Does this game have anything to do with actual Ogres?

[PozerWolf]

^ topic

[Haddon]

Yes. Sort of. If you are "western", Americas or Europe, Aus/NZ etc, ogre probably means a completely different thing though. To the Japanese, "ogre" is synonymous with "demon", it is a KIND of demon. So in the game, it takes place long LONG after the fabled "Ogre Battle", that the first game in the series Ogre Battle: March of the Black Queen mentions. Which was essentially humans vs demons, then angels got involved. It isn't quite like Abrahamic angels and demons, but fairly close, and the "ogres" are some of the high level demons. Although maybe not all are high level demons, it isn't really clear.

So think of the title more like this; Demon Battle: Tactics. Demon Battle (Ogre Battle: MotBQ) came first and exists in the same world, and some recurring characters from that show up (but this isn't really a sequel, no need to play that first), but the real-time wasn't super popular in Japan, so the developers made Tactics.

The story in this game has nothing to do with ogres until near the very end. Even then, you aren't fighting a war against demons, or going down into hell (although...eh sorta, Palace of the Dead was called Hellgate in the original). This is a political story, closer to Final Fantasy Tactics, or A Song of Ice and Fire (though much higher fantasy when it comes to magic than that) than to say the main line Final Fantasy games.

[Tape]

It's named "Tactics Ogre" because at the end of the game the villain says "I guess your tactics are all ogre now" and then he reborns you

[Haddon]

Originally posted by Tape:

It's named "Tactics Ogre" because at the end of the game the villain says "I guess your tactics are all ogre now" and then he reborns you

Jesus that was bad.

[Pickleton]

Originally posted by Tape:

It's named "Tactics Ogre" because at the end of the game the villain says "I guess your tactics are all ogre now" and then he reborns you

Smash Mouth starts playing in the background

This series makes a lot more sense if you think of things more on an alignment chart than purely "good" vs "bad".

When referenced in this game, an "ogre" is generally flung as an insult for someone unwaveringly lawful, and implied more "lawful evil". Someone who will sacrifice anything and anyone for their ideals.