Samurai Warriors Chronicles - Nintendo 3DS

This game puts you in the shoes of either a male or female samurai in ancient Japan. Your character will participate in dozens of battles throughout history, fighting alongside many historical figures as you learn the bloody story of the Sengoku period. The combat system will be familiar to series veterans, and accessible to newcomers. There are a variety of unique attacks and maneuvers available to characters. Each battlefield requires a significant amount of strategy to complete, more so than ever before in the series. There are many missions that can be completed during the course of the battle, some of them timed. Additionally, you must switch between up to four officers on the battlefield at once; using and positioning each officer is key to your success. Although completing these missions is optional, it is very beneficial in turning the tide of the battle in your favor. Outside of combat, you can converse with other characters to increase your friendship rating with them, unlocking them for use in free play. Get a character's friendship rating high enough, and you can equip your character with his/her weapon. There are a variety of RPG elements to character advancement outside of combat. You must carefully chose which items and weapons to equip on each character in order to balance their stats. Thankfully, an auto-equip system is in place to give your characters items which are most suited for them. Finally, you can combine weapons with other weapons or items to boost their stats or give them new stats; however, this costs money, making it essential to complete missions and defeat officers in battle to gain their gold. The presentation is very well done. The character models are detailed and well-animated. However, many of them look bad up close, due to a lack of detail in the face. The 3D effects given the battlefield depth and make some stunning pre-rendered cutscenes. The voices are all kept in their original Japanese. Another issue is that often times the game cannot display enough models on the screen at once, meaning sometimes your character will be attacked by someone you didn't even realize you were there. An upgrade to the amount of soldiers that can be shown on-screen would have been welcome. Overall, a very enjoyable game. With so many weapons, items, and other things to unlock, four difficulty levels (one must be unlocked), many missions and friendship events, and a street pass minigame, there's plenty of content here to keep you invested for quite a while. Series veterans will certainly enjoy this game. Casual gamers, however, may be overwhelmed by the frantic style of gameplay and overall intensity of combat. But I guess that's why there's an Easy mode.

redblackhamlett . Review provider: walmart.com

Fans or newcomers only.

If you're a fan of the Koei warriors series then you'll like this game. If you've never played, you might like it. If you have played these games before, didn't like them or found them repetitive, turn away. The graphics are on par with the early 360 games. They're ok, but still lazy looking. Music is nothing special, you'll forget about when you're not playing and maybe when you are. Story takes place around 1 of 2 character(male or female) that you pick at the start. Generic characters that you mold through choices made in the game. Story is told through single portrait cutscenes, somewhat old feeling but I like 'em. Story/plot is nothing special, but it's not the rehash that the past games use. Gameplay is hack-and-slash or button mashing; if you find killing dozens of the same enemies gets old fast, avoid this game. This really is the majority of the game. You can switch between multiple characters on the battle field and control them with the touchscreen. This works very well and certainly alot better than I thought it would. Closing: $40 is alot to pay for this game. I would only recommend this to series fans; it's one of the freshest games in the series, without changing too much from the core gameplay system. If you've never played one of games, there's a chance you'll either get bored with the wash-rinse-repeat gameplay or actually liking it.

Anyiex . Review provider: walmart.com