The official Gamespot review was right ins some places, but undeservedly harsh. This is a good game, if you use it right
GRAPHICS: 8/10
There are some nice high detail characters in this, but unfortunately these high detail models appear mostly in dialogues and not in combat. That said, this game doesn't need high detail models in combat. Shaders and 3D make everything look pretty, and the pop-up, while obvious, is done smoothly so you won't really care about it.
SOUND: 8/10
It didn't get higher than 8 since, unfortunately, a lot of the tracks sound the same. I felt that there was less of the high octane guitar solos of Dynasty Warrior's music, which was a bit sad as that metal added to the adrenaline of the game. However, for people who like Japanese culture, and traditional Japanese music, you won't be saddened at all since this game is full of it. Indeed, there is no English dub, but I don't feel it is necessary, but I do play Japanese-only games more than the average monolingual western gamer ;)
ONLINE: ?/10
I haven't had much use for it yet, but apparently free DLC is coming to this game, and this includes an online Co-op mode that has not yet been released. This leaves me excited, but a bit disappointed since I haven't seen any Spotpass notifications about it. Maybe not in the EU/AU region yet?
STORY: N/A
Unlike Sonic/Mario etc, there is a story here, and there is some main character development, but it's, as gamespot says, forgettable. Ultimately, the story is really a history lesson with a slight personal touch and some creative license (I refuse to believe that blue skinned people existed in feudal Japan). If you need a story, there is one, but it's a game that requires the player to be part of the story. Don't expect to play this half asleep and have an engaging narrative make you excited like Dead Space 2.
GAMEPLAY: 8/10
THIS is where people start to get bored with Dynasty Warriors games. Let me tell you something important - DO NOT PLAY THIS GAME ON EASY! It is too easy. Sure, playing on hard mode in a battle half an hour long might cause frustration if you get someone important killed and lose at the very end of the battle, but at least play on medium. There's a couple of reasons, mostly that A) you need higher difficulty, and clever AI to use combos effectively, and B) there's no sense of threat or urgency on easy, and the AI is ridiculously stupid on easy too. Hard mode however makes even a since normal soldier dangerous to your heroes, where as medium is, well, medium. Ultimately, this is a game you need to know how to play well before it gets interesting, which is unfortunate for western audiences who are largely obsessed with shooter games and more heavily strategic games who aren't used to depth that isn't placed straight in front of them. Samurai Warriors is a game you have to dig deep down into before you start to get the depth out of it, and shallow attempts at playing it will result in a shallow gameplay experience.
Some additional notes:
- If you're expecting your enemies to all attack you at once and swarm you and go psychotic like in the movie 300, don't. Contrary to popular belief, human beings do not like throwing themselves into certain death and carnage, and this is reflected in the AI - they like to encircle you and stab from relatively safe positions. The realism sort of stops there though, as while the AI has good tactics, your hero has super magical powers and stuff like that, sort of destroying the balance (thank god though when the game expects you to take out 200+ units per turn on the early levels!)
- You actually can use tactics on the main battlefield map, sending your playable characters around the battle to hold up enemy officers (the "boss" characters basically), so you can easily manage inundating groups of 5 officers attacking important ground of yours. This is actually much better than the strategical elements introduced in the PSP's renditions of Dynasty/Samurai Warriors, which had various small maps joined up like Monster Hunter.
FINAL VERDICT:
A decent launch title, and while I haven't played much of the others I'd say this is my favourite one. But it's not a game you can just expect to show you how awesome it is, and you really need to dig deep to find what makes this game increadibly popular in Japan. There's reasons why Famitsu in Japan gave this game a very high score, where as Gamespot gave it a horrifyingly low score - there are great gameplay elements hidden behind a veil of shallow and repetitive hack and slash action, and it is up to the player to find them. Give Samurai Warriors a chance, unlike Gamespot ;)