Onimusha 3: Demon Siege

"Onimusha 3 is another great addition to an awesome series, and playing as Jean Reno is totally kick-ass awesome."

Onimusha 3: Demon Siege as you would expect, is the third series in the Onimusha series which began with Onimusha: Warlords on the PS2 starring Takeshi Kaneshiro as Hidemitsu Samanosuke Akechi, who generally simply went by the name of Samanosuke. Then the sequel Onimusha 2: Samurai's Destiny changed main characters. This time around it was deceased actor Yusaku Matsuda (died in 1989 of cancer) who played the main character Jubei Yagyu. Now in Onimusha 3: Demon Siege the hero Samanosuke has returned along with Jean Reno as Jacques Blanc. This is the first time in the Onimusha series that a non-Japanese actor plays one of the main characters. For those of you that don't know Jean Reno is a very famous actor in France.

Story:
Onimusha 3 marks the first game in the series where you do not spend the entire game in 16th century feudal Japan. Don't fret just yet, a large portion of the game is in Japan, but instead of playing as the samurai in Japan you play as Jacques Blanc. At the very beginning of the game you are shown a very impressive CG movie which introduces Samanosuke back into the story after he temporarily gave the spotlight to Jubei Yagyu. After this CG movie Samanosuke is transported to 2004 Paris, France where it is under attack by Nobunaga's demon hordes known as the Genma. It seems that Nobunaga has once again refused to perish after being slain three times already, once by a stray arrow, once by Samanosuke and once by Jubei Yagyu. After Samanosuke and Jacques briefly meet each other Jacques is then transported to 16th century Japan. Now Samanosuke and Jacques must head out to defeat the demon hordes, defeat Nobunaga once and for all and find a way back to their respectful time periods.

Gameplay:
Would anyone in their right mind ever think that they would be able to play as Jean Reno in a video game? Most likely not but now you can and his character in Onimusha 3 is pretty damn cool and fits into the story very well. During the course of the game you will constantly be alternating between main characters Samanosuke and Jacques, and sometimes you will play as other minor characters as well. Onimusha 3 plays pretty much the same as any other Onimusha game besides the fact that you can now control your character with the analog stick instead of having to use the d-pad. However for any of you Onimusha players out there who simply must play Onimusha the way it has always been played you can still control your character with the d-pad if you really, really want to.

Those of you who are fans of Onimusha: Warlords will be pleased to know that Capcom has indeed paid attention to minor details. Such as in the beginning of the game when you take control of Samanosuke he still retains all of his weapons from Onimusha: Warlords and you can use them briefly until he loses them once he is transported to Paris, France 2004. This is not necessarily bad however since you can now obtain new weapons for Samanosuke. Samanosuke and Jacques actually play quite differently. Samanosuke relies mostly on strictly sword type weapons (with the exception of 1 axe) that are basically meant for simply just hacking away at your enemies. Jacques on the other hand has some very strange weaponry but is actually really cool. His first weapon is the Oni Whip (which is the equivalent to Samanosuke's basic, boring sword that has no power) is actually a very cool starting weapon. You can still use it as a sword by hammering on the square button whipping away at your foes, or you can actually use it to grab your enemies and send them flying or even grab objects in the environment and fling them at your enemies. All of Jacques other weapons still retain this ability but control quite differently. Besides their weapons the main difference between Samanosuke and Jacques is that Samanosuke has a bow and arrow which he can use and also find many different types of arrows with many different elemental attacks. Jacques on the other hand can use his weapons to grab onto Oni fireflies so he can go to out of reach areas. Jacques way of destroying air born enemies is usually done by flinging his weapons out at very long distances and stabbing them.

Besides plain really cool action Onimusha 3 has its fair share of puzzle solving but thankfully none of it is platforming. A lot of it is transporting items between time through Jacques and Samanosuke with the aide of your trusty (yet incredibly irritating) fairy sidekick Ako. The puzzle are usually not to difficult but some of them will take you quite some time to complete. There are also many treasure chests you will find that contain items that will greatly help you along the way but require you to complete a puzzle in order to open the chest. Sometimes these puzzles are very difficult but for the most part seem to be manageable after a few tries. They are all puzzles where you must slide squares around in a fixed position and you only have a certain amount of moves. You must line them up properly so that the line has a clear path from start to finish.

Ako, who was mentioned earlier is a little fairy sidekick that you can outfit with different suits you can find that will bestow you will some helpful abilities such as replenishing your health meter when you are standing still (which is extremely helpful, trust me) or making it so that you can absorb the souls of your enemies with the Oni gauntlet before they are even defeated. Ako will also help you by picking up items for you and finding hidden treasure chests when you are close enough to them.

Graphics:
Onimusha 3 is the first Onimusha game in the series which has fully 3D background graphics instead of 2D pre-rendered backgrounds. I must admit that I a total sucker for pre-rendered backgrounds. I don't know why but I just love the way they look and can add incredible beauty to the graphics of certain games. (Final Fantasy, Onimusha, Resident Evil, et cetera.). Although I may have been somewhat disappointed Onimusha 3 has incredible graphics for switching to fully 3D and also has one of the most amazing CG cut-scene sequences I have ever seen in the beginning of any video game.

Sound:
Similar to the other Onimusha games the music is a good selection of tracks that easily fit the mood of the game. The only problem I have with this area of the game is that like the others some of the voice acting could have used a little work. For the most part this is perhaps the best game in the series so far for English voice acting. The only character that really irritated me was Ako (the fairy sidekick) but there are others like Guildenstern (Genma scientist) who I could imagine would probably annoy some people. Also for those of you who are fans of Jean Reno will be pleased to know that he does contribute his talents to his French voice, but disappointingly does not do the voice work for his English counter-part.

Value:
Onimusha 3: Demon Siege is the longest game in the Onimusha series to date, which took me about 13 hours to finish on my first play-through. While that may not seem incredibly long for an action game that is a decent length considering the repetitious nature the hack 'n slash genre is notorious for. Once you beat the game there are some neat unlockables such as Samanosuke's weapons from the first game, however you must meet certain tasks to unlock them, which are met during the game. There are also some cool bonus missions, some cool extra costumes for the characters and some neat videos for you to watch. For fans of the hack 'n slash genre there would most definitely be the incentive to go through this game at least one more time, perhaps not right away but I can definitely see myself playing through this game a few more times.

Score:
Gameplay: 9
Graphics: 10
Sound: 8
Value: 8
Tilt: 9

Overall: 8.9
Hack 'n slash games are not in short supply but due to the repetitive nature of the genre it is your responsibility to weed out the bad ones from the good. Onimusha 3: Demon Siege may have some of its own button mashing repetitive qualities as they all do (even God of War) but it is still a great game and should be played by any fan of hack 'n slash period.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 03/13/06