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Samurai Warriors 2 Mini Review
Jon Wilcox
20/09/2006
Koei takes us to Japan to relive the battles of feudal Japan - wait a second, haven't we seen this before...
Another month, another 'Warriors' title from Koei and Japanese developer Omega Force. Not content with bringing the Dynasty Warriors franchise to Xbox 360, it seems that yet another lesson in Medieval Japanese history is to be made with the release of Samurai Warriors 2 on both Microsoft's next-gen platform and PlayStation2. Actually, somewhat surprisingly, it's been two years since the release of the original, though an 'improved' version of Samurai Warriors was launched in the UK back in June 2006 under the moniker "Xtreme Legends".
Set during the Sengoku "Warring" Period of Japan during the 16th Century, Samurai Warriors features a number of stylised historical figures as they fight through various battles against rival factions. Names like Oda Nobunaga may not be familiar to a Western audience (unless you're a scholar in Japanese History), but such characters headline this significant era in the country's past. Looking at the features of the game, you'd have to say that it gets off to a generally positive start, as it's the first title from either of the two Warriors series to offer Xbox Live support (more on that shortly). There are also a small number of other gametypes away from the main Story Mode that aim to improve both variety and depth to the Samurai Warriors 2 experience...though whether gamers in the West will find much appeal in the four-player Sugoroku parlour game is up for debate.
Aside from such relative frivolities, the main bread and butter of the Samurai Warriors 2 experience of course rests with the Story Mode, a 100% bona-fide brainless hack 'n' slash where repetitive gameplay allows players to lose themselves in their own thoughts...surely not quite the intentions of the developers. In a move away from the previous title, character development now rests with RPG-style levelling up and Experience Points, which enables their attributes to improve through the course of the game as well as expand the number of Musou (Special Attack) Meters to a maximum of three. New combinations are also unlocked through levelling up, though the fact that such attacks largely rests with how many times a gamers presses the 'Normal Attack' button before hitting a second attack button means that the combo system is far from complicated. There has been an expansion (of sorts) in the range of attacks on offer however, besides Standard and Musou moves, including the ability to whistle for a horse or execute a running attack. Further additions have been made with the ability to buy new skills and upgraded weapons from the Shop before every battle, along with a number of horses...
Back to the battles themselves, and Samurai Warriors 2 does implement an improvement over its predecessor, the inclusion of integrated castles in battlefields. It's certainly something that had been targeted by fans of the two franchises as a key weakness of the original Samurai Warriors, and it's somewhat refreshing to see that the issue has been addressed in the follow-up. Of course, such a revelation isn't going to persuade newcomers of the series to purchase the game, but for the diehard fans, it's something that they'll no doubt welcome.
As we've already said, Samurai Warriors 2 features two-player gameplay over Xbox Live, the first title in either of Omega Force's series to do so. However, it's the nature of this multiplayer gameplay that will raise eyebrows. Rather than feature co-operative play or pitch players against each other on the same battlefield, Samurai Warriors 2 has both gamers fight through their own battlefield (like an instance) with the winner the first to accomplish whatever objective is set. Multiplayer is far from being as complete as it could be if the studio had implemented the likes of co-operative play, but there's something that the team can work on when it comes to the inevitable iterations in the future.
Elsewhere in the game is a Survival Mode, where players have to navigate their way up a castle of infinite height, completing tasks as they go in order to win more gold. Playing in close quarters does at least provide a change from the large battlefields of the Story Mode, though the actual range of missions isn't inspirational - they're largely variations on a theme, with players having to get to allies and take them to the next stairwell, etc...
Visually, it's true to say that whilst Samurai Warriors 2 is presented in High-Definition, the graphics themselves are far from what you'd expect in a next-gen title. Hundreds of cloned soldiers seemingly merge into one against the repetitive backdrops of the game's Japan, with the only real variety in the opponents coming from the generals and their sometimes over the top armour. The series has a long way to go before it can be termed next-gen, in fact, it's closest rival in the 'most visually poor' stakes on the new platforms must be Actvision's GUN released for the launch of Xbox 360.
Samurai Warriors 2 is the third large-scale button-basher to come out of the Far East in recent months, following the release of its cousin Dynasty Warriors 5: Empires and Tetsuya Mitzugushi's N3: Ninety-Nine Nights, and doesn't offer anything that the other two don't already provide - sore thumbs, seemingly endless repetition, and death-wish enemies who practically line-up to be slaughtered. There must invariably be a demand for this sort of title in the West otherwise it wouldn't be worth the expense of localisation, marketing, and distribution, but surely it's a case of having played one title in either Warriors series, you've played them all.
Despite slightly extending the attacking moves on offer, the fact is that Samurai Warriors 2 remains the same sort of title that we've been seeing from Omega Force over the last few years. Western gamers usually castigate the likes of Activision and EA for reproducing samey instalments of increasingly stale franchises, but there's no way that any studio can match the proliferation and replication of Omega Force's output. 'Tweaking' must be a buzz phrase up and down the corridors and offices of the studio, because that is all they seem capable of doing, regardless of whether the resulting game offers anything substantially new or not. Samurai Warriors 2: Empires is set for release in Japan before the year is out, so expect more repetitive hack 'n' slash-ery in the coming months...
Anonymous
Date Added:Fri 2nd Feb 2007 10:58
Anonymous
Date Added:Sun 17th Dec 2006 02:20
Sega Boy
Date Added:Tue 26th Sep 2006 15:17
tom_dog
Date Added:Fri 22nd Sep 2006 13:55
Gamer_UK
Date Added:Thu 21st Sep 2006 23:46
Gamer_UK
Date Added:Thu 21st Sep 2006 23:46
Gamer_UK
Date Added:Thu 21st Sep 2006 23:46
Anonymous
Date Added:Wed 20th Sep 2006 18:02
Repeat fro six hours - it doesn't get anymore satisfying then that...
Gamer_UK
Date Added:Wed 20th Sep 2006 17:32