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You know what is the greatest thing in the world. Monotony. I love nothing more than
to wake up every morning without having to worry about alternatives during my day. This
is exactly how I like my videogames, don't give me something new just give me something
exactly the same and I as a humble consumer wont feel threatened. Of course by now I hope
you realise I am being sarcastic but just to clarify, IM BEING SARCASTIC.
A Videogame series that has been deemed guilty of monotony in the past few years is Dynasty
Warriors
If you haven't been living under a rock then chances are you have at least heard of the
Dynasty Warriors Franchise published by Koei that have a new game out pretty much every
year, The most recent addition being Dynasty Warrior 8.
This time around it appears management at Omega Force have pulled out the whip, deciding
that sitting around picking their noses and debating on which costume design looks cooler
is not the way forward, Instead creating new and interesting content may actually be the
saving grace to the fall in sales figures over the years.
So what is actually new? The first big addition to the game is a massive
change in the story mode. Now instead of selecting a singular character to play as through the
entire timeline in the story, You select a Hero at the beginning of each battle depending
on weather they were present or not. To me this is a fantastic addition to the series
as it teaches the gamer a little more about the history of china.
'But jimi' I here you fret 'We don't want to learn things whilst playing a videogame,
that's what books are for.' and to this I can relate. History and myself get on like
a house on fire, filled with a litter of puppys. However the history of feudal china is a very
interesting one shrouded in myths that the game explores more than factual events. So
think of it as a mythological story.
Complimenting this is the way the game shows what each faction is doing in between the
playable campaigns, allowing you to understand the bigger picture of the battles. Although
this is were I have a major problem, When the game has an opening cut scene that looks
like this, In battle cut scenes that are like this, and yet in between the battles when
you want to know the outcome of your struggles you are greeted with this....
There is not even a Narrator telling you what had happened after the battles.
In this small gap between fights I wanted to rest my eyes as I realised I hadn't blinked
for half an hour due to an intense and mesmerising montage of bright flashing lights that ... just
... look... grooooovy.
Sorry about that trailed off again; the game does look nicer than previous titles, more
vibrant and with a higher contrast. However it still suffers from the same problems such
as a disappearing soldiers and a drop in frame rate as the game renders hundreds of enemies
in your field of vision though these aren't game breaking faults as long as your kill
count steadily increases and your combos string together nicely you wont care that several
guards disappear when there are dozens more to replace him.
Another new edition to the game is the Ambition mode, were in you are attempting to start
up a new city in order to gain favour from the emperor of the land. To do this you set
out on Skirmish style missions to gain recourses extra allies and fame to grow your city with
more shops and the like. This I found to be like a more violent version of Animal Crossing
were instead of finding bugs I would slay a couple hundred peasants and show dominance
over their generals who would 9 times out of 10 grovel to become my student. Which seems
like a good idea but felt very slow to progress.
In Battle the game has added an affinity system which is essential Rock paper scissors with
weapons. This seams like a good idea however you see from a distance which affinity the
enemy wields and your able to switch between your two equipped affinities to see if you
can have the upper hand in battle.
What's that Lu Bu Mightiest warrior in the land, You have scissors. Well allow me to
put away my pitiful paper and use my rock. To bash your face in. Now I am the most powerful
warrior in all the lands and you must bow to my superior MIGHT!
Replay ability in the game is pretty high, You have 3 main factions to play as and a
Jin Faction which is set later in the timeline, your also able to play through special Campaigns
such as Hu Low Gate from the side of the opposition which is really fun.
Also during each level you have additional objectives during missions that open up characters
and missions including secret Hypothetical Paths.
The Hypothetical path is a continuation of the storyline as if everything turned out
to be from a fairy tale. Right at the moment of despair your friendly warriors show up
and save the day and eventually the ideals of your Commander come to fruition.
This game is definitely a one to buy, the price tag may seem steep but with a potential
30hours plus playability it is justifiable. It has fun gameplay especially in split screen
or online multiplayer and the amount of time you can spend fixed to the screen gets ridiculous.
I honestly played the game for days strait and had the be forcibly removed from my seated
position in order to enjoy some vitamim-D like some kind
of extravert.