Review: Samurai Warriors (PS2*)

Graphics- 5/10
Sound- 5/10
Gameplay- 6/10
Replay Value- 6/10
Overall- 5.5/10

Samurai Warriors from Koei is pretty much the same game as Dynasty Warriors, just set in Japan, not China. So if you've played any of the 5,000 Dynasty Warriors before, you know what you're getting. If you liked those games, or if you like other pointless button-mashers, you'll probably like this one too. If you didn't, then stop reading this review, because nothing will convince you to buy this game.

Samurai Warriors is set in ancient Japan. And while I'm pretty sure this game might have some historical accuracy, I can't really tell. But it doesn't really matter, because the stories suck. Each playable character has a separate story, although since almost all of the stories overlap, a lot of similar elements are used throughout. There are a good deal of playable characters, but it's rather pointless to play them all, since you just unlock new characters with the same story you have already heard. Also, you can create your own character if you like, and while the character creation mode is pretty good, I don't really see the point for the same reason mentioned above. But if you get bored, which you will, you might want to give it a shot.

And to make it worse, this game is a pure button-masher. You can upgrade your character to give them new moves, but it doesn't really matter, since you just press the same button or two over and over again. There are two attack buttons, Square and Triangle. Square is your basic attack (the only button you'll ever need) and Triangle is a stronger attack. However, all you need to do is press the Square button 100 times, anytime you are near a group of enemies, and you will get the job done. Speaking of the enemies, they all look the same. There are maybe five different types of enemies, but most of the time you will only see a group of 20 of the same type of enemies. And if there happens to be more than 30 enemies and/or allies (which also look the same) on the screen at once, the game will start to lag. Because of this, you can usually only see enemies that are 20 ft. in front of you or closer. But it doesn't matter, because the AI sucks too much to attack you anyway. You can run straight passed a group of enemies, and they will just stare at you. To prove my point, I took the character with the worst defense at level 1, and just stood in a group of enemies. Even with two officers, it took me 2 min. to die. That is way too ridiculously long, even for a game of this low caliber.

Because of your near-inability to die, most of the time you lose a mission, it's not because you died, but because of the next point. The game will give you objectives based either on a timer, or on your progress. You will sometimes think you are going the right way, and then will get an objective telling you to go to the opposite side to the map, and since the characters move incredibly slow without, and most of the time even with, the use of a horse, you will not reach where you are supposed to go in time.

Every once in a while, there will be an "officer" (very slightly stronger enemy with more health) who comes along. After you defeat them, you see a cut scene to break up the monotony. However, the voice acting is so bad, and because you most likely won't care about what the officer has to say, you will skip it. Speaking of the cut scenes, you know how, in most games, the cut scenes look better than normal gameplay? But do they in Samurai Warriors? No. They look just as bad as the rest of the game does, and most of the time, the very repetitive animations during gameplay are actually better than those in the cut scenes. The only reason I bought this game was because I played a little of Dynasty Warriors at a friend's house, and the game seemed fun. It was for a little while, but soon enough I began to see this game for what it really is: the same garbage featured in every other Dynasty Warrior game, and a poor excuse to make money.

Pros: A lot of playable characters, character creation mode, ability to skip cut scenes, same as Dynasty Warriors.
Cons: Button-masher, stories in story mode suck, voice acting, animations, graphics, lagging, AI, same as Dynasty Warriors.

Review: Eric

*Also available for Xbox. Review for PS2 only