The term bakufu originally meant the dwelling and household of a shogun, but in time it came to be generally used for the system of government of a feudal military dictatorship, exercised in the name of the shogun; and this is the meaning that has been adopted into English through the term "shogunate". The shogunate system was originally established under the Kamakura shogunate by Minamoto no Yoritomo. Although theoretically the state, and therefore the Emperor, held ownership of all land of Japan, the system had some feudal elements, with lesser territorial lords pledging their allegiance to greater ones. Samurai were rewarded for their loyalty with land, which was in turn, on the liege lord's permission, handed down and divided among their sons.

The hierarchy that held this system of government together was reinforced by close ties of loyalty between samurai and their subordinates. Each shogunate was dynamic, not static. Power was constantly shifting and authority was often ambiguous. The study of the ebbs and flows in this complex history continues to occupy the attention of scholars. Each shogunate encountered competition. Sources of competition included the emperor and the court aristocracy, the remnants of the imperial governmental systems, the shoen system, the great temples and shrines, the shugo and the jito, the kokujin and early modern daimyo. Each shogunate reflected the necessity of new ways of balancing the changing requirements of central and regional authorities.

Tenga Seiha is a strategy / simulation game released by Imageneer for the Playstation & Saturn consoles in 1997 based on the Mediaval japan shogunate style. The game is divided into different sections, the main one is inside the player's character house where he meets his generals and spies that will provide him advices to improve the army, the land, etc. Other part of the game is a overview of the main town, and other is in the battle parts where the player can select which action will want his army to make.