"Redemption for Onimsuha 3? Or does the downward spiral continue?"

Shin Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams is the fourth installment in Capcom's successful Onimusha series, which began on the PS2 5 years ago. The original Onimusha was phenomenal for it's time, and it still holds up remarkably well even today, proving it's a classic. Onimusha 2 surpassed the excellent original game in every way, and to me is the best PS2 title without a doubt. However, Onimusha 3 retained little (if any) of Onimusha 2's innovations, and with it's lame time travelling plot and rather annoying new characters, remains my least favorite Onimusha game (and was an incredibly disappointing end to the trilogy).

So is Shin Onimusha redemption for Onimusha 3? Not at all.. it partially makes up for the flawed Onimusha 3 while simultaneously introducing several annoying features. As a matter of fact, Dawn of Dreams actually makes me respect Onimusha 3 on a whole new level.


Where do we begin. Okay let's start with the characters. They suck. Okay I take that back. Only one of the characters is actually decent. The rest just fill in your standard cliched anime archetypes.

First you have Soki, the blond haired main character of the game. Soki is blatantly a Japanese ripoff of Dante from Devil May Cry fame (Capcom's other series), right down to the similar hairstyle, carrying a sword on his back, and wise-ass smirk on his face. Soki is a laid back arrogant guy that is almost always referred to as Oni of the Ash or the Black Oni (not unlike Dante who is always referred to in DMC games as "Son of Sparda"). What might cause some people to dislike the main character is that Soki looks (and acts) like a cocky teenager, which is in stark contrast to the older and more rugged Onimusha heroes like Jubei, Samanosuke, and Jacques.

There is Minokichi, who has absolutely TERRIBLE character design and is just about as useless and obnoxious in every conceivable way. Capcom proved that Minokichi is completely useless in the near the end of the game but I digress.

You have Akane Jubei, aka Yagyu Jubei (sound familiar)? Yes, this brash annoying brat is the (sigh) granddaughter of the great Yagyu Jubei, the awesome main character of Onimusha 2. Akane Jubei is just like Sakura of the Street Fighter Zero series, except that Akane has a much more annoying voice and tons of more dialogue, clearly making her more obnoxious. And as we all know, whomever has the most annoying VA in the cast will have the most lines and spend most of their scenes of shouting, crying, screaming, etc. There is absolutely nothing original about Akane Jubei at all. She fills the archetype of the hyper snotty nosed brat ninja girl right down to the last letter. In terms of gameplay she is similar to Kaede and Kotaro of Onimusha and Onimusha 2, respectively. I personally take offense since Yagyu Jubei is my favorite protagonist from the Onimusha series, and this punk kid claims to be related to him. Unfortunately, she plays a central role in the story.

Then you have Ohatsu, a gun wielder that will make most Onimusha fans think of Magoichi Saiga from Onimusha 2 (and will make Devil May Cry fans think of Lady aka Mary from DMC3). Ohatsu is a student of Magoichi and trained with his gun troop. It's unfortunate that she isn't as good as Magoichi when it comes to gameplay. She has rather boring character design, and it shows. Tenkai is a master of spears and staves and his gameplay style bears a similarity to Ekei from Onimsuha 2.

Tenkai is a rather interesting character. Onimusha 1 and 3 fanboys would be pleased by his presence in this game. Tenkai is the oldest character in the bunch and resembles a chaperon that is looking after a bunch of rowdy kids at a birthday party.

And finally you have Roberto, a Westerner of Spanish and Japanese descent. Apparently Roberto has borrowed Dante's Ifrit and Beowulf gauntlets, because that is exactly what it looks like Roberto is wearing on his hands. And, not surprisingly, he plays exactly like Dante from DMC and DMC3 wearing the Ifrit and Beowulf gauntlets, respectively. Roberto is the silent type and the tallest character of the bunch (although his height advantage hardly comes into play). So there you have it, these 5 characters (6 if you count Minokichi but he's a NPC anyway) are the ones who will take down all evil.

The sad part is that collectively this group of kids looks incredibly goofy in cutscenes, especially when running around later in the game. They look more like the Scooby Doo gang than a badass group of warriors....again this has to do with the age of the characters. In keeping with the juvenile protagonists, the storyline is equally juvenile, complete with over-dramatic scenes (especially with Akane Jubei), family disputes, and secret crushes. It's like the O.C. was set in feudal Japan. It's kind of stupid when you take a look at the final battle: Soki has beef with his father, Akane Jubei has beef with her uncle, Ohatsu has beef with her "sister", and Roberto also has beef with his "father". Thank God that Tenkai didn't have any relatives or else he would have beef with them , too. It's corny. I'm guessing Capcom couldn't let go of the "family dispute" theme that they had going on in Devil May Cry 3 and decided to carry it over to Shin Onimusha.

The presentation of the story itself is confusing. In Shin Onimusha dates, geographical locations and characters names scroll up the screen in large bold print (accompanied by a loud sound effect), making it seem like this is an important history lesson. And then you have the female narrator at the beginning of each stage who sounds like she's doing her best impersonation of the female narrator in Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring. And then you have Soki being referred to as "Humanity's Last Hope". How pretentious. Any sense of importance is immediately negated by one look at Soki's goofy hair or the presence of Minokichi and Akane Jubei. The game takes itself too seriously at times (especially during the ending) and at other times not seriously enough.

Graphically the game is top notch. It maintains the high standard of quality that is present in nearly all Capcom games. Sadly though, Shin Onimusha doesn't break any graphical ground either. Shin Onimusha has the same high quality aesthetics of Onimusha 3. Surprisingly, there is no high quality CGI opening cinematic movie by ROBOT that was a tradition in past Onimusha games. Instead you have a high quality cutscene using in game graphics. There is CG in the opening though, although it's takes a while to kick in. However it's quality is mediocre and rather unrealistic: most of the time Soki looks like a cat made out of plastic (and later in the game when he transforms into an Onimusha, he resembles a yawning cat made out of plastic. Weird). It's okay, but it doesn't come close to CGI FMV that was featured in Onimusha 1 through 3. Shin Onimusha retains the 3D real time backgrounds that were introduced in Onimusha 3. Although it is very nice looking, it lacks the high degree of detail and realism of the pre-rendered backgrounds of the first two games. Although the preference is debatable, I would rather go with the pre-rendered backgrounds. In the end the backgrounds look nice regardless, so this is negligible. The characters in this game are all done in an anime style as opposed to the previous 3 games which were based off of real actors, so don't expect the high level of detail in the character's facial expressions outside of the cutscenes.

In the audio department Shin Onimusha falters. While the first two games had dark foreboding melodies that perfectly captured the horrific atmosphere, Dawn of Dreams has a mostly forgettable soundtrack, with some tunes that will actually grate on your nerves after awhile. There are only a couple of BGMs that sound decent. There are times when the BGMs are so obnoxious that I actually had to turn them off in the Options menu.

The voice acting is very well done.....if you're listening to the original Japanese voice tracks, that is. The English dubbing is COMPLETELY obnoxious with about only two decent voice actors doing a decent job. While the Japanese dialogue is professional and very dramatic, the English VA is very corny and awkward. Soki's English VA tends to over act and sound like a complete ass while Ohatsu is monotonous and incredibly boring. Roberto in English sounds like a Wolverine wannabe and Tenkai is just laughable. The only two characters whose English VA is on par with their Japanese counterparts are Akane Jubei and Minokichi, who sound obnoxious and unbearable in ANY language. It is highly advised that you play with the settings set to Japanese dialogue and English subtitles if you want to preserve the game's authenticity (and your sanity).


The gameplay is where Shin Onimusha turns truly rancid. I understand that this is a "new" beginning for the series, but there are some gameplay additions that are completely unnecessary and are quite annoying. It seemed like the main theme Capcom was going for in this game was "excess". You thought too much of a good thing could never ruin a game? Well believe me, it definitely can. Too many weapons, too many rings, too many necklaces, too many stages in the Dark Realm, etc. This just leads to an incredible amount of excess and junk that is meant to artificially lengthen the gameplay.

First off is the faux-RPG system. Yes, Shin Onimusha is the first installment in the series where you can level up your character just like in a traditional RPG. Every time your character gains a level they gain an Ability Point , which you can put towards extending the length of your attack combos, increasing the strength of a particular skill (such as Issen/Criticals), and completely maxing out a specific skill will unlock a new technique to be mastered. Sounds good right? Well it really isn't. Leveling up a particular character can take many exhausting hours to complete, and trying to unlock new techniques for five characters requires many hours of unnecessary time revisiting areas or spending time in the infamous Dark Realm, which is VERY repetitive.

Shin Onimusha is the first game in the series to be broken down into stages, 17 to be exact. My guess is that Capcom was doing this to appeal to the Devil May Cry crowd. Instead of experiencing one long adventure as in the past, the game is broken up into sections, which is really distracting in my opinion. On top of that, after every completed stage you have the opportunity to go a Hideout, where you have the opportunity to buy weapons, rings, necklaces, and healing potions at a Shop, have characters in your party combine items in order to create weapons and healing potions, and converse with your allies. The same way you can buy items in Devil May Cry games at the start of a new Mission, you can buy items in Shin Onimusha before you begin the next stage.

The first problem is this seriously affects the games difficulty, making it easier than it should be. Although there is a limit to the healing potions you can buy, the fact that there is a place to buy healing potions makes the game a lot easier. This is a stark contrast to the previous games where you had to survive with what you found in the item chests and what you found along your journey. When you are in the Hideout your health, magic, and Oni gauges are completely restored, already giving you an advantage (whereas in previous games you just saved with whatever life you had left).

The second problem is that although each character in your party has a limit to the amount of times they can combine items in order to create healing potions, weapons, etc, there is nothing stopping you from saving and reloading the save file with the number of available combinations per ally reset each time you load the file. That already gives you potential to make more than enough healing items to survive one playthrough.

Next would be the flawed weapon system. Flawed how? Because there are too many useless weapons to be found and upgraded. Seriously, you cannot go 3 feet without tripping over a new weapon in one of the MANY puzzle chests that are scattered throughout the game. You will definitely feel like a jerk when you spend a good hour or so running in circles killing enemies to gain enough souls to upgrade your newly found weapon when SURPRISE! A better and more powerful weapon is found just 15 feet away in the next scene. On top of that weapons are even dropped by defeated enemies!

In the past Onimusha games you felt like you achieved something special when you gained a new weapon, because Capcom had limited the weapon inventory to about 5 or 6 elemental weapons, with the exception of the default and "ultimate" weapon you would earn for completing the Dark Realm. Now finding new weapons is nothing special since it is so common.

Now I know the Shin Onimusha fanboys will scream out that each individual weapon has properties that are unlocked when maxed out. I am well aware of this and I am also aware that having 30 plus weapons in an action game is ridiculous, especially when the maxed out abilities are very redundant. Capcom should have kept the traditional weapon format with the "less is more" mantra. Adding 30 weapons to be found with ridiculous names like "Star Killer" or "Onyx Sword" leaves much to be desired. Did I mention that now weapons are now fully maxed out at Level 10 as opposed to Level 3 in past games? And that your character's armor is now maxed out at Level 100 (again as opposed to Level 3)? This is just useless filler to lengthen the game experience by having the player run around for hours on end slaying enemies for red souls in order to max out everything.

One gameplay aspect that has changed for the worse is the Magic system. Where as in previous Onimusha games you could perform Magic attacks in the heat of gameplay granting you temporary invincibility (and the strength of the Magic attack ranged from 1 to 3 ). In Shin Onimusha the screen goes dark (for what I'm guessing is supposed to be a dramatic effect) and time is frozen while you are about to unleash your deadly magic attack. What the hell is this? Are we in 1994 and this is Super Street Fighter II X? It is completely unnecessary to have time stop for the magic to go into effect. And now you must charge your magic attack to a desired level. This is most important for the magic Issen, which I will get into.

Another gameplay aspect that will disappoint many hardcore fans is that Capcom has watered down, butchered, dumbed down, and basically eviscerated the Issen technique. In past Onimusha games the Issen technique required a good amount of skill, patience, and timing and rewarded hardcore players with the benefit of more souls to absorbed from a defeated enemy. Issens in past Onimusha games were instant critical kills that killed every enemy in one death stroke, with the only exception being the boss characters. The Issen was a deadly counter attack that put the player at risk unless they mastered the timing of every enemy's attack. Completing a successful Issen and killing an enemy in one fell stroke was a feeling of achievement in Onimusha 1-3. Sadly, this is not the case in Shin Onimusha.

Capcom has now introduced the "Magic Issen", which might as well be known as the Dummy Issen or Scrub Issen. What used to be a technique that was risky and rewarding to skilled players is now cheap, way too easy to abuse, and will make any beginner look like an elite player. This Issen is no longer a counter attack or risky defensive technique but now an offensive technique that will make a 4 year old seem like an elite player. It is performed by initiating a Level 1 magic attack and as the enemy reels back in the stunned animation, you rapidly press Attack and proceed to Chain Issen the living crap out of every enemy that is within your range. Perhaps to even things out a bit Capcom chose to reduce the amount of damage a magic Issen inflicts and the amount of souls rewarded for killing an enemy with this technique. Even though you receive more souls and inflict more damage for performing what is now sadly known as a "true Issen" (basically the classic method based on timing and skill), it doesn't negate the fact that was an extremely poor move on Capcom's part in order to make the series flashier and faster paced.

Another first for the Onimusha series is that you can now view the enemies health gauge. To me this doesn't affect gameplay too much and is unnecessary. And just be warned that you will suffer many cheap death in the Dark Realm because of the stupid camera. In area like the Dark Realm where it can get very hectic, you need to know where your enemies are at all times. A frustrating camera is not needed here.

As for the Dark Realm, it's just a waste of time. Going through 100 floors in order to gain the most powerful weapons for each character is unnecessary. Fifty floors would have been more than enough. 100 floors with 5 characters = 500 floors of pure sadistic bliss. And considering the fact that you can't carry over the weapons you earned to harder difficulty, you will be going through the Dark Realm another 500 floors for each difficulty. I think that Capcom made the DR 100 floors (500 really) in order to slow the progress the player was making through the game. It's just a roadblock.

Is there replay value present in Shin Onimusha? Not really. Capcom was extremely lazy this time around and included next to no extra features. You basically unlock three extra sets of costumes for the five protagonists and you unlock 3 additional difficulty levels (Hard, Oni, and Ultimate Oni). That's it. No creative mini games, no art gallery, NOTHING. What a gip, considering that even Devil May Cry 3 has more extra unlockable content than Shin Onimusha. And this is really embarrassing when you take into account that extra unlockable goodies have always been a hallmark of the Onimusha series, and that even the original Onimusha contained more unlockable extra content than Shin Onimusha does. There is absolutely no incentive to tackle the extra difficulty modes since you won't be getting anything to reward your efforts. There is one universal ending no matter how your performance is, so there is no inspiration to strive for 100% completion of all weapons/items/charms/etc, an "S" ranking, or anything at all since you will be getting nothing new.

Overall, if I were to describe Shin Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams in one word, it would be weak. The juvenile kiddy storyline, the Devil May Cry inspired presentation, the faux RPG attributes, the introduction of the Magic Issen, and the totally ludicrous Dark Realm makes this quite possibly the worst Onimusha game in the series. As an action game it is merely average, but as an Onimusha title it is a disgrace. Shin Onimusha is to the Onimusha series as Street Fighter Zero 3 is to the Street Fighter series. Zero 3 was widely embraced by many casual and hardcore gamers as "the best Street Fighter EVER", although the game had an incredibly stupid story and dumbed down gameplay mechanics which pissed off staunch purists. The same applies to Shin Onimusha. A watered down fighting engine, lame puzzles, over thirty junk weapons, and a plethora of miscellaneous items. What I really dislike is the fact that Shin Onimusha is in itself a short game, but Capcom uses several slick tricks that are completely unnecessary in order to give the player the false impression that the game is lengthy. If you already own Shin Onimusha and have played all the previous installments, ask yourself:

-Was it necessary for Capcom to make the Dark Realm 100 floors?

-Was it necessary for Capcom to make weapons max out at Level 10 and Armor at Level 100?

-Was it necessary for Capcom to throw a new weapon at your feet every few steps (knowing full well that you will spend hours trying to max it out to see how deadly it is)?

-Was it necessary for Capcom to cram in over a dozen puzzle chests near the final battle (knowing full well that you will try to open each and every last one)?

-Was it necessary for Capcom to make you go through the Sakai facility TWICE (knowing full well that it is the most time consuming stage since you have to repeatedly switch characters)?

-Was it necessary for Capcom to make the main character Soki not as versatile as past main characters in Onimusha, his prowess to only Broadswords (and not being able to use arrows and guns like Samanosuke and Jubei)?


Everything I listed is a completely useless action that Capcom made to make the Shin Onimusha seem lengthy. If you were to cut out all of that filler Shin Onimusha might be, at most, a four hour experience from beginning to end. It's pathetic. If Shin Onimusha indicates the new direction that Capcom wants to take the Onimusha series, than I want no part of it.

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 04/03/06, Updated 11/08/10

Game Release: Shin Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams (JP, 01/26/06)