Gundam Seed: Battle Assault E3 2004 Impressions

Giant robot fighting games always make for a good novelty gaming experience, but it's always that much more appealing when you've got a good robotic license on your hands, such as the case of Gundam Seed: Battle Assault. In this upcoming PlayStation 2 and Game Boy Advance fighting game, you'll be able to fight with 25 different Gundam suits from everything from Gundam Wing to G Gundam. Bandai had Battle Assault available for play on the E3 show floor, and we gave it a good once-over to see how it's coming along.

The PlayStation 2 version of Battle Assault features full 3D fighting arenas, each littered with various pieces of scenery, like large buildings, that can be crashed into and then used as weapons. Only two suits were available in the demo we played, though both had decent arrays of attacks. Aside from standard strikes and jumping moves, you can also pull out an energy sword as well as fire off energy bursts at your opponents. The fighting controls are pretty simple, but you can pull off a few neat special moves with each suit. One that we saw involved our Gundam spinning through the air toward our opponent, performing a drill-like attack that provided quite a hefty number of hits. Though the action was fairly frenetic, it was still pretty easy to keep a grasp on it and not get overwhelmed by the speed of things. Additionally, though the matches we played were only one-on-one, up to four players can play Battle Assault.

The GBA version of Gundam Seed: Battle Assault is much the same concept as the PS2 version, but on a 2D fighting plane rather than on the 3D environments. Most of the same moves and types of moves will apply in the GBA version, and similarly, you will be able to link up with up to three other players via the GBA link cable.

Gundam Seed: Battle Assault will be released this fall for both systems. We will have more on the game in the coming weeks.