Ghost samurai tactics in the Afterlife
Skulls of the Shogun is a turn-based strategy game set in the Samurai Afterlife. You command ghost-samurai warriors, magical animal monks, and mustachioed samurai generals across 2D maps. The design draws on Advance Wars but moves at a quicker, arcade-inspired pace, and it mixes in a fighting-game attitude. The tone is comedic, with cartoony characters and a light touch even while the tactical play stays serious. The Bone-a-Fide Edition adds a new episode, the Tanuki Monk unit, a player progression system where you gain experience and fuse emblems, and Developer Commentary.
Playing together with your group
Multiplayer supports up to 4 players at once, played locally or online. Matches take place on dedicated multiplayer maps, so your group can square off against each other directly. The Steam features list includes Online PvP and Remote Play Together, which gives your group options for getting a session going. Note that the old Skulls Anywhere asynchronous mode is gone; multiplayer now runs in realtime through Skulls Online only.
Before you start
The single-player campaign runs through 24 levels, with an additional episode in the Bone-a-Fide Edition that features persistent troops and the Tanuki Monk. The Tanuki Monk is a new unit you can use to confound opponents. If your group wants to learn the systems first, the campaign is a straightforward place to do that before jumping into multiplayer maps.