Dynasty Warriors 4

"One of the most fun dang games i've ever played!"

Hey,this is my first review for this great site and probably not my last,so here goes nothing.

THE GAMEPLAY 8/10

There are several modes of the game to play.One is ''Musou Mode'',which is basically your classic story mode,much like the previous Dynasty Warriors games.You choose between three kingdoms,Wu which is led by the Sun family,Wei led by Cao Cao or Shu led by Liu Bei. After that you choose from a handful of officers to play as. There are a variety of officers to choose from,though only three or four at the beginning,but there are plenty to unlock.You start out in the game as a member of the Han alliance army,and through the first two ''parts'' of the game,you defeat The Yellow Turban alliance and the Dictator Dong Zhuo's army alongside the other two kingdoms. Later,you'll fight the other two kingdoms to rule over Ancient China. There are also several other armies you can play as,which I won't spoil for you. Another mode of play is ''Free Mode'',where you can play the all the battles you've beaten in Musou Mode. I almost forgot to mention you and a friend can play co-op in Musou and Free mode in Split screen fashion,and if the two of you have your Musou bars filled and stand next to each other and hit B at the same time,something real dope happens.You can't go head to head with your own armies,nor on Xbox Live,which would've been cool. There's also a very lame Create your own officer feature,where obviously,you create your own officer.The only mildly in depth part of the create your own officer feature is you get to choose your fighting style,which is pretty dope. You can also duel your friends in a small arena in ''Duel Mode'',which is kind of fun. There isn't an insane amount of depth to the gameplay itself,I'll admit it is mostly walk up to a group of guys,waste them,lather,rinse,repeat.But you know,there are other objectives that pop up like protect a siege weapon or a traitor to kill,and horses to ride on,and elephants to ride on later on in the game, and enemy officers to defeat,so it's not always same old stuff. I'm a sucker for Hack and Slashes,so I'm going to give the gameplay an 8/10.

Lots of fun,but not for everyone.....

THE STORY

A mildly accurate portrayal of ''The Romance of the Three Kingdoms'',a war way back in the 100-200 ages. There's a VERY long and in depth summary of the war in the game,which is actually interesting and very helpful if you have to write an essay about it for school. I actually took half an hour to read the whole thing,it's interesting stuff.

I'm not going to rate the story,since it's based on real life....

CONTROLS 10/10
Sweet and simple,kind of like Lord Of The Rings:The Two Towers. Fierce attacks,normal attacks,arrows are simple to shoot,move around with the joystick,not much to say here.Easy to learn stuff,no complaints here.

Moving on....

GRAPHICS 9/10

Ok,first of all I've got something to say. I don't care about graphics in games,if they're nice then cool,if they're bad then I'll still play it if it's fun.This game has pretty nice graphics,all of the infantry and some officers you can't play as look the same,but it all looks good.The fire and explosion effects are decently done,and the surroundings,weapons,horse,buildings,etc. are all fine.

Not much else to say here either...

SOUND 8/10
The sound is good to,the music is fun to listen to,even though it's not very fitting.The voice-over's are nicely done also,but if the characters spoke Japanese with English subtitles,that would have been nice. You'll hear a lot of repetitive sayings from your fellow officers like ''We have to fight harder!'', ''Reinforcements! Finally!'', and probably the most over used one of all ''They are strong,but do not falter!''.The weapon sounds,horses hooves clapping against the ground,and cries of fallen soldiers,all make for an overall good sounding experience.

Almost done.....

OVERALL 8/10

In my book this is an easy 9/10,but I can't recommend this to everyone because it does get repetitive. There's plenty to unlock,and much fun to be had.If you love action games, go buy this,otherwise give it a rent.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 03/13/04