). Minor update to the Dynasty Warriors 3 FAQ.

5/2/02: A little menu cleanup, fixed a few incorrect links, new copyright, and took the old site off-line replacing all pages with URL redirects. It is time to let the old bear die. Also added a link to the novel and history section from the main pages.

5/1/02: (In the novel and history section) Added SGZ biography translations for Chen Tai, Deng Ai, Jiang Wei, and Zhou Yu (thanks to Battleroyale). Completed the essays and writings submissions section, updated Jonathan Wu’s introduction. Added a submission explanation page and a submissions FAQ. General section cleanup.

4/30/02: The Novel and History section has been updated with a page that include officer styles and regular names for cross-reference along with a detailed explanation of why officers might have multiple names. A complete collection of Rot3K VII avatars has been added to the Rot3K VII page. Small updated to the Destiny of an Emperor page that include repairing the search engine occurred. The FAQ section has been updated with the current e-mail issue. Home page layout improved.

4/25/02: The Novel & History section has been updated. A few initial errors (grammar, layout) have been corrected, the title colors and background has been changed (now less obtrusive), and an excellent introduction to the book Romance of the Three Kingdoms has been written for us by our friend (a most excellent read). Also updated release date for Romance of the Three Kingdoms VII (June 26th, the date stores are now getting). Re-exporting desktop wallpapers with the new domain and placing them all in .zip archives (you will now download them to your hard drive instead of taking them from a popup window), this makes it much easier for me to manage the section.

4/23/02: The new Novel & History section has just gone online, take a look and participate or contribute if you can, this section will be a home for the RTK community’s work and talent. Updated navigation menus on all pages to reflect this change. Added search form to all pages.

4/22/02: Some Dynasty Warriors 3 FAQs have been updated, some new characters illustrations (Huang Gai and Zhao Yun) have been added to the bottom of the DW3 page, and a new Dynasty Warriors 3 wallpaper has been added. The Destiny of an Emperor page has also been updated (and the downloads section there has been reworked, DoaE 2 in English is now available without the IPS patch requirement). Started a new Three Kingdoms and Chinese History section on the links page and added some pages.

4/19/02: Started working on the Novel & History section (not yet online).

4/16/02: Fixed some minor layout and HTML issues and updated some hidden content that was appearing in the search engine.

4/12/02: We have just added a Search Engine to Kongming’s Archives (at the bottom of the right-hand menu). The search engine searches every html and text document on the site, so it may take a moment (but it will get you the results you are looking for). If you have any problems at all with it please inform us. We will be adding the search field to all pages down the road.

4/11/02: Our Dynasty Warriors 3 FAQ has been updated to version 0.9.4 and we have now prepared out partner sites page (if you are interested in this program and your site’s content is relevant to this site as a whole please contact us).

4/10/02: Added a new page with kongming.net link buttons for webmasters to use on their sites (if they like using images instead of text). A sample button can be found at the bottom of the black right-hand menu. I have also made some HTML improvements to the layout that should improve the site for viewers with 3.0 (and older) browsers along with users who use current browsers that do not offer good support for new standards (like OmniWeb and iCab).

4/9/02: The soundtrack for Romance of the Three Kingdoms VIII has gone online (my thanks to Sun Wentai), Temprus’ Dynasty Warriors 3 screensaver has been added to the Dynasty Warriors 3 section (Windows .exe), and some corrections have been made to various pages in the site (that you everyone that submitted the problems). I have also tweaked the style sheets used on this site to improve the layout and make some items easier to read (most notable being the link colors, menu alignment, and menu colors).

4/8/02: We have moved to the new domain name kongming.net and we will be here for a long time to come. We are now providing professional POP3 e-mail hosting, see the news for more information. I have gone through the whole site and updates all links (the old site is not used at all). While doing this I trimmed links in many key areas reducing file sizes and fixed a few outdated or broken links (there should now be none left in the whole site). If you find anything we missed please contact the webmaster.

4/7/02: the whole Romance of the Three Kingdoms section has been updated with a new look (consistent with this section and the Dynasty Warriors section, but with a unique theme). The whole officer portraits section has also been updated with the new look. Romance of the Three Kingdoms VI officer portraits and VII officer portraits have both been reviewed for errors and all found errors have been fixed (which leaves no problems at all). I have also added several new portraits to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms VI portraits set that were not previously available (completing the set).

4/5/02: created two avatars for each character in Dynasty Warriors 3 for you to use in message forums. If you don’t know what an avatar is go to the page and read the description at the top, it tells you pretty much everything you need to know.

4/4/02: added 5 new Romance of the Three Kingdoms Desktop Pictures (after the desktop pictures released yesterday I received several requests for similar work, but not game related. If you like the Three Kingdoms era, the novel, or the game, take a look at the new additions.) Added some attractive officer portraits from Sanguo qun Ying 3 found on the Odinsoft (developer) game website. The game looks very attractive, but I highly doubt we will ever see in in the United States.

4/3/02: Added Romance of the Three Kingdoms V Sound Track (thanks Carp’s Tail), created and added 5 new Dynasty Warriors 3 Desktop Pictures (I have come to love two of them in particular and have even replaced my own desktop, check them out even if you only like the Rot3K game series or novel). Uploaded more FAQs and Walkthroughs for Kessen and Kessen II. Added useful links to the right hand menu of all pages (mostly message board links). Site-wide cleanup: all e-mail requests, backlog, and problem reports resolved. Went through the whole Romance of the Three Kingdoms section to revise information and make the site layout more consistent (this is the first of two steps to bring the new design to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms section). Wow, did a lot of work today! O_o I guess that is what happens when you actually get a full day to play around with.

4/2/02: Updated layout of all pages in the home section (click here to see the original version of Kongming’s Archives) and in the Dynasty Warriors section. Minor touchups in the home section and in the Dynasty Warriors section to improve consistency. Added the Five Tigers Discussion Forum to the links page (go check it out, very nice). Improved the text-based games menu that appears on the right-hand side of the home section.

4/1/02: Updated our Dynasty Warriors 3 FAQ to version 0.9.3. This version features many improvements to the fourth weapon instructions section and the stage reference and events guide. Some FAQs have been added to both the Kessen and Kessen II pages and the final errors were cleared out. Three very pretty wallpapers from Koei’s Sangokushi Senki game (external) (prepared in Photoshop for multiple resolutions by us) have been added to the wallpaper page.

3/31/02: The all new Kessen and Kessen II pages are now online (thank you everyone for your requests). Content will be added to these pages as the following days pass. I also took the time to go through the whole Web site and fix little errors and add little requests that I have been notified of by e-mail. Thank you everyone for taking the time to make this page better for everyone else! We also have snazzy new Kongming’s Archives headers on many of the home page sections.

3/28/02: Updated our Dynasty Warriors 3 FAQ to version 0.9.2. This new version includes the often requested Stage Reference and Events Guide. Please contribute to this new guide if you have anything to offer. Also went through my backlogged e-mail and fixed all the little errors that had been e-mailed to me, thank you very much everyone for letting me know!

3/27/02: Added the Sanguo ONline Community web page to the links section, check it out if you like Romance of the Three Kingdoms. See also the Sanguo ONline Meeting Hall (a very good forum for Romance of the Three Kingdoms games and novel). The Dynasty Warriors 3 page has received a number of additional updates and the Dynasty Warriors 3 FAQ is now at version 0.9.1. We have also released a text version of the Dynasty Warriors 3 FAQ which can be found at GameFAQs; if you wish to include it on your web page please contact the webmaster using the link in the black right-hand menu.

3/23/02: Added a few new pages to the links section.

3/21/02: Some portraits for Romance of the Three Kingdoms VIII have been added. The Dynasty Warriors 3 page has received a number of additions over the last week and now also includes our own Dynasty Warriors 3 FAQ which will be regularly updated until it reaches ver 1.0 (currently 0.8). A new music page has been added which includes all music from Dynasty Warriors 3 and some samples from Romance of the Three Kingdoms VIII.

3/15/02: Dynasty Warriors 3 maps are all online and are now being translated into English. When complete the section will be revised giving it a new look. A new section for Dynasty Warriors and Romance of the Three Kingdoms wallpaper has been added and is now online. I have created 3 desktop pictures for Dynasty Warriors 3 and 6 more are planned in two more groups of 3.

3/12/02: More FAQs added along with character portraits for Romance of the Three Kingdoms II-VII, Destiny of an Emperor, and Dynasty Warriors.

3/6/02: Some review links, more FAQs and Guides, and some additional game information on several different pages along with general cleanup through out the site. Coming soon list added to this page to give viewers an idea of what will be added in the days and months to come. Added a links page for Romance of the Three Kingdoms web pages.

3/5/02: We have been adding walkthroughs, FAQs, guides, codes, cheats, etc. all day. This is a slow process as we are making sure we have permission from the author or author(s) before anything is posted. If you don’t find what you want here please take a look at GameFAQs as that is the best place on the Internet IMNSHO to get information on games. There is a chance that what you are looking for exists, but was written by an author that denied our request to post here. To all those authors that have offered us permission thank you kindly, I like to take every chance to share any information on RTK games with the community whenever they present themselves. Credits can be found on each individual game section. Added the site FAQ, a place were I will post commonly asked or anticipated questions.

3/4/02: All work mentioned on the update below has been completed and all known link issues and page display errors have been fixed (bearing in mind that we do not support our layout in 4.x and older browsers, just access to content). Now some Windows testing to make sure nothing got by us and then we start collecting walkthroughs, codes, cheats, etc. Also added the ‘Game News and Updates’ section at the top of the page (it replaces the ‘Read Before Entering’ section which is now a part of the ‘Site Viewer Agreement’).

3/3/02: Completed all other Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Dynasty Warriors pages. For now they lack walkthroughs, hints, tips, cheats, etc., but they do have a good amount of useful content. I am converting all links to images to JavaScript links so I can control window sizes and get the most use out of the space available. This will prevent these links from working in very old browsers, but if it was not done many people who are not very experienced with the Internet would loose track of the main pages. Anyone else can upgrade their browsers. After that (something that will take about 2 hours tomorrow) I will start including walkthroughs and other helpful content. This site is for everyone that loves Koei and Romance of the Three Kingdoms, enjoy.

3/2/02: Initial completion of Romance of the Three Kingdoms VIII and VII pages along with Dynasty Warriors 3 page. Fixed a CSS problem that was breaking some styles in Netscape 6, fixed an image/link problem that was adding empty space to the bottom of pages in Internet Explorer 6. There are no more known issues.

2/28/02: Located ROMs for Romance of the Three Kingdoms I, II, III, and IV. Located DOS versions for Romance of the Three Kingdoms I, II, III, IV, and VI (not online). (READ BEFORE DOWNLOADING). File names will change weekly so don’t link directly to the files on this server (download them from us and then upload them to your own server if you don’t want to link to us, our bandwidth is not for your site. The files are all very small and would even fit without difficulty on a GeoCities site. Placing them on your own server prevents your site from filling with dead links.) This is important, if people try to leech these files with direct downloads we will have to take them off-line, that means no one is happy. If you have any questions just ask. To download the files select the game you want to download from the menu at the top of the page.

2/23/02: Layout complete (there still may be some bugs to work out, but nothing worth holding back over). Content gathered (it is only a matter of posting it now). Site file skeleton designed. Graphics for all sections designed.

2/16/02: Site construction begins. Layout is designed and original graphics are developed. First draft CSS and JavaScript are written and initial testing begins. I do not yet know if I am going to offer layout and aesthetic support for older buggy browsers like Netscape 4.x or iCab, but time will tell. The content on this site will be available to any device that can surf the web.