"Yu Yu Hakusho : Bleak Result..."

I only just started to play this game a few days ago. I am a big fan of the Yu Yu Hakusho anime/manga series, so I was very excited to start playing it. The game turned out to be so disappointing that i'm contributing my first review.

Story : 7/10

It was really just YYH Budokai, as in the story mode followed the exact story parts from the anime series. There were scenes from the dubbed, TV edited version of the show. Dark Tournament mode was your story mode, but some sections were oddly left out and put in DT plus mode. So, points off for edits and random omissions.

Gameplay/Control : 1/10

I played through training mode first with Kurama, my favorite character. The training seemed alright, the controls were very sluggish though. I figured the control would balance out in actual gameplay, but it didn't at all. The cpu was fast, cheap, and blocked everything possible that flowed like an actual fighter. Only through being cheap could you get through. The controls were so unresponsive that you'd get failed and delayed attacks. The damage was tweaked badly, and the characters were unbalanced. Yusuke was terrible, but you played as him most in the Dark Tournament mode. Toguro was essentially unstoppable. The programming was just very off. Its a shame b/c they could have made it a much better game.

Graphics : 7.5/10

The character graphics were very well done, in the same shading technique that DBZ Budokai 2 featured. So, all of the characters just looked like colorful 3-D versions of themselves. The backgrounds on most stages were decent enough. Some of the stage destruction effects were very odd looking though. The cutscene for the end of the game was original for this game and that looked really nice.

Sound : 5/10

The cutscene audio was perfectly fine, most of it taken right from the series. Each move had a name so Yusuke would shout "Spirit Gun", etc. Genkai's talking in Training mode and Koto during fights was very repetitive and annoying. Characters said nothing at all during their one victory pose.

Extras : 3/10

There is a token card minigame which seemed very thrown together and a complete waste of time. The load time during in game battles was extended due to gaining new tokens after every win in story mode. Tag mode was a great idea, but the game had to load mid tag. Plus with such awful control who would sit around playing this game against friends. Costume selection was terrible. The 4 main guys and Toguro bros only had 2 costumes, every other character had 1. Hiei and Yusuke didn't even have their signature costumes. For Kurama I was disappointed with the white uniform being his default costume. I expected a multitude of character skins, to find just the one at the start, not even the right one, I was discouraged.

Buy or rent: Rent, only if you are into the series. Even for big fans its not worth it.

Reviewer's Score: 3/10, Originally Posted: 10/19/04