Ninety-Nine Nights

"Dynasty Warriors meets Lord of the Rings"

Graphics: 90
Gameplay: 65
Sound: 80
Content: 60
Value: 60
Overall: 60

NOTE:Review is based on the version that i have,which is the Asian version,as such some points may be irrelevant to US gamers

You'd think with the bajillion Dynasty and Samurai Warriors games around people would've gotten sick of the kill a thousand guys per battle style of gameplay. Bah…who am I to talk? I'm as much a big fan of the Dynasty Warriors games as the next gamer. N3 is the closest thing to a next generation Dynasty Warriors game you can get…at least until Koei gets its butt in gear and finally makes one. In some ways, N3 is a step above Dynasty Warriors but in other ways (usually in areas where it counts the most), it's a step down…way down.

Starting the game, you won't have a choice on who to play as, only the femme fatale, Inphyy is selectable. She's quick and nimble and her attacks are incredibly flashy…it's no wonder all the N3 posters and other materials feature her prominently. The first few minutes of play will leave you feeling breathless. Incredibly smooth framerate, a ton of enemies battling each other and something the Dynasty Warriors games NEVER seem to have…intelligent enemies. Finally, after years of playing with the dumb AI in DW, N3 gives you 2 squads of bodyguards that actually are useful! They can fight and hold their own, even finishing off mobs that you leave behind! Prior to each mission, you're given a choice of 4 bodyguards type: Infantry, Heavy Infantry, Pikemen or Archers. Don't ask me the difference between them though, I have no idea, the game doesn't explain it and neither does the manual. Save for the archers (which stand back and pepper the enemies with arrows…missing most of the times it seems), the rest are melee fighters that seem to be the same as each other. Having Pikemen is a waste though…there're no cavalry or any mounted troops in the game at all so why have Pikemen whose specialty is stopping cavalry charges?

Still, most of characters you can play as don't get to select bodyguards though. Only Inphyy and Aspharr do. Klarrann and Myifee only get to pick on some stages. It's not a big deal though. Useful as bodyguards are, I found myself asking them to stay put out of danger instead of going into battle with me. They die too easily (thus giving you a bad ranking at the end) and clutter up the screen unnecessarily. The enemies and allies look too similar to each other and trying to find one single surviving baddie out of a throng of similar clones is a pain in the ass.

Inphyy, while being the cover girl and naturally getting the most exposure, isn't the most fun to play as. Strangely, the lesser characters like Klarrann, Tyurru, Dwingvatt and the hidden character (VigkVagk) steal the show. Tyurru in particular is a blessed departure from the melee based combat. Using spells instead of getting down and dirty is refreshing. Sure, it takes no skill to stand back and pepper the baddies with long range attacks, but hey, at least it's different. On a side note though, Tyurru and VigkVagk deserve to be singled out for the having the best looking specials EVER. Tyurru summons a tsunami wave to wash out the immediate area and VigkVagk…well, detonates a nuclear bomb. It least that's what it looks like. Amazingly fun to watch and use…BUT (and this is a big but, hence the caps and bold letters) the slowdown they cause on screen is horrendous! I honestly thought my game hanged when I used VigkVagk's special for the first time. NOTHING was moving onscreen…

Anyways, the amount of enemies on screen at one time is amazing. Sometimes, the only thing you can see are the bodies of the formations of enemies as they rush towards you. Charging headlong right into the throng is not only fun, it's recommended. With the tons of stuff happening at once, the game doesn't even slowdown a bit…at least until you use the special attacks or break something. Strangely, breaking environmental objects like guard towers or wooden stands will cause the framerate to dip like nobody's business.

Say what I might about the game's flaws, it sounds magnificent. Every wham, every bam, every impact sounds visceral! Don't believe me? Use Aspharr, find a decent mob of enemies and then charge in and combo using X,X,X,Y,Y,Y and listen to the glorious sounds of ass being kicked. Music is pretty good as well, with some thumping scores and a classical one as well! A strange pick but one that fits…While the subs usually don't match with what's being said some of the time (give me SOME credit, I may not know Japanese but I do know a few words!), the voices are nicely done…Though strangely the ‘supposedly' main baddie, Dwykfarrio, doesn't say a lot. Strange with him being the head honcho for the army of Darkness and all…

Fighting the baddies is mindless fun but once the elite enemies come, you'll be cussing like a drunken sailor. Not because they're hard to kill, it's because the collision detection for the elites completely suck! Even if the bad guys aren't blocking, chances are you have a 30 or lower percent chance to nail a blow on them. If they're attacking, there is NO way in hell for you to interrupt their blows. Yup, they won't feel a damn thing, the game won't register it as a hit as the combos make them invulnerable while they're executing it. Fun, no? So how do you beat cheap elites? By being stooping to their level, sadly. Boss encounters will ALWAYS boil down to you spamming the aforementioned invulnerable combos as well…Phantagram knows this it seems since every single character has combos that make you invulnerable. Cheap and stupid.

Fighting the normal baddies is a pain as well, though of a different nature. Apart from bosses or mission objectives, NO enemy in the game has a lifebar. Yeah, you have no idea how close to death an enemy is so you'll have to mash and attack continuously. Has no thought been given to the little details?! Even worse, elite enemies that appear as bosses in earlier missions may appear again as normal baddies in later ones. Without lifebars, you'll be spending an even longer time asking yourself the eternally fun question: Are they dead yet?

The best flaws I've saved for last though. The game wants you to waste your hdd space. Why else would it force you to make a separate save for each character? Overwriting a character save with another character will erase ALL your hard work for that guy/girl. Yup, you say your Aspharr was Level 9 when you overwrote the save with a Level 2 Tyurru? Say bye bye to Aspharr…next time you wanna play as him, you start from the beginning…At level 1, on the first mission, with no items or weapons. Fun! As of this writing, I've accidentally overwrote 2 Inphyy saves…both with Aspharr ironically. Both times I was at Level 9! Phantagram, you guys better run if I see you…

Add to that, the inability to save in a level (die and restart ALL over again), no multiplayer mode of any kind, the lack of a good variety of stages (all of the stages are reused over and over save for the Another World stage), too little playable characters, too little missions, too many side characters who aren't explained properly and you have a recipe for crappiness.

Stages are either too small or too linear. It's usually either or. The small stages are great, they feature big battles and a wide battlefield BUT they end too soon and well…they're too small. The big ones are too big and always force you down a linear path. With the immensely slow running speed (think a turtle walking), traversing a huge area without a mount (of which the game has none) is an exercise in patience.

If you're going into the game expect some great story or cutscenes, do not buy this sucker. Playing N3 is like watching a movie when it's already at the middle part. You have absolutely no idea what the hell is happening or has happened. The game seems to expect you to know though since it doesn't even bother to set up the conflict between the Forces of Light and the Forces of Darkness. Not only that, the endings don't make sense for the most part (though VigkVelk's is pretty touching) and serve no purpose to further the story or drive it to a satisfying conclusion.

Even better, somebody screwed up and completely forgot about adding subtitles to the FMV cutscenes. Yup, I hope you understand Japanese cause if not, you sure as hell aren't gonna understand the FMVs. Thankfully, the rest of the game has subs and it's pretty well done.

It's easily apparent that not much thought was given to N3. It's either that or the developers and testers should be shot repeatedly for ignoring elements that make a game fun. I won't say it isn't fun rushing headlong into an enemy formation and decimating them all at once but those moments are eclipsed by other moments that mar the fun to be had. Overall, I truly hope the game gets a sequel that's more polished. With the problems fixed, the series has a potential to be a flagship Xbox360 title…and that's no lie.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 08/18/06