Onimusha: Blade Warriors

• Choose to be noble heroes like Samanosuke Akechi and Jubei Yagyu -- or become an evil sub-character or monster from the series.
• Fight in beautiful interactive backgrounds -- fantastic graphics and realistic lighting create lifelike game worlds.
• Customize your characters' powers as you go - strengthen your equipment, boost your Genma power and more.
• Four exciting story modes - Story, Fighting, Mini-Game and Practice.
• Team up with up to 3 other players for lightning fast multiplayer battles that show off your warrior skills.

Product description ------------------- Onimusha Blade Warriors -- Command a legion of noble, powerful warriors from the Onimusha Warlords series, in this 3D fighting game. Select your warrior and fight alone or against other warriors, in epic battles that will test your skills to the limits! Review ------ Until now, PS2 owners have had very little in the way of good four-player games (other than sports) to throw in when there are more than two people in the room. Blade Warriors, while by no means revolutionary, is a good solid multiplayer brawler that should keep you pounding each other to bits well into the night. If you've ever played Super Smash Bros., you'll immediately be comfortable here – even the fighter select screen is strikingly familiar. Barring a few elements, such as a life bar and combo attacks, gameplay largely follows in SSB's footsteps. Not that it's necessarily bad, but this is a very derivative title. Not in every way, though. Souls drop when you hit or KO someone, and they can be collected to refill your . Arenas are fairly three-dimensional, which can make it tough to line up ranged attacks, and everything from models to effects is very easy on the eyes. Though play is for the most part frantic and fun, Blade Warriors does fall flat in a number of areas. The camera and character variety are both suspect, and combos are nigh-impossible to break up. Fighters don't have nearly enough moves, either. On average, I found myself doing the same four-slash combo all the freaking time. If you're one of those people with more than one friend, this is as good a way as any to get your brawl on with a PS2. Concept: Use your favorite Onimusha characters to unlock other Capcom heroes (and villians), and control them in a giant slugfest Graphics: Sharp, varied backgrounds and excellent models Sound: Umm, clangs and battle cries. Mega Man EXE and Lan are annoying as ever Playability: If your square button is feeling lonely, this will reacquaint you with it Entertainment: Definitely one of the top PS2 four-player titles Replay: High Rated: 8 out of 10 Editor: Adam Biessener Issue: March 2004 2nd Opinion: Going into this review, I was prepared to nominate Capcom for a Darwin Award. Applying the Onimusha license to gameplay that cannibalizes the Super Smash Bros. formula is equivocal to pouring Coke on your Wheaties. As asinine as Blade Warrior's concept is, you can't help but become completely entrenched in its simplistic, yet frantic hack n' slash frays. Strategy laden multi-tiered environments, character-specific special moves, and four-player support pretty much round out the elements that Capcom has so blatantly stolen from Nintendo's popular series. Although very similar in design, Blade Warriors doesn't offer a robust selection of character types, nor reasons for people seeking a single player experience to invest more than a few hours of playing. Fun as it may be, it doesn't have the legs or chemistry of Super Smash Bros. Rated: 7.5 out of 10 Editor: Andrew Reiner Subscribe to Game Informer ( http://www..com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0000AN45D/ ) -- Game Informer Review