Alot better then what I thought I was going to be getting into!
But ironically enough a video game based on a TV show which in itself is considered bad and inaccurate to alot of people, comes a game which is not only a unique experience for this generation of console, but also for the measly price of 10 dollars!
Now onto the game!
let me express that this game is a realistic fighting game where not only do limbs fly off. But also you have a small health bar where even just one small combo can be deadly. This can be incredibly fun and rewarding for being patient readying to strike when the enemy misses just by a fraction of a second this also consequently means this game has a pretty high learning curve...
Lets talk about difficulty!
I suggest going to the options and changing the difficulty to normal (normal is easy, hard is normal and deadly is hard ) It starts on hard but even beating that might be a daunting task for some people not used to this type of gameplay. The game can especially a jerk if you want to try to get the cool samurai helmet by beating all the characters on deadly dying up to 30 times per a arcade run can get kinda frustrating but you still keep coming back for more! Also some of mini games to get the alternative weapons can be hard for some class (knight especially on the meat beating stage) But never did it not feel doable.
Classes, gameplay and graphics oh my !
You get a mixture of 8 classes all from different times of warfare from the salty sea dog pirate to the holy Templar knight! Each one of these has 2 short,mid, and projectile weapons of different type from pistols to pikes theirs a plethora of killing devices to choose from. Also the classes feel really different like you feel the difference between being a big bulky armored knight or the fast flipping ninja. Though some classes are in the same category such as the Apache/ninja or the spartan/centurion theirs enough of a difference to make it so your not playing a carbon copy. Also you can paint your character some of theme actually look pretty neat. You don't get the biggest choice of colors but even a little customization is wonderful for a ten dollar game!
Game play is 1v1 fighting like a old game called Bushido blade. But if i had to reference it to something even close today maybe demon souls(without magic and monster and if it was a fighting game xD). But besides that you die fast and kill quick in this game and where spamming X will get you killed with a quick parry and get your head sliced off. Also theirs limb damage for instance you can attack certain parts of the body using Y(head) X(body/arms) A(legs). Head damage can cause a instant kill gratifying head slice. Arm damage can cause the enemy unable to use anything but his short weapon or even slice off his arm and quickly lose health. Leg damage makes you unable to dodge and basically makes you a sitting rock ready to be rained on by projectiles from afar.
Graphics are alright the characters looks pretty nice though the stages are a little bit bland and ugly plus there can be some bugs seeing the outside of the map plus some of the maps it can be sorta easy to get stuck the one with the torches comes to my mind this is one of the very few faults of this game.
Game modes and more!
For being only ten dollars they sure did a bang up job here . You have run of the mill regular arcade mode where you slice through the ranks of all 8 warriors in the game(mostly you play this to get the secondary weapons and unlock the avatar armor). Theirs survival mode/practice mode which is exactly how they sound like. Battle mode for fighting against CPU and your friends who plug in controllers.
Then a online which not only has ranking which you can physically see but also tournaments(i have not dabbled that much in tournaments so far so forgive me what little info i have). Some issues can arise though if someone quits you don't get the win which is sorta lame(i don't know if i can say this but the community seems pretty damn good at having good sportsmanship 29 wins on the score and i think 4 quit so not to bad!). Also finding a game can be sort of a pain if there's alot of matches . Since it seems like it looks for all of them one at a time then sometimes by the time you get there it wont even let you join the room . But for some reason refresh dosent work well in this so you have to back out and re go through the custom settings).
closing comment
i hope to see more games of this type in the future just imagining a full price gladiator game with this battle system with multiple fighters at once maybe fighting animals and stuff salivating at just the thought!
so overall
+ Avatar armor(samurai to be exact) which looks cool and is probably worth half the price of the game alone
+ online with tournaments and a physical able to see ranking system
+ a combat system which awards patience/opportunities
+ a combat system which is gloriously bloody and satisfying
+ finishing moves that look cool/brutal/ and each one is a special attack which is different for each warrior
+ achievements with a nice sense of humor
+10 dollars for a full game that's great that you can spend the 5 dollars left over for a movie instead of buying the COD map pack
+ninja and pirates come on!
-some graphical glitches(though some are funny)
-maps look kinda meh and not remember able
-getting into matches sometimes takes longer then the match itself..
- lame people who quite and not getting the win or poison runners can cause issues in some match ups...