Genji: Days of the Blade

"Not Fun But Frusturating"

Gameplay(30/50)
A hack and slash more on the level of Onimusha with few enemies on the screen to battle against at a time rather than a whole army of enemies as seen in Dynasty Warriors. There are four characters that you control each with their own unique abilities that you utilize in order to solve puzzles and vanquish your enemies. You have your fast paced fighter, your distance fighter, your strong yet slow fighter, and this one fighter that sits there and spins a spear around that hurts anything that comes near you. I found only two of the four characters useful in a combat situation and used only the other two characters to solve puzzles. The combat itself is real clunky and often frustrating when fighting large groups of enemies. Sometimes the control doesn't respond quick enough for you to switch characters really quickly or execute a really powerful combo move in order to avoid dying. I found myself getting frustrated at parts of the game where save points are few and far between and at how health restoring items didn't drop often enough. You can improve your character stats by using different items found in boxes scattered throughout the game and you can improve your weapon stats by killing particular types of enemies. They're the ones with purple crystals sticking out of them.

Graphics(12/15)
The character models are very smooth and the surrounding scenery is pretty as well. The only real flaws I found in the graphics is that the vegetation still looked like it was on a console from the previous generation. The FMV movies are really beautiful though.

Story(5/25)
Now maybe I personally am at a disadvantage here. I never played the first Genji on Playstation 2 so I don't understand the majority of the back story to this game. Sounds like a couple clans were at war with each other and demons have now been summoned, but why? There are also several elements of Japanese culture mixed into the game which I being an American I am unfamiliar with.

Sound(3/10)
Boring music, mediocre sound effects and the voice acting is sub-par. If this game takes place in Japan that why are a good chunk of the characters speaking with European and North American accents?

Overall(50/100)
I wouldn't recommend wasting time on this game. It was mainly an impulse buy for me to have something to play on Playstation 3. The game frustrated me more than entertained me. If you really want to try it out you could always rent it.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 04/19/07