If your looking for the Next-Gen Dynasty Warriors, this game isn't it! Its 50% Gundam, 5% DW, 45% Wasted Potential.
User Rating: 8 | Gundam Musou (PlayStation 3 the Best) PS3
Dynasty Warriors has always been one of those games where you either like it or you don’t. Ever since my first experience with the series, Dynasty Warriors 3, I have always enjoyed getting a friend of mine together and thrashing some Yellow Turbans. The game has never been especially impressive but it has always maintained itself in my collection all these years. The most recent iteration, Dynasty Warriors: Gundam, holds true to what you would expect, for the most part. It isn’t exactly strong in any particular sense of the word but it has some value to it. Originally, when it was first shown, you thought, “Hey look, you get to fly and fight in free space.(Moving in zero gravity and all.) You would think that fighting in space would utilize some kind of flight mechanic. This is simply not the case though for the best support they provide for this dynamic is the ability to perform short boosts either up or forward. They also incorporate boosting into certain attack combinations. There are levels which do take place in space, but the action is strictly on a linear plane and can get pretty annoying at times. All in all, you really get the sense that this is an untapped potential that was just left you feeling unfulfilled. For the game itself, it is a Dynasty Warriors game true enough. Even with the over the top "mech" combat, being usually somewhat slow by nature, you never really get a sense that the action lets up. There are those times when you find yourself literally surrounded by hundreds of foes and are forced to hack and slash your way through to gain a specific point or objective, as you would expect. A common level consists of you taking strategic fields by defeating a certain amount on enemies in that field. Sometimes there are mini-boss battles before you “conquer” the field in which you have to destroy a certain "guard," Enemy Character, or group of three guards. Along with this you usually have specific character “mobile suits” that are the equivalent to the generals from the previous games that you must hunt down as they appear. They even add a new dynamic to this game that has never been seen before. For the first time ever, you will fight against two different factions at the same time. That adds something new and interesting to the game, even with the story lines for the game being weak themselves. There is a leveling up system for the pilots and the suits. Unlike previous games, this one incorporates skills that are learned as the pilots gain experience. There are also parts that are sometimes left by defeated enemy generals that boost stats and enable special properties when equipped.. With the skills and parts mechanic combined ,it does serve up a good substitute for the weapon/item mechanic from past iterations in the series. Now for the down side, or should I say sides, plural. There aren’t a fantastic number of different pilots to choose from, in fact I would go as far as to call it down right unacceptable. They try to cover this with the fact that once you clear the campaign for a given pilot, you can switch between a number of different mobile suits, but all in all the number is just plain low. One would think that with the games of the past, you would be able to switch between at least 50 different characters and ideally 50, or near to it, mobile suits. Especially with all that extra space that seems unused on the disc, you would think that this is simply yet another missed opportunity. Some can argue that they ran out of source material to fill out the roster, I say that’s no excuse. The way it stands, there are a plethora of Dynasty Warrior characters that could have been special unlocks in the game, another well of potential left unused. The game leans heavily on the Gundam aspect of the name. The Dynasty Warriors side is nonexistent for the most part. The levels are all pretty unimaginative and are few in numbers. You will find yourself playing the same six or seven maps from all different sides and that gets old quickly. They also cut free mode all together. You no longer have the ability for you and a friend to just scroll through the available maps, choose a faction, and go. That factor, along with no online support make the game just seems unfinished or hurried. You can see all the game has to offer in about three hours of solid gaming. Those numbers don’t add up fantastically well. All in all this is a good game strictly for the fan base. I don’t even think I would put the Gundam fans on this bill. You would have to seriously love the show to sit and play this for hours on end. That aside it is an excellent addition and a fresh spin on the series. I enjoy the game with coop, and even with the drawbacks (unacceptably low character count, map count, nonexistent online etc,) I have put plenty of hours into the game. I would not recommend the price point simply because the game isn't worth 60 dollars. The problem as with most Dynasty Warriors games, they don't make very many so if you wait to long, you may have trouble finding yourself a copy. (I was just recently able to pick up a new copy of Dynasty Warriors for the PSP and that has been out for ages!) I would love to see them take another whack at this thing, maybe put some effort in it, add free roaming space levels, keep the three faction battles, (or bump it to four!) add some Dynasty Warrior characters, online coop, more missions, something that uses the 40+ gigs of space on that disc to make it more of a $60 Playstation3 game. As it stands I see nothing that couldn't have been done on the PS2. I gave it an 8 out of 10 which puts it at "Exceeds Excellence" on my personal scale simply because I am a big Armored Core fan and it is kind of like Armored Core meets Dynasty Warriors. (Yea, kind of.) Bottom line, be sure you know what your getting before you get it.
