I'm a big fan of Koei's Dynasty Warriors Series. I've played and reviewed a seemingly endless number of new versions and expansion packs, and I've never really gotten tired of the game. I guess Koei spaces the games just enough apart so that when the next one comes out I haven't been burnt out on the game yet.
So, I hadn't played a beat 'em up in a while when a friend came by and asked if I'd seen the new screens for Sengoku Musou.
Sengoku Musou? Er?
Sure enough, it's by Koei...but it's not the same universe this time around. Instead of ancient China, Koei is taking us for a spin in ancient Japan. For those of you wondering why the ninja get all the love and the samurai get left out in the cold, well, here's a little bit of payback for the samurai.
Story
Sengoku Musou takes place in the Sengoku Jidai or "Warring States" period of Japanese history. This was also the setting for the first Kessen game. Characters from this time period also appear in Onimusha and Onimusha Tactics.
This period of history begins around 1568, when Oda Nobunaga is "reunifying" Japan by marching on Kyoto at the request of the man he later installs as the figurehead shogun, Ashikaga Yoshiaki. After Nobunaga drives Ashikaga out 5 years later, he sets about trying to quell any rebellion and is having a pretty good go of it up until 1582, when one of his generals, Akechi Mitsuhide, has had just about enough of Nobunaga. Furious at him for the indirect assassination of his mother, and tired of having his name trashed in public, he betrays and slays Nobunaga at Honnoji.
Mitsuhide then attempts to claim the shogunate for himself, but the tenuous political connections he has fall apart due to the disgrace surrounding his sudden rise to power. Hideyoshi Toyotomi puts an end to Mistuhide's pipe dream of ruling Japan in a mere 13 days, killing Mistuhide as he tries to retreat to the refuge of his brother's city. Toyotomi and leyasu Tokugawa end the Warring States period in 1590, completely reunifying Japan.
Unfortunately for the Toyotomi family, Hideyoshi was too busy invading Korea and with other matters of war to address other concerns, and when he dies in 1598, his heir to the throne is only 5 years old. Tokugawa seizes control politically and then settles things militarily by crushing the Toyotomi army at the Battle of Sekigahara.
Why do you need to know all this? First, because knowledge is power. Second, because as is the case with all historical games, you enjoy them more if you understand who's who, and why they are where they are. In any case, that's the real world background of the game, now on to the gameplay.
Gameplay
Any veteran of Dynasty Warriors will know what's up. Same four button combination, attack, special attack, musou (Super Move), and jump. If you haven't played the game before, imagine going into the middle of a fight with a sword or spear, and then just beating up hundreds upon hundreds of people. That's this game.
However, there are a couple different things this time around. First off, R2 now performs a roll. Also, your R1 ranged attack is now unlimited. This is cool because when you throttle the piss-ant ranged attackers who have been interrupting your combo attacks and leaving you open for huge strikes of retribution it means they don't only drop arrows, they actually drop useful items.
Your elemental attacks now have to be purchased with skill points. You have a skill chart that gives the specific upgrades available for your character, and your weapon's elemental combos are part of that list. This means you unlock a variety of different moves and combos, which is good for people who were bored with the limited combos in previous DW games. Good stuff.
Horseback riding is a bit different here, too. On horse you are now a formidable enemy, whereas in prior versions, you were just moving faster. Maogichi, for example, starts a 4-hit combo with the bayonet on his rifle, and then starts firing. VERY devastating to the poor infantry. Your horse also has a health bar, so you can actually manage to get it killed in this game. Fortunately, Koei also fixed that little bug where you knock a boss character off their horse, steal it for yourself, and return later to find that same boss on the same horse again.
You start with 5 characters available, and the ability to unlock 10 others, as well as put together your own original character. The 5 you can start with are as follows. Sanada Yukimura, who uses a long lance type weapon, fought at the Battle of Sekigahara against Ieyasu Tokugawa; the aforementioned Akechi Mitsuhide, betrayer of Nobunaga, fights with a sword; Oichi, the ill-fated wife of some of Nobunaga's generals, wields one of those "toss & catch" toys; Usesugi Kenshin, gender-questionable, heavy-drinking samurai who often clashed with Takeda Shingen, uses a jagged longsword; and finally last of the 5 is Hattori Hanzo...the ninja.
Each character is given a weapon, and as in the past games you'll go ahead and pick up increases to your items, as well as new and rare ones. In the case of Sengoku Musou, your most powerful weapon tops out at Level 5. As always, going and hunting down your Level 5 weapon is a bit of a chore, but the best things in life don't come without work.
Unlike past games in the DW series which only had you fighting 1 front, you'll find in many of the campaigns that you have 3 seperate forces to engage. This makes it enjoyable because the two enemy forces will attack each other and frequently, in their attempts to hurt you, take out other surrounding people. It's a nice touch to bust into a castle and see forces engaged and already wounded. Typically, if you pound on the yellow side too much, they may not be around for future missions, something you may want to keep in mind if you feel that you need a bit of assistance.
Koei also added an expanded "challenge" mode to Sengoku Musou. These modes are quick and simple, good for when you just want to beat the crap out of a whole bunch of little guys for a bit. Some of the modes test how many enemies in a confined space you can dispatch in a minute. Your timer will add 5 seconds for every 50 enemies that you defeat. Another mode will only allow you to use the Musou button, but enemies will constantly drop musou refilling items and the timer pauses while you are in the Musou animation. These modes are fun for some variations on the standard missions.
2-player mode has a bit of a twist to it as well. Instead of the two of you having separate Musou gauges, you have one, that is filled with the combination of the 2 characters' separate meters. Player 1 can't fill the bar by himself, and neither can player 2. When both do fill them up, either player can activate it, but it activates for both characters. An interesting little twist, however, it's more annoying than helpful.
This game is challenging on the normal difficulty level but you don't have to worry about the game balance problem you had in past games, where you'd need to pop into Free Mode in order to have a decent shot at clearing the missions. With the exception of Date Masumune and Uesugi Kenshin, I haven't had to level up outside the Story Mode to clear any of the main story arcs so far.
Graphics
The characters in the missions seem sharper now, maybe a bit more aliased than before. It really doesn't matter too much to me, as the game mainly seems quicker, excluding times when you get into the field headquarters of enemy generals. Something about a mass of men, special moves, and the tent cloths grinds the game to a halt.
On the plus side for the graphics, each of the characters actually gets a rendered opening and ending. One does wonder though, since the engine hasn't changed, and there are less characters...why not give all of them rendered openings for each mission? Also, the intro is disappointing...although there is a scene where assassins come upon one of the female characters bathing...with not-so-sexy results (Parents, no real nudity). The intro this time around just doesn't have the high octane feel that the past Warriors titles have had.
So, the engine is definitely not feeling its oats this time around. If this comes to the XBox maybe it won't grind to a halt quite so much, but Koei either needs to wait for the PS3 for their next game, or find some of this hidden PS2 processing power that Sony's talking about fast.
Audio
Most of the audio is fairly repetitive, but this is pretty good since you don't want it interfering with the game, especially since you're going to have to hear it so much. I will however, say good things about the ending theme, BoA's "Be the One". It doesn't quite fit the tone of the game, but it's a catchy song in and of itself. Almost makes up for the rage from hearing Koyanagi Yuki's awful "Cross Colors" in the last game.
The effects and voice overs aren't bad either. Normally there's one character I'll have issues with, but that's not the case this time around...but maybe that's just because there are fewer of them.
Gripes
Aside from the sluggish framerate, and Koei's need to get another update to the engine fast, I think I've actually covered almost everything I had to complain about.
Overall
Koei and Omega Force obviously know their audience and they obviously know their stuff when it comes to this genre. This game became the first title in Japan to sell a million copies this year, so it's loyal fan base is getting to be pretty large, and for the most part Koei doesn't disappoint them. Kenshin's first castle invasion mission is one of the most enjoyable experiences I've ever had in this style of game. Saiga Magoichi (a gun-wielding Saiga clan ninja who took on Nobunaga, and rebelled against the government in order to try and protect a group of Buddhists) is so cool in this game that I can easily see how Koei could spin-off a game just featuring him (think light-hearted Devil May Cry and you're on the right track).
The fact that Koei managed to make these characters so damn cool makes me that much more ticked off at how badly Capcom pulled them off in Onimusha Tactics.
That being said though, a lot of the novelty does wear off from having much of the same experience before. These games just don't have the same edge that they used to, and I think it's time for Koei to start thinking in a more value-added sense. I'm curious to see what Shin Sangokumusou Empires (Dynasty Warriors 4 Empires here in the US) brings to the table, or possibly what Koei and Omega Force could do by teasing a bit more fiction into the game. Perhaps there could be a crossover between the Sangoku Musou and Shin Sangokumusou characters, before retiring the series so that they can spend a couple years creating it from the ground up again for the next generation of consoles. Hardcore fans of this series are going to start to want a bit more, and they're going to start wanting it soon.
If this is your first Warriors title, then Samurai Warriors comes away with the base Overall Score I gave it up top. If you're a hardened veteran of the series like me, knock off a half point. You'll still like the game, there just happens to be a bit of a chance of burn-out. If you really don't like the Warriors series so far, or beat 'em ups, take a full 1.5 off. It doesn't bring that much new to the table, but there's a small chance that the newer characters and the nicer maps may bring you around.
