Personally, I haven’t played the first Gungrave, so I can’t make any comparisons between the two games. Gungrave is an anime in the form of a game, designed by the creator of Trigun. You play as Grave who is also known as “Death” or “Beyond the Grave” because he was brought back to life in some experimental project, as for several other of these so called “dead men”. Without spoiling any of the story, Grave was revived (again) by a girl named Mika so you can help her take out these host creatures called seed. Without playing the first game, the story is explained pretty well and is fairly decent. The graphics are not the most detailed ever. In fact, the models by themselves look very plain. Although, the celshading and stylish design make the graphics look outstanding. The cutscenes look especially nice because it looks very much like you’re watching an anime. Most the sceneries look plain at a glance, but with the destructible environments and all the flashy effects, it makes the game look stylish and gives you the immersive feel of an intense anime fight scene. The game play of Gungrave: Overdose is very action packed. It looks similar to the intense gun shooting action of Devil May Cry, but it somewhat feels like Max Payne as well. So the game play is like a hybrid of the two. You are constantly having enemies randomly spawn out of no where, and all you do is basically kill them all. There’s no puzzle solving, and only one scene of platforming. Sometimes you have to destroy something like a generator or door or some other stationary object. But basically, all you do is destroy people with your pistols, or you have a huge gun on your back that’s used for melee attacks or special shots. It’s very intense, and the game gets extremely hard as you encounter stronger enemies in larger numbers. There are two things that could’ve been improved in the game play. One problem being the turning, because some bosses move around you so fast, and you turn at an incredibly slow rate when you’re trying to make a 180 turn. The second problem is the lock-on aiming. You can lock onto enemies to help you get better shots, but you can only lock on when you’re basically a few steps away from doing a melee attack, and it doesn’t lock on unless they’re directly in front of you. If you are to turn far enough, you lose your locked target. The sound can be both a pro and a con in this game. The music is similar to animes like Cowboy Bebop. So if you’re a fan of that style, you’ll enjoy the music but if you’re not a fan of that kind of music, you’ll find it annoying. Also, the voice actors are quite professional. Three of the five protagonists are voice acted by people who did voices in Metal Gear Solid. But then again, that can be annoying as well. For example, Juji sounds TOO much like Master Miller from Metal Gear Solid. Also, Rocket Billy’s voice is VERY annoying. He sounds like a wannabe 80s rock star voice mixed in with a country singer. Yeah, pretty bad. So basically, the sound is a love it or hate it thing. There is quite a good amount of replay value found in this game. It’s fairly short, but you also can play the game through with two other characters, Juji and Rocket Billy, and play through the missions that they did. Each character also plays fairly differently as well. Grave is more a gun guy, Juji is more melee, and Rocket Billy… is just weird. And even on the easiest difficulty setting, the game can still be very challenging because you get jumped by so many enemies at once in this game. Overall, Gungrave: Overdose is recommendable to anyone interested in animes, third person shooters, or action games. It’s very fun and has intense action. And for $15 brand new, there is no way you would want to rent this, it’s definitely a game you’d rather buy since it’s worth far more then the money you’re paying for it.
Any game that stars an undead dude with two guns and a giant coffin that he can swing at people gets me interested. Even moreso when the beginning of every stage exclaims "Kick Their Ass!!" Gungrave Overdose... I mean, w... Read Full Review
After playing the first one I didn't really expect that much. Luckily I was positively surprised when I brought Gungrave Overdose back home. First one was graphically appealing good piece of art. But was way too short... Read Full Review
