THE SHORT: Some people will like this, yes. But coming off of the Dynasty Warriors series, I was pretty much disappointed by every change they made.
THE LONG: SW is not a bad game. But if I were to compare it to the Dynasty Warriors games, I'd honestly say that I had more fun and spent more time playing DW2 back in 2000 than I did with Samurai Warriors.
SW is basically DW except in Japan instead of China. Or at least that's what the magazines all say. They may also tell you about the extra stuff this gam brings to the table, like the random castles and stuff like that. Well, I bought it, beat it, got bored and frustrated with it, and sold it a month later.
I hate to keep comparing it to DW, but it can't be helped. This game has about 15 or 20 total characters, down from DW's 40-something. Several of the characters in SW are unique, yes, and some are even quite cool. But whereas in DW you can dislike half the characters and still have 2 dozen others to pick from, that option really tightens when you're talking about a handful like this. So, I hope you find more than just the 4 or 5 that I liked.
The game entails the same Dynasty Warriors theme of being a powerful single cog in the massive battle machine. You'll still kill 147 million foes, and this time the combo system is kind of cooler (you get more points for multi Musou hits, etc).
But populating those battles are extra new characters, such as fire bombers who you'll know are near only after you've lost a third of your energy being blown around by their almost invisible little bombs. Or you'll know that some big ogre fist-fighters are nearby because you've been thrown 300 feet away from battle because something suddenly slammed into you. Variety, yes. Pain in the ass? Oh, most certainly.
But let's not forget the feature that Koei seems most proud of here: The new random castle system!!! It's so fun I can hardly contain myself!!! Imagine this: You slog through a half hour battle, protecting the suicidal idiot who you were supposed to guard, all the while losing points because you're passing up one of the dozen "missions" that pop up on the battlefield. Then when you kill the bad guy at the end of the stage and wanna just save the game and go to bed, you can't because the guy you just killed has "retreated" into the castle! Now you get to run around and look for him!
And what fun this is! An endless (literally, endless) stream of enemies will trickle out of the walls, and you have a time limit to get to the end (otherwise you start on fire, see). But the castle isn't a castle by any stretch of the imagination. It's a big warehouse maze!! Glee!!! Yes, you must literally navigate through these mazes avoiding all the enemies and trying not to spontaneously combust while desperately searching for the exit. And yes, the layout is random. Meaning that every time you play, you'll have to run into every room, look up and down every hallway, go down the fork of every branching path, all the while looking for that one wall-colored door that you missed, which needs to be knocked open so you can go through it looking for the next one. All while racing against a time limit, starting on fire, pushing through endless enemies, avoiding traps like wall saws and shooting arrows, and enemies that can literally fly out of the sky onto you!! Yes, it's THAT *&%^&%& FUN!!!!!!!!
But don't worry, you won't miss it. Even if you try. The game's creators are so proud of their sadistic little death mazes that they've made sure that every character has to go through at least a couple before finishing the story. Awesome.
Oh and create-a character is back. Wait, no it isn't. You have to earn your character. That's right. You have to pick their stats, then test the warrior in a sort of "training school" text-based mode where you have to prove yourself and overcome odds like killing x amount of people in y minutes. Then if you persevere, make sure your character can absolutely past the last 2 big tests. Because if your character can't defeat x amount of foes in y minutes, or hit a target with an arrow the requesite amount of times, that's it. You lose. You save nothing onto the memory card. You do start over. You do not get a created character. You do not get the last half hour of your life back.
In a deep role playing game, maybe. But this is a *$^%$** ACTION GAME!!!!!
Have I said enough about what I like about this game? No? Hmm...Well, some of the characters are neat, the usual 15% of them are voiced well, and about 4 of the actual game stages seem different from one another. Awesome!!!
I'd like Dynasty Warriors 5, please.
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