Samurai Warriors 5

While we all enjoy the direction that games have gone in throughout the last few years with intricate controls, mechanics and visuals. There is still more than enough space in the digital space for mindless button bashers. There is something cathartic about hacking and slashing your enemies to bits with rapid pushes of buttons almost at random. Well, the Samurai Warriors series is synonymous with this type of gameplay and Samurai Warriors 5 aims to offer a fresh take on this format and a new compelling story to absorb.

This game plays rather similarly to other hack and slash titles such as Devil May Cry, Onimusha, Dynasty Warriors, Samurai Showdon and Bayonetta to name a few. This title plans to offer hundreds of enemies and a variety of violent ways to take them down. However, does this game push the series forward? Or does the mindless button bashing lose its charm? We find out in our preview of Samurai Warriors 5.

More Fluid and Fast Paced

While the game series has always been able to boast a very fast and chaotic brand of action, it seems that there is an emphasis on upping the ante this time around. In terms of the gameplay, the game will now feature a new hyper attack which allows you to close vast distances in split seconds, meaning that less time is spend running back into the fray. Plus, ultimate attacks, more fluid combo attacks and a refined musou gauge all culminate to offer a much more fresh and intuitive combat system.

As for the art style, the game will continue to base its style on Japanese artwork. Something that we have seen in games like Persona and Okami in the past. It’s a superb looking series and from what we have seen, this game promises to continue in this vein.

Then lastly, in terms of narrative for this game, we are hearing reports that it will be rather limited and rely on past events to piece together this games’ story. It will follow the events leading to the Honno-ji Incident and will prominently feature characters such as Mitsuhide Akechi and Nobunaga Oda

The Verdict

Overall, we feel that this game will be more of the same from the series with a handful of small changes and additions. Visually, we would wager this game will make vast improvements but sadly, we reckon that the storyline, game modes and gameplay will suffer as a result.

Pros:

• Retains the series’ unique art style
• Gameplay has some good combat changes

Cons:

• We don’t expect a lot of changes or improvements
• Story is going to be rather limited in scope