Monday 11 March 2013

Asura's Wrath - Full Review

Woah, long time no post for this blog it seems. I'd love to say that I've not posted because I've been busy, bu that would be lying, I just haven't been playing as many games recently so haven't had much to write about unfortunately. Anyway though, I'm back and with a game to knock the socks off anime lovers, Asura's Wrath!
It's hard to talk about Asura's Wrath because it rides the borderline of what constitutes a game. Actual elements of play narrow down to QTEs (Quick Time Events), third person rail shooter type sections and beat 'em up style sections. The largest portion of the game is cut-scenes which involve QTEs. If you skip non-gameplay cutscenes; the entire game will only take a few hours to finish. BUT what gameplay there is in there I really enjoyed. Because these sections are fairly far apart, they never feel boring or tedious, and overall I just had fun playing. The issue is whether Asura's Wrath should be considered a game, as most of the time spent on it will be watching cutscenes to further the story. I'll touch on this again at the end of my review but gameplay wise Asura's Wrath is lacking in some respects.
Graphics and music are one reason I loved Aura's Wrath. The game takes an anime style throughout and the graphical style and music fit this very well. In a lot of games I have trouble noticing the music unless the score is exceptional but in this case, I just couldn't get enough. The score fits so well and every scene has an accompanying tune to enhance the experience, especially those involving two characters in particular. The graphics aren't exactly amazing, but in terms of style, they just fit. The more human looking characters have a very anime type style to them and because of this the more non-human looking characters don't look strange or out of place. The landscapes, as with most media of this style, look beautiful.
This section will be about the story, which in my opinion is the largest and most important part of the game. The section marked with *s contains spoilers so if you haven't played the game then I implore you to skip that section and play the game first. =)
Asura's Wrath to put it simply is based around a demi-god whose power stems from his anger, and he is always angry. The story surrounds 8 demi-gods known as the 8 guardian generals in a seemingly endless war with a race known as the gohma. Both sides are fighting for control of earth (Gaea) and the guardian generals overall aim is to eliminate vlitra, the largest and most powerful of the gohma from which all others spawn. I loved the story to Asura's Wrath and it is the real part of the game that will keep you playing. Every area of gameplay is fleshed out incredibly with a great story and I can't stress enough how much I loved it. My only gripe is that the final part of the game (the last 4 chapters) are dlc and these are what I consider to be the best part of the story, so if I were to give any advice to a potential player of this game, it would be to buy the final part. 
*My favourite elements of the story are Asura's immense anger at the thought of his daughter crying, but also his hatred of being worshiped or those who wish to be worshiped. Both of these points are shown clearly in Asura's first fight with Yasha after returning from naraka when he is clearly outmatched, but after hearing Yasha talk about his daughter and reffering to himself as god, it released a burst of pure anger inside Asura that makes him powerful enough for a moment to stagger Yasha. This also leads me to my other favourite element of the story which has to be the rivalry turned friendship between Yasha and Asura, my favourite scene from the entire game being Yasha's death where he sacrifices himself to give Asura one last chance.*

So, with all that out of the way, what about scores? I guess we better get to those.
Gameplay: 7.4
Graphics: 8.8
Music: 9.1
Story: 9.5
Fun!: 8.5

Overall score: 8.7

I love Asura's Wrath, my only issue is that I love is as a piece of media, not a game. As a game it leaves a fair bit to be desired, which is why despite my almost endless praise it only gets an overall score of 8.7.
Anyway, who else played and loved Asura's Wrath? Or on the other hand, who played it and hated it? I wanna know! So throw any opinions into the comments section below.
Thanks for reading, I hope to have new reviews and other such things up soon!
madseverus