Of course, being the first one I am playing in HD helps. Even still, this is Musou pornography. Gundam Musou (which I might say is second best. . .possibly first best) is Gundam pornography, but this is Musou porn.
You get tons of warriors, both the more, uh, relatively grounded original Dynasty Warriors and the somewhat different playing Samurai Warriors (yes, I too was surprised they managed to eek out a pretty different "general" play style), and a story that is, well, it's the kind of cheesy crossover crap that happens when you try to cross over two things that really have no real reason to do so. See also the shambles of plots around Marvel Ultimate Alliance and, well, most comic book world events, actually.
But you don't just get the tried and true gameplay, you get some new kinks in the form of the Marvel vs. Capcom-esque tag out system. So far, it's made the game a bit easier than most musous I have played, but I think that's hardly a negative. Your team mates get health back and build up their musou meter when they aren't on the clock. This system could really add a lot to future games. If they wedge in some sort of class system, it could change the game totally. As of now, it's a nice addition, but they haven't scratched the surface of what this new gameplay wrinkle could offer.
For example, now I can have a fast and nimble guy and a slow clunky big gun. There are tons of characters I never use in these games--fat slow folks don't fit my play style, but they do have uses that pop up, and it's handy being able to keep one in my party for, oh, the one encounter I might really need him. Similarly, some characters work better on mounts, some off. Why not bring a good mounted character, a fattie, and a fast swordsman. You got it. And there are always more exotic characters with weirder weapons that I just never give shakes because they are a bit too esoteric, and these games come out much too frequently for me to get into them with that degree of depth. You know what I mean.
Everybody has weapons. There's a rudimentary weapon crafting system. Fairly simple stuff. It's simple, but there are like 75 warriors in this, so a veritable dictionary of weapon names wuld be required if there were much depth here, much less more numbers. There's also a skill system. Haven't delved into it too much. While I will give the weapon system for being simple, the skill system, from my cursory understanding, is a bit too simple for three characters. You are given ten or so slots, and you don't equip character specific skills, they are team specific. So ou might equip a skill. . .that makes certain character types attack faster. Or expand the musou meter. But these are not skills like Extend Hanzo's Public Hair To Choke Bitches. It is mildly disappointing, especiailly since from my gander at the skill screen, there aren't a whole lot to get in the first place.
The reason all that skill stuff is kind of a bummer is because it is an area Gundam sort of excels in. But what with it's different drivers for different Gundams and different parts, I guess there's probably at least a layer more of depth there when it comes to customization. Still, this game has a bunch of things Gundam doesn't have, so I'll call it fair.
Visuals are about what goes for par for a musou game on 360 now. A good job upscaling and a decent cleanup job to make it kinda pretty, but this is still your grandpa's musou game. Comparison to Gundam (for those who never got into Musou before Gundam), the graphics are of about the same quality, despite Gundam being a PS3/360 game and this being a PS2/360 game. I mean, this isn't scifi, so it looks drastically different, and losing enemies that break apart into pieces well, breaks my heart, but these games are visual humpin' cousins.
Missions seem good so far. Solid, nothing special. Nothing annoying. Some of these games have annoying bits. Actually, I am sure this will have at least one, but I am wondering how they will make up for the difficulty diminished by swapping characters. Actually, to keep up the Gundam Musou comparison, the missions feel more Gundam Musou (grueling and unmistakingly DW, but kind of easy for the series), than they do Samurai Warriors 2 (aka Hell) and its expansions. I think they must have a couple musou teams going.
I have skipped out on Musou from 5 up until Gundam, and that was a long enough bit of downtime for me to find my love again. With these two games, it really feels like the series has taken some of the bigger steps in its very, very incremental history.
Fans, you know you need to pick this up, even with Gundam still warm.
