Dynasty Warriors 5 Xtreme Legends
We take a final English build of the game for a spin. Impressions inside.
Published: November 2, 2005
You have to hand it to KOEI, they clearly understand their audience enough to know they really don’t have to do anything to the Dynasty Warriors franchise. They can just keep pumping out the games and gamers will literally snap them up as if they were the latest copy of Madden.
It’s a sobering sight to read the developer/publisher happily tout that Dynasty Warriors 5 (at least up until August of this year) had outsold The Punisher, Xenosaga Ep. II and even Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, and all of them I remember at least marginally heavy advertising for. DW5? Not so much.
Still, it’s not like we’re complaining here. KOEI clearly understands the biz, and they’re more than happy to milk the franchise for all it’s worth. Case in point, the final build of Dynasty Warriors 5 Xtreme Legends that arrived on our desk a little over a week ago. While it’s certainly meant to be something of an expansion pack, falling somewhere between the content offered in an add-on and a full sequel (with a price to match), the game is certainly playable on its own.
So playable, in fact, that the better part of the day was spent alternatively distracting different people in the office. There’s nothing especially new here, just a lot of button mashing and thousands upon thousands of chumps ready to fall before your blade, but hey, it’s DW, and it’s still eerily addictive when you need something to procrastinate with.
While the game will allow you to unlock more content should you have plain vanilla DW5, the real appeal is in what XL offers on its own; most notably the Destiny Mode and Xtreme Mode, which let you create a character and embark on something of a career mode, or just take a fighter and attempt to survive for as long as possible. It’s the former that’s most exciting, though, and one that promises the most immediate value.
Destiny Mode lets you whip up a character, male or female, choose from 10 different hair and face types, lets you set the build and height on sliding scales and then lets you pick a weapon. While your character starts out small-time, enlisted with a kingdom and general of your choosing, you’re able to wield any weapon you come across, and over the course of eight stages, the game will give you ample opportunity to stab your leaders in the back, defect or double-cross.
Regardless of where your loyalties will eventually fall, it’s in your best interest to stick with your commander at first. Not only will you get a nice bonuses to health recovery and attack, but you’ll be more easily recognized for your achievements, like felling enemy lieutenants. These directly tie into promotions, which in turn give you the ability to command officers beneath you and call in ambushes or arrow flurries that help thin crowds as you charge at them.
Once you’ve risen in the ranks a bit, you’re free to take on objectives of your own (as long as you fulfill the overall level ones too), which net you bonuses after battle. These points can then be used as currency to buy bigger combos, battle enhancements, the ability to use charge, musou and musou rage moves that the legendary players from games past can wield at will.
You’ll also net new weapons to try out, each with varying bonuses to stuff like your attack, your overall health and musou power. Those bonuses must be weighed against the strength of the weapon too, though, so there’s a fair amount of strategy to be had.
The main game, though, is still cutting a swath through your enemy, leaving hundreds of them slain on the battlefield, and that’s still as fun as ever. Extra modes like Xtreme are really just there to test your mettle, though the whole idea of not refilling your life along the way makes for some nice balances in how you pick your levels. Xtreme Mode offers both blacksmith and shop areas to boost your weapon strength or buy items to refill health or increase base attack power too, and these have to be considered in addition to the currency multipliers harder levels offer.
It’s a nice balancing act; forgoing the ability to refill health in exchange for using iron found on the battlefield to forge stronger weapons. Do you go with a better offense, or play the safe route and slowly hike up your abilities? Sucessfully completing a string of levels before you’re eventually killed (and it’ll happen, eventually) will give you bonuses that you can then use in the game’s Camp Mode to upgrade the series mainstays.
Legend Mode presents a handful of stand-alone scenarios that help extend the main game a little farther if you’ve plowed through things in the original DW5. From what we played, they did help extend the mileage and offered a nice difficulty (though you can pick that before you start) if you get tired of suping up your own character.
A handy reference available from the menu helps shed a wee bit of light on the progression of Chinese history, outlining major battles that helped shift power among the three main factions of the game. It’s a lot to take in, sure, but it does help clear up a few of those bajillion Chinese names that flash on the screen 20 times per battle.
In the end, we were pleasantly surprised by how much original content the game offered – especially for $30. We’ll have a more involved review covering the ins and outs of some of the other modes in a few weeks, but this is easily the most impressive expansion we’ve seen KOEI tack onto a series that simply refuses to die. Or change. Or stop selling like crazy.
It’s a sobering sight to read the developer/publisher happily tout that Dynasty Warriors 5 (at least up until August of this year) had outsold The Punisher, Xenosaga Ep. II and even Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, and all of them I remember at least marginally heavy advertising for. DW5? Not so much.
Still, it’s not like we’re complaining here. KOEI clearly understands the biz, and they’re more than happy to milk the franchise for all it’s worth. Case in point, the final build of Dynasty Warriors 5 Xtreme Legends that arrived on our desk a little over a week ago. While it’s certainly meant to be something of an expansion pack, falling somewhere between the content offered in an add-on and a full sequel (with a price to match), the game is certainly playable on its own.
So playable, in fact, that the better part of the day was spent alternatively distracting different people in the office. There’s nothing especially new here, just a lot of button mashing and thousands upon thousands of chumps ready to fall before your blade, but hey, it’s DW, and it’s still eerily addictive when you need something to procrastinate with.
While the game will allow you to unlock more content should you have plain vanilla DW5, the real appeal is in what XL offers on its own; most notably the Destiny Mode and Xtreme Mode, which let you create a character and embark on something of a career mode, or just take a fighter and attempt to survive for as long as possible. It’s the former that’s most exciting, though, and one that promises the most immediate value.
Destiny Mode lets you whip up a character, male or female, choose from 10 different hair and face types, lets you set the build and height on sliding scales and then lets you pick a weapon. While your character starts out small-time, enlisted with a kingdom and general of your choosing, you’re able to wield any weapon you come across, and over the course of eight stages, the game will give you ample opportunity to stab your leaders in the back, defect or double-cross.
Regardless of where your loyalties will eventually fall, it’s in your best interest to stick with your commander at first. Not only will you get a nice bonuses to health recovery and attack, but you’ll be more easily recognized for your achievements, like felling enemy lieutenants. These directly tie into promotions, which in turn give you the ability to command officers beneath you and call in ambushes or arrow flurries that help thin crowds as you charge at them.
Once you’ve risen in the ranks a bit, you’re free to take on objectives of your own (as long as you fulfill the overall level ones too), which net you bonuses after battle. These points can then be used as currency to buy bigger combos, battle enhancements, the ability to use charge, musou and musou rage moves that the legendary players from games past can wield at will.
You’ll also net new weapons to try out, each with varying bonuses to stuff like your attack, your overall health and musou power. Those bonuses must be weighed against the strength of the weapon too, though, so there’s a fair amount of strategy to be had.
The main game, though, is still cutting a swath through your enemy, leaving hundreds of them slain on the battlefield, and that’s still as fun as ever. Extra modes like Xtreme are really just there to test your mettle, though the whole idea of not refilling your life along the way makes for some nice balances in how you pick your levels. Xtreme Mode offers both blacksmith and shop areas to boost your weapon strength or buy items to refill health or increase base attack power too, and these have to be considered in addition to the currency multipliers harder levels offer.
It’s a nice balancing act; forgoing the ability to refill health in exchange for using iron found on the battlefield to forge stronger weapons. Do you go with a better offense, or play the safe route and slowly hike up your abilities? Sucessfully completing a string of levels before you’re eventually killed (and it’ll happen, eventually) will give you bonuses that you can then use in the game’s Camp Mode to upgrade the series mainstays.
Legend Mode presents a handful of stand-alone scenarios that help extend the main game a little farther if you’ve plowed through things in the original DW5. From what we played, they did help extend the mileage and offered a nice difficulty (though you can pick that before you start) if you get tired of suping up your own character.
A handy reference available from the menu helps shed a wee bit of light on the progression of Chinese history, outlining major battles that helped shift power among the three main factions of the game. It’s a lot to take in, sure, but it does help clear up a few of those bajillion Chinese names that flash on the screen 20 times per battle.
In the end, we were pleasantly surprised by how much original content the game offered – especially for $30. We’ll have a more involved review covering the ins and outs of some of the other modes in a few weeks, but this is easily the most impressive expansion we’ve seen KOEI tack onto a series that simply refuses to die. Or change. Or stop selling like crazy.
