Onimusha Tactics

"It's no masterpiece, but still fun."

Let's clear this up first: I've never played another Onimusha game, so I don't know how this compares/relates to the story of the others. I'm rating it purely on game play and enjoyability (which is what it should be rated on anyway).

The evil Genma (weird demon things), led by King Nobonuga, have attacked your country. Only a descendant of the Oni clan has what it takes to stop them. Armed with his Genma-soul collecting Oni Glove, Onimaru is in a race against time to defeat the King, before he gains absolute power.

For lack of a better word, this game is simple. Linear to the max, it's really easy to get a hang of, especially if you've played other Gameboy Advance titles like Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, or Tactics Ogre: Knight of Lodis. You can choose to move, attack, use a skill, or use an item. Unlike Tactics Ogre, you can attack and then move, which is always nice. One notable drawback is there are no changeable classes in this game, something that separates it greatly from its Strat/RPG cousins. Each character comes with their own preset class and weapon type they can use, and each character learns different skills. It's great in the beginning, but as you get 4 of every character, you wonder what the point of even having this many fighters is. Changeable classes would have gone far to improve this game.

Another drawback (for me anyway) is the lack of purchasable items. Genma fighters drop Genma stones when you defeat them, and you use these to make items and weapons. This happens a few battles in, and until then you have to depend on Herbs from dropped enemies. There are 8 types of Genma stones, and Onimaru uses his Oni glove to turn them into weapons, armor, and items. Recipes for these items are dropped as well. This system makes it tough to get the amount of healing items you may want, and on top of that each character can only equip two expendable items per battle. Considering most bosses in the beginning of the game can take away half your life in one hit, it can get frustrating. A few healing skills are available however.

For the first part of the game, the battles are severely lacking in strategy demand; in other words, they're insanely easy.

You get rated at the end of each battle based on four categories, one of which being tactics. I don't know where you'd need to use tactics, because for most of the battle you can just move, hit, move, hit, move, heal, move, hit, repeat. There are a couple tough battles requiring some strategy, but for the most part I could just have my cat walk across the keyboard and he'd win the battle. This is made even easier by the fact your units aren't lost when they die. So you can send units on suicide missions to weaken bosses without worry.

The story isn't mind-blowing, but it's not bad at all. At points the game seems to not take itself very seriously, and the whole game has a rushed feeling in the story...Which isn't so bad, because you ARE rushing to stop the Genma from taking over Japan, and the world. However, for being a group of people knowing they are the only hope against an evil horde, they sure take the situation lightly. Don't worry, there's lots of lame womanizing comments, like ''We need to find a sage? I hope it's a chick.'' Overall, the story is fun if you don't take it too seriously.

The graphics and sound are one real plus to this game. The character portraits are very well done, the sprites look great, and the spells all look awesome. The world map is incredible simple, but it doesn't really need to be that detailed. Battle maps aren't that great unless you're in a castle or something; otherwise they're pretty basic.

When I first started the game, and listened to the title music, I thought to myself, ''Hmm, so that's what happened to all those NES music composers''. Once I started the game however, I found the sound was much better. I even played the game without turning off the music, which is amazing for me, as the repetitive battle music usually drones into my brain to the point where I want to email the composer a punch in the face. Some game sounds sound a little odd, but for the most part they're crisp and appropriate.

It shouldn't take you very long to complete this game, unless you go all crazy training, but it's a fun game nonetheless. I recommend you at least give it a chance; borrow it from a friend or something. A decent game to keep you entertained on road trips or while waiting for your mom to finish her mammogram, I give it a six out of ten.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 11/14/03