Customer Reviews

Dynasty Warriors 5

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The Dynasty Warriors series of games keeps going and going! We're up to #5 now - with Chinese warriors running around slashing through historical battles.

If you have never played any of the Dynasty Warriors games, I highly recommend at least renting it. The series is incredibly popular and many other games tend to use bits and pieces of its style. In general you choose a warrior from one of several families. You take your warrior down his or her "path" in life - moving from battle to battle. Each battle involves you, your favorite weapon, and MASSIVE groups of enemies to bash your way through.

Remember the intro sequence to Lord of the Rings, where the Dark Lord Sauron and his giant mace taking a sweep and hitting multiple people in a row? This is the same sort of thing. You wade into large groups of enemies and swing your sword, knocking over 4-5 at a time. It can seem odd at first for someone used to realistic FPS games where your aim is one on one fighting. But the super-human bashing gets addictive very quickly, and you watch your KO count rise quickly to 200, 300, and more. It gives you a great sense of satisfaction.

Each Dynasty Warriors sequel improves the graphics, voices, reactions of your enemies and friends. In this version, you have a loyal bodyguard who stays by your side. When you do a power up attack, so does your bodyguard!

You can ride on horses, collect special items, plan out your strategies and hear the cheers of victory when you triumph. As always, you can unlock new people, new outfits, and work to achieve every ending.

The graphics are really nice, but are a bit polygonal. That's simply a limitation of the PS2, though. I really believe this is about as good as you are going to get given the PS2's abilities. You get flowing water, falling rain, fogs, cool special effects, and rather detailed armors.

The sound is very arcadey - but that's the point of this game. It's not about realistic stealth and atmosphere. It's about wild hacking and slashing. You get bouncy rock music and a lot of built-in quotes - "In the name of justice!" and "you've been training hard!" Nobody sounds even remotely Chinese, but I suppose many US players would complain that the voices were hard to understand if they tried to make it more authentic. I also suppose that a few of the outfits look more like medieval knight wear than Chinese traditional warriors.

The system of building up your levels, your bodyguard's levels and working from map to map is pretty much the same as in all of the series. You can really learn a lot about Chinese history, too, by playing these game series.

I really enjoy this series a lot. There is the simple hack-and-slash that is so gratifying after a long day of work - a feeling that you've waded through the enemy and come out victorious. There is also the ability to strategize your assault, to study the map and determine the most efficient way of winning the objective.

Some may ask why they really need to buy 5 if they own 1-4 already. It's a fair enough question, just how many Dynasty Warrior versions can you really need? But the graphics are nicer and the gameplay is definitely fun. I'd gladly consider this an 'upgrade' that I buy once a year, to improve my fun and enjoyment of the game. We definitely get months of fun gameplay from each release!

Highly recommended

I had most definitely not expected this. I had a love/hate relationship with Dynasty Warriors 4, and Dynasty Warriors 4: Empires was so bad that I popped in for two days and then sold it off. Dynasty Warriors 5, however, seems determined to correct every flaw about the two above games and the results are surprisingly impressive.

DW4: Empires was a stinker to me because of endlessly respawning enemy generals, a tiresome "stronghold" system, worthless allies, and an inability to build up your fighters since they start at Level 1 at every new game. Much to my delighted surprise, all of the above problems were fixed.

PROS:
- The gameplay is now a hybrid of DW4 and Empires where enemy generals stay dead when you kill them (thank heaven), checkpoints and supply bases can be realistically captured without having to wait at one location for 10 minutes to defend it against endless enemies. The system of taking down enemy supply bases works very well; you actually see a marked turning of the battle in your favour as you proceed.
- No more levels where you kill a dozen enemy generals only to have a single, artificially enhanced enemy reinforcement pop up next to your commander to ruin your game. Your commander is no longer a dummy that can die with a poke. Obviously, this allows you to do more fighting and less running around saving your allies' butts.
- Fighter training is back (which was impossible in Empires), though a little more difficult than before because now your weapon doesn't go up in levels at the same time the character does; you have to find these weapon items while playing the levels, and the quality of weapons you find is proportionate to the difficulty of the level. Tougher than DW4, but manageable, and the system is logical enough.
- The biggest surprise: Allied AI became far, far superior. DW4 players will remember this hyper-annoying situation where if you slaughter every one of the enemies except their commander, your allied soldiers will run towards the commander like idiots, not attacking, and pushing the commander around so much that you can't get at him. That is, happily, history. Allied generals are now almost as skillful as enemy generals, and your bodyguard (now only one, rather than a team of eight at once) is now very helpful, aggressively attacking, healing themselves and you, getting you out of jams. About time!
- Happily, they kept the control system from Empires so that now you can fully control where your combos face. This was like a breath of fresh air. Now if you miss a hit, it is indeed your own fault, and not the computer messing you up.
- Marginally better voice work. Some of the changes in voice actors were for the worse -- Zhou Yu, Cao Cao and Lu Bu had good voices in DW4; now they sound silly. And new character Xing Cai is abysmal, sounding like a six-year-old reciting bad dialogue. But the overall quality of voice work has improved, with fewer stiff deliveries. Diao Chan, Yue Ying, Sun Ce, and Lu Meng all sound far better than before, and Jiang Wei's character lost that horrible accent and is now quite nice to listen to.
- Improved graphics. Seems like they added some shadowing, and the look is now more textured, a little grittier.
- Improved map design. You still have to do some running around, but aside from the labyrinthine "Battle of Chen Cang" level, no more levels like that insufferable He Fei map from DW4, where you had to run along the length of the map six to seven times to beat the level.
- The "peons" -- enemy footsoldiers -- are more numerous and less hard to kill. The later soldiers in DW4 were so hardy they were tiresome to fight; no such problem here, at least at Normal difficulty level.

CONS:
- No more duels. I personally don't miss this feature, but I know that one of the top requests from DW4 players was the ability to challenge computer enemies to duels. Instead of refining the duel system, they've dispensed with it altogether.
- No more customized officers of your own design. This was one of the more fun aspects of Empires -- gone with the wind.
- The new Musou Mode will not be to everybody's taste. Now, instead of choosing a side and having all of the officers of that side available to you, you choose a character who has a specific story arc, and you can't swap fighters midway. There are advantages to this -- more varied storylines, deeper gameplay -- but the downside is the inability to switch characters, and now you *have* to master every single character to finish the game.
- Enemy generals do an insane amount of damage. It's just not fun in any context to face an enemy that can take half your life bar with one single combo. It's nice that enemies do less of the "block you to death" trick, but to have to pay for one mistake with half your life bar is excessive. It doesn't ruin the game, but it mars the enjoyment.
- Cao Pi, Pang De and Xing Cai are all pretty unappealing as new characters. Cao Pi's moves are pathetic, Xing Cai is slow and unremarkable (terrible voice, too), and Pang De looks like a nameless general. It's as if they ran out of character-design ideas. Ling Tong's nunchaku are neat, but why not have a character use a mace ("liang ya pang", or "wolf's tooth club"), a whip, a quarterstaff, or tri-sectioned nunchaku?
- Character balance has actually suffered. The new weapons system, where each weapon has a "weight" rating which affects how fast you attack, actually skews the game even more -- the fast, powerful characters become overwhelmingly strong (Jiang Wei is almost unstoppable with the new weapons system), while "alternate", more joke-like characters like Zhang Jiao, Xu Zhu, and Diao Chan are now nearly feeble -- the slower characters are crippled by heavy weapons, short-ranged characters get overwhelmed by the increased number of peons, and slow-moving characters will get pummeled by the insidious enemy AI. They should have given these harder characters a little something to balance the odds.

Overall, this game has successfully restored my faith in the series. It was more appealing to pick up than DW4, and leagues above Empires in design and gameplay. Highly recommended for fans of brawler games -- not perfect, but the best example of this game series I've seen and played yet.

Now I'm probably one of maybe 200 people on the continent that has actually read the entire unabridged "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" by Luo Guanzhong, Dynasty Warriors really messes up some of the history and the characters and yet I own 5 of the games. Why? Because they are fun as hell and they got most of it right, right enough anyways.

The Japanese makers have really "animade" the Three Kingdoms and seriously over-exagerated things but that is part of the charm.
I do wonder who decides which people to add, Guan Ping was a nice addition but Guan Xing and Zhang Bao(Zhang Fei's son, name sounds just like the yellow turban) are more important. Xing Cai was news to me, I never heard of her until this game and it sent me into a research frenzy. Suffice it to say, she never would've picked up a weapon(much like all the female characters with the exception of the daughter of Sun Jian, she actually did know her martial arts and put the fear of God into the generals that tried to stop her).

This game does a good job on the Sun family, in that unlike the previous games they actually include that Sun Jian dies before returning home from the (failed)attempt to remove Dong Zhuo from power.

Cao Cao is great, Xiahou Dun, Guan Yu, and Zhang Fei all look perfect, just like the ancient paintings.

It may also bring joy to fans to know that Lu Bu did actually have the antenna-like feathers coming from his head. They did ruin him in this game though, they made him the "peerless samurai only searching for a challenge" similar to Musashi when he was opportunistic, petty and a total traitor(he killed his adopted father to join Dong Zhuo then killed him). Honor wasn't high on his list of priorities an dby the time of his capture(and execution) either Zhang Fei or Guan Yu were already strong enough to beat him.

Kudos for having the right Kanji(literally "written characters from China", in Japanese) for the names right.

If you know your Chinese history(which you probably don't, which is okay as few do) you might be bothered, but not enough to stop playing.

Oh, and his name is pronounced T'sao T'sao(Cao Cao) not Cow Cow, I'm almost at the point of murdering that French Voice Director, you'd think that since Koei has a branch office IN CHINA they could at least get my favorite professor's name right.

Despite comments about this being the same as the others, sure it is the same idea, but it has many changes. Look at how small the characters are in DW 4 and how dark the environments are. In DW 5 the characters are huge, and the environments are not only interactive but the landscape is much brighter. The fog is lifted so you can see far far away. The castles are amazingly detailed, as well as the surrounding environment. Character stories are all based on their own experiences. Some have many battles others only a few. Lu Bu fans will be amused by his story, but let down by the shortness of it. Each player can use the assorted items, orbs, harnesses, and even a tiger, that you find...And each officer gets 4 weapons to choose from. Thats right, no more leveling up your weapon, you must find them. The weapons even come in light, medium and heavy. This controls the speed of your swings. Also, the new evolution combo system allows for high number combos. Your bodyguard is but one person, not 8. He/she can be any of several types of guards, with different special skills earned by fighting. You can have 8 guards in stock, but only take one with you. After missions you sometimes can hire new guards, too. Combos are a little different from DW4. Some characters have newer moves. Characters... You must unlock them as always, forcing you to be every single person. I got Lu Bu from doing Sun Quan, go figure. The music is the same as always. Also, if you are given a task, and choose to do something else the mission changes somewhat. Oh, and the maps are much bigger than in DW4. Good luck if you dont have a horse. The AI appears to be smarter. There are forts and gates in this one. Gates are the usual, but forts provide many different things and you must bring them down as well. New to the series is musou rage icons which super power your character, and double musou with your bodyguard. That is something that is a must see. You can clear 100's of enemies with that. Cons are that you do not have a create an officer mode, or bodyguard. Good- graphics, gameplay(2 player in all modes), and new story delivery. Aside from the best DW.. DW3, this beats the pants off DW 4. If you like DW, get it, if you are new to the series(where have you been?) you will not be disappointed.

We all know about Dynasty Warriors. It's gameplay is pretty cool, and while a lot of people say it's the same thing over and over (and they're right to an extent) they never seem to notice the quirks in gamplay (Dynastay Warriors 3 is a HUGE step above number 2 and there are a lot of people who--for God knows what reason--didn't see that). Dynasty Warriors 5, on the other hand, is a step down from Dynasty Warriors 4. Dynasty Warriors 4 was not much above number three anyway, so seeing number five take a step down from it is pretty daunting. I warn you now, if you've never played Dynasty Warriors, this review won't help you out as much. If, however, you've played previous installments, you'll really be able to decide on number five after this.

First, let's go about the things that are different. There are more characters, one added to each group. Not as rewarding for those who went from Dynasty Warriors 2 to 3 (in which you were rewarded with 22 new characters), and those who played Dynasty Warriors 4 first won't notice at all. The maps of course, are also different, and there are a few new missions.

But let's talk about the step back. The thing that hurts Dynasty Warriors 5 the most. First of all, there's no complexity in raising your characters. There never was in Dynasty Warriors, but number four did incorporate a level up system, and KOEI had something going with it. Unfortunately, they decided not to experiemtn with it again in number five, and that's a damn shame because it made raising characters much more complex and much more exhilirating. You know, you felt like you were actually getting something done! You were hacking and slashing for a reason! Now you're just... hacking and slashing.

Second thing that takes them back; the musou mode. Each character now only has five levels, and they're short. In previous installments some had ten levels, and they could take you a while. Some missions have also become one sided. If you need to say, get a fire attack going, you have to do it. If you don't get it going it's almost an instant loss of the mission. In previous installments it was not a problem. It helped your morale, but if they somehow managed to thwart your plan, it didn't mean you were sure to lose the battle. In this version it does, and it's particularly annoying. Likewise, if you actually do the mission as they specified it makes taking down all the enemy generals (save for those who have like two bars of health and an insane defense, which I'll talk about later) severely easy. The only exception are the playable ones.

In addition to that, the maps are terrible, and to an extent, difficult to read sometimes, such as when there's a river in front of you, and it isn't depicted on the map. That, and there's not much free roam anymore. There's always a path you must take instead. So you can't cut through the level anymore by running across the map in a battle field fashion. In order to run around a fortress, let's say, you have to follow a path around the fortress. In previous Dynasty Warriors, you didn't have to do this!

The new "weight" system introduced by the weapons is also a setback to this game. Heavy, weapons, for example, make some characters useless. Characters that are already slower than a snail, are reduced to seeming like statues! Take a character like Xu Xhu (if you've played previous installments), who is already slow and already carries a fairly heavy weapon. Now give him an even heavier weapon and he's slow as all hell. It's annoying, time consuming and makes you reject what could be a better weapon because you want to get a mission done quickly. In other words, this make some characters nearly useless. Even speedy characters (Lu Xun for example) have a tough time with heavy weapons, and it leaves them open for attacks. It's embarassing when the soldier you're trying to kill gets a cheap hit in there because your weapon is too heavy to carry.

Likewise, enemy generals do a ridiculous amount of damage to you! This takes the fun out of DW5. The playable generals not only have an insane defense, but an insane attack. And they've gone back to era of DW2. If you happen to knock a general on his back he'll gain some sort of power up (and it could be the dreaded musou for ten seconds, even!). Most of the time it's an Attack X2 and that surely means you're in trouble. It's no fun with that kind of rule in place.

Not being able to switch generals didn't bother me too much, but you'd think they'd keep up with it after how well it worked in number four.

What I'm trying to say is, what was working for the series they neglected when they created this game. The gameplay remains unchanged, and that's a good and bad thing. The gameplay is fun in Dynasty Warriors, but I just can't help but admit it's the same hack and slash we've played a million times. Dynasty Warriors 3 was a huge step above number three. Dynasty Warriors 4, however, was only a babystep above number three. Now, sadly, number five seems to think moving in the opposite direction seems best.

The music is also not great. Dynasty Warriors always has mixed results with music, but I think in this one we can all agree that the music is nothing above sub par. The series hasn't had the best music, but it has had tolerable music. This one doesn't have as much. The voice acting, as with every KOEI game, sucks the big one. And you can't switch to more emotional japanese voices either (again, something that only number three did).

Graphic wise, it looks no different than Dynasty Warriors 4. However, I will say that they did manage to do something about the "pop up" enemies and how the game slows down when the screen becomes overcrowded with people. However, when the screen does become over crowded, you can barely even find yourself.

The extras are also not worthwhile. How many more games do I have to suffer through that have "Sound Test" as an unlockable secret? Whatever happened to the days when you could find "Sound Test" under "Options"? When did "Sound Test" suddenly become an unlockable secret in video games? At least we're saved by some tunes not being worth listening to anyway.

The Challenge Mode isn't very exciting either. Endurance isn't much fun. You must defeat each and everyone who comes at you looking for a fight. The goal is to last as long as you can. Until you die. In Dynasty Warriors 5 that death will be pretty quick. This is simply because when the enemies crowd around you, they all begin swinging at once. The moment you're lifted off the ground, you know it's over. Generals, as noted above, do incredible damage to you as it is. In Endurance, generals are the only ones who drop health, and that's if you're lucky enough to survive. Time attack is no better, being just like Endurance, only you must kill one hundred enemies as fast as you can. This would be fun if there were enemies. And when there are, it ends up being just like Endurance.

So here's the big let down of Dynasty Warriors 5. The gameplay mechanics take a step down from previous ones and at some point in time even sink lower than Dynasty Warriors 2 (which really IS just nothing more than "tap square", at least in the ones following we got to raise characters). At the same time we're faced with terrible maps and mission objectives; generals that are way too strong to take down, and more additions that were taken away from the game rather than added.

The new characters added are hardly worth it and only seem to be there to mock other characters. Speaking of which, the characters aren't all that unique anyway. Almost every character who uses a sword for example, has the same basic structure to his attack. Likewise, many of the musous (special attacks) look the same for many characters

If you have Dynasty Warriors 3 (which is the best one in the series) stick with that. If you've got Dynasty Warriors 4, stick with that. If you don't have a Dynasty Warriors game at all, I'd suggest you get number three or number four. Number three was, by and large, the best in the series. Dynasty Warriors 5, however, should be the end of the series. There's nothing more you can do with it, and it shows because instead of moving the series forward, they've begun moving it backwards.

Don't waste time with this game. Unless you really haven't played Dynasty Warriors, and you're looking for an intro. Otherwise, it's better to leave this on the shelf and shop for a different game. Dynasty Warriors 5 was it, there's nothing more to do with the series than put it in the recycling machine. It produces something that looks different, but it's virutally the same thing. Dynasty Warriors 5 is no different than the three before it (Number one was actually a Street Fighter like game), and unfortunately there aren't enough tweaks to make it better.

There was a time where I was a huge fan of the Dynasty Warriors series. That time has long past. I didn't actually buy this game, instead played it with my friend who did purchase it.

While I was unable to see every feature there was to see and experience the game as an owner, I was far from satisfied. It's the same, boring button smasher from a long line of games exactly the same. True, there are more characters, the graphics have improved somewhat, and the voices are less pathetic, but it just isn't enough to buy it while there are 9 other games which are pretty much the same as it.

Your allied generals do pack more of a punch and their AI has improved noticably though, a big plus in my rating system. But the idea of being in an army is completely stupid. You might as well just be your own character versus the entire enemy army. Your allied peons do virtually nothing. When they actually do fight, they attack every seven seconds and half of those attacks are parried, and those that do hit are noticable but insignificant.

I was a huge fan of the series for a while though, and had some nice experiences. I really liked the third dynasty warriors, especially the Battle of Hu Lao gate which really did require some allied help if you were playing as the allies. It was quite spectacular to have 8 grizzled, elite soldiers in shining armor as your bodyguards for some players, but it also took out what little challenge the game had. In a few of the games, which I can't remember the exact titles, you had no bodyguards which I heavily disliked though, and it's nice to have a bodyguard with respectable AI in this game.

While this game has it's appeal, especially for people who enjoy pure action with no strategy whatsoever. I don't mean to be sarcastic, this game really is quite enjoyable. It just isn't for people who want a videogame that has more realistic and laid back action, where you aren't so invulnerable, where it actually means something to kill a soldier, where your allies do make a difference. DW4 certainly was entertaining, DW4XL had it's positives but was certainly not worth it's price, and DW4 Empires was just a horrible game where the 'strategy' involved meant absolutely nothing and where the one-man army hack-and-slash gameplay was greatly reduced. The first Samurai Warriors was entertaining and the replay value was quite high. The second was a pointless waste of time that added nothing to the game.

In short, this game is quite entertaining and will be enjoyed if you're someone who likes to mindlessly cut their way through an army to kill the enemy leader and win the battle with virtually no strategy. The officer battles are an exception, but with the duel feature missing, it's lost much of it's challenging nature. I personally am just waiting for Spartan Total Warrior to release where your health is significantly limited and where the common soldier will be of actual value to the army. I hope Koei either makes significant changes to the many Dynasty Warriors, Samurai Warriors, and Romance of the Three Kingdoms games to come, or crashes and burns. Both of my hopes are unrealistic and probably will not be fufilled.

I'ma keep this real simple. Dynasty Warriors 5 is better than the rest. YES, if you've played 4 than you'll notce some changes. I suggest you accept them {u may even come to like alot of them} that way you can actually enjoy the game for what it is.

Pros - Better graphics
Bodyguards who actually save that'az for a change
Stronger Allies {if the moral is high, they can pretty much take care of themselves}
Folk DIE {every officer is not in every battle. Remember they all have their own story. Example- Cao Cao is dead before the battle of Hei Fei castle. When you beat the game, the speaker tells of your characters LIFE, not how many enemies he killed per battle. {Story is superp this time around}

Cinemactics {EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER has a brief {fully} cinemactic scene when you complete the game. The game saves them for you and you can watch em anytime. Thats MUCH better than DW4, where the endings were the exact same things with different colors or officers.

Cons - You find weapons via DW3. I used to like DW4 level up system better.
No more duels. ......{personally I think its a plus}

Difficulty - This games HARD. I'ma DW vet and I play on easy. {Unless my character has been seriously built up} They ain't playin wit'cha.

Overall it does what it should. Its the best yet. Same old with minor upgrades. If you have DW4 and are still unsure, heres a thought. Wait for DW6 .....we KNOW its comin.

The fifth instalment of the game that has earned some $500 million for Koei is quite a good version, and will definately impress anyone who hasnt played any of DW5's predeccesors. Its a easy to pick up action game in which you slaughter endless foes in pretty awesome graphics (though theyve gotten stale over the years) and an awesome story to boot.

Dynasty Warriors 5 is a certain improvement over DW4, returning to the 'choose a character'/musou mode which made DW3 such an fun and lasting game to traverse. The graphics as mentioned are improved a little, but the gameplay even less.

The strongholds that can be conquered in the games are a cool addition over DW4, but the story and the way of progressing through the game has all been done before. Level design is also inferior since DW3.

As a game by itself, its really in a class of its own, and I would love to play it like the millions of others - no doubt, but the way they just keep recycling the gameplay it would otherwise only scrape in with 3 stars.

If you arent a die hard fan (like me) and you want to save some money - DW3 or 4 are possibly better purchases OR get the Romance of Three Kingdoms Ebook (the infamous story the game is based on) FREE from DW Three Kingdoms (website is dw3k,com/newrotkebook).

Their new color version of ROTK makes the book almost as interesting as this game itself!

For those new to the series, Dynasty Warriors is Koei's hack n' slash in which your warrior battles hundreds of enemies in ancient China. The series has been a smash hit ever since Dynasty Warriors 3, and 5 looks to continue the trend.

GRAPHICS 9/10

Visually, DW5 is similar to DW4 with a few improvements. The graphics engine has been tweaked, resulting in less fogging, improved draw distance, and many more on-screen enemies. In DW4, one might be "bothered" by about two dozen enemies with many of them "blinking" in and out of existence fairly close to you. In DW5, it's quite normal to wade through about four dozen enemies while still maintaining a respectable view of distant soldiers. However, all of these improvements are diminished in two-player co-op mode.

The characters themselves again have revised costumes with about the same level of detail and quality, which is to say, they are fairly good. You can unlock up to four costumes for each character, compared to six in DW4, though admittedly the costumes in DW5 seem more diverse than the palette swaps in DW4. Among the generic enemy and ally soldiers, there is a greater variety of skins and weapons, such as "magicians" who hurl ice balls at you.

Environments are generally more detailed though this is certainly not a game one buys for mindblowing backgrounds and sets. Some of the stages, especially those involving castles and structures, feel more leveled and 3-dimensional. On the downside, I seem to experience more camera issues than before, especially when fighting near walls.

SOUND 5/10

I have NEVER been a fan of Koei's choice of music for the DW series; I just don't care for headbanging guitar riffs. It feels inappropriate to the setting and makes the game feel immature to me. Having said that, the music does seem improved over DW4, with greater variety of instrumentation and some decent melodies.

Sound effects have always been decent in DW and 5 carries on with strong, engaging impact noises and dramatic roars that nicely complement brilliant, light displays when executing fancy special attacks. For some odd reason, peon soldiers now scream like 4-year-old girls when they die.

The English voice acting (VA) varies from bland at best to ear-bleeding horrible at worst. The VA in the DW series has been so consistently campy and corny that I'm convinced that it's not a matter of Koei not caring or cheaping out with bad actors. Rather, Koei's understanding of what constitutes good English voice acting is completely out of touch with the true perspective of a North American audience. If anything, it's a cultural snafu. Some DW fans have learned to enjoy the campiness in the same way one appreciates the goofy dubbing in kung-fu flicks; others force themselves to tolerate them even when favorite characters' voices are butchered between installments.

GAMEPLAY 9/10

More than any other feature, DW's fluid and intuitive gameplay is what has drawn such a large fan following. [Square] is attack; [T] is "charge" attack; [O] is super attack (musou attack); [X] is jump. Special attacks are executed by stringing together several [S] attacks followed by a [T] attack. So [S][S][T] results in one special attack and [S][S][S][T] results in another special attack. Furthermore, every character has his own moveset; with 40 characters to choose from, there is quite a bit of variety.

For DW5, Koei has revised many of the movesets, mostly for the better. Some of the generic moves that were the same for all characters have diversified; for example, jump charges (pressing [T] after jumping into the air) executes a unique aerial attack. In addition, Koei added "Evolution" attacks. Normally, most weapons only allow a string of 6 attacks. Evolution weapons allow the player to continue the attack for several additional hits if the character's "musou" bar is full.

Just like in DW4, you can also charge into combat on a horse or elephant. Other special items can be equipped, to make your character faster or to improve defense for example. One new item let's you bring a tiger into combat with you; I'm not sure how effective this is, but it's a neat idea. Once again, you can equip orbs on your weapons to add elemental effects, to temporarily freeze your enemies, for example, but there are only four orbs instead of the six in DW4.

In addition to your special musou attack, DW5 has added "musou rage." Every now and then, enemies or boxes will yield tokens. These tokens can be used to go into a berserker/bloodlust mode with enhanced speed, attack, and defense. It's very handy for finishing off tough enemies or getting out of rough spots.

Enemy and ally AI seems improved but is still weak at times. One has to wonder what is going through the minds of enemies who ignore you when you're standing two feet in front of them. I did notice that occasionally groups of peons will get together and execute a group charge against you.

PLOT and STORYLINE 7/10

The general plot remains the same. In short, the game revolves around the struggle between three powerful warlords in China around 200 AD. Dynasty Warriors is based on the novel "Romance of the Three Kingdoms," which in turn was based on Chinese history. Therefore, don't expect any continuation of plot from game to game. Instead each DW simply retells the same war over and over, with several "what-if" scenarios thrown in.

As was the case in all DW games, the player can choose to play in either Free mode, in which you simply play one stand-alone, single stage for fun, or musou mode, aka story mode. DW4 featured a musou mode that was unique for each kingdom. With only eight kingdoms, there were eight stage-sequences to play through, varying from about five to 15 stages per story. Players complained that there was too little variety, and that too many stages were reused throughout the storylines.

DW5's musou mode has reverted to DW3's. Now each character has his/her own musou mode. So there are now over 40 different storylines. The drawback? Each story mode consists of only 4-8 stages. Regardless, I'm fairly sure that there are more unique stages (probably around 32) than in previous DW games.

Now many musou stages are preceded by a "drama part," in which your character talks about his thoughts and feelings. Sounds corny? Yes, it usually is and the low-rent VA, which I already ranted about, doesn't help. This is followed by a commander briefing describing the stage and whatever "strategy" may be involved. I guess Koei was trying to make each story mode seem more personal and unique by adding all this "drama." In some ways it succeeds as there are more references to specific events in the novel, but I found myself frequently skipping through all of it.

Every single character also receives his/her own FMV ending following completion of the respective musou mode. More on this later...

Additional NEW FEATURES and CHANGES 5/10

First the obvious: there are six new characters, bringing the total to 48. While they are generally good characters from a gameplay standpoint, hardcore Three-Kingdoms enthusiasts may find the choice of new officers questionable given all the other viable characters who have been repeatedly passed up for inclusion.

DW5 now uses the Stronghold system that debuted in DW:Empires a few years ago. Strongholds are forts placed throughout the stage. The strongholds boost defense, offense, or morale for their respective sides. Taking over a stronghold generally hurts the opposing force and makes the stage easier. I personally don't think strongholds make much of a difference to gameplay aside from occasionally dictating the exact route used to play a stage.

DW5 now has four difficulty levels. "Easy" is absurdly easy, more of a tutorial level, and allows unlimited in-stage save games. "Normal" is still fairly easy and allows three in-stage save games. "Hard" is clearly more difficult but probably easier than "Hard" in DW4. "Chaos" mode is to satisfy those players who complained DW4 was too easy. In Chaos mode, health restoration items are very rare, enemy stats are boosted, and enemies are a bit more aggressive.

The Bodyguard system has been overhauled. Instead of having a crew of eight bg, you acquire unique bg who can then gain special skills such boosting your team's morale, healing you, or helping you find additional weapons. You can only bring one BG into battle, but the BG is generally more effective and aggressive than BG in previous DW. Overall, the new BG system adds a very nice bit of variety.

Now we get to the controversial "additions"...

DW5 has reverted back to DW3's system for acquiring new weapons. New weapons are found throughout the battlefield in boxes. This is probably an improvement since "leveling up" weapons in DW4 was a bit tedious.

However, Koei also added a weapon "weight" system. Weapons can be light (weaker but move very fast), normal (balanced) or heavy (powerful but move slower). I can think of very few situations in which I'd want my character to fight slower so there seems to be very little advantages of using a heavy weapon. Indeed, the least popular characters are frequently the ones who move and fight slowly to begin with. To compound the situation, each character, as in every DW, can acquire a unique powerful 4th weapon by completing special requirements. A few characters' fourth weapons are heavy; oddly enough most of those characters are females who rely on speed to be effective. The end result is that some fans will be upset that certain characters have been "nerfed" by this new weapon system.

It's nice that Koei tried to innovate, as lack of innovation has been the loudest criticism of DW in the past. But I personally don't see what the weapon system adds besides frustration when you acquire a great weapon with great bonuses only to realize it is Heavy.

Finally, Koei, for some reason, removed Duels, the Create-A-Warrior feature, and Versus mode.

Duels were always controversial in DW4. Some found them too easy, others found them too hard or cheap. Furthermore, there were a few bugs and design flaws with duels. Nonetheless, I personally enjoyed them and thought they added great variety to the gameplay, and they were always optional anyways (duels could be declined in DW4). Instead of removing it, I wish Koei had fixed it.

Create A Warrior (CAW) was flawed by its lack of features in DW4 as well, but its very existence was adequate for most of its fans. It was a quick and easy way to include a general who been omitted from the character selection. Are you a big "Cheng Pu" fan? Koei left him out, but you can always make him up in CAW. Furthermore, it let you cross genres. You could make characters from another video game or your favorite movie. Instead of removing it, I wish Koei had improved it.

Versus mode was a small feature, but considering the versatility, it was well-worth it. In short, it was a street-fighter version of DW5. It was perfect for when my friends and I were about to head out and didn't have time for a full stage. I can't imagine it took much code to implement this feature; instead of removing it, I wish Koei had, well...you get the idea.

I can understand removal of features for the sake of adding new features and improving existing ones. But these new features simply don't exist in DW5, at least none that are mind-blowing or revolutionary. So why did they remove all these features? I noticed that altogether there are about 70 FMVs. Coupled with all the audio from the "Drama" parts, I wonder if Koei removed features simply to make room for mediocre FMV and lousy voice acting?? In fact, Koei decontents the game in order to re-release them as new features in Dynasty Warriors XL.

MISCELLANEOUS

Dynasty Warriors has always been strong technically, with only a few glitches and very fast load times. The manual is pretty thick and pretty thorough.

OVERALL 7.0/10

So how to judge the game overall? In and of itself, no doubt this is a great game. It's fun, and there is a lot of variety and replay.

But truthfully, Dynasty Warriors 5 does not exist in a vacuum. If I take a great game, rename it and re-release it, is it still a great game? Taken in context with DW3 and DW4, I'd say DW5 is a good game but hardly an incredible game. Half of the "new" features are simply reversions back to the old way of doing things in previous DWs. It seems like with every step forward, there is one backwards and several side to side. So here is my final advice to potential buyers:

Hardcore DW fans (who have LOVED every installment and can't get enough): DW5 gets a 7/10. There is about a 90% chance that you'll love it. At the very worst, you may be a little dissappointed.

Casual DW fans (who enjoyed but were not particularly enthralled by previous games): DW5 gets a 6/10. Rent this game first. After about five hours of play, you should know whether or not to buy a copy.

New to DW (who has never played DW but enjoys hack n slash): DW5 gets a 8/10. This is a tough call. DW5 is arguably better than either DW3 or DW4, but since it currently costs $50, picking up DW3 or DW4 at $20 may make more sense as you wouldn't notice big differences anyway.

This game has definitely stepped up from Dynasty Warriors 4. I will address the separate parts of this game in individual sections below:

Game-play: This game plays similar to other Dynasty Warriors games. You still slaughter your way through gangs of foot-soldiers, but they have added some variety in this time around. There is a new stronghold system, which makes capturing bases more interesting and rewarding. They have also added more customization to your bodyguards. There are 48 playable characters to choose from, as well. There is also a new Challenge Mode with different mini-games and activities to spice the game up.

Graphics: The fog has been pushed back, allowing you to see more enemies. The frame-rate is usually very good, but can be interrupted at times. Special effects look a bit nicer in Dynasty Warriors 5. The character models are essentially the same as Dynasty Warriors 4. Levels and backgrounds stay about the same, graphically.

Sound: Sub-par voice acting, with some funny dialogue thrown in at times to keep dialogue from being too stale. Music is the ordinary rock music with the solos that accompany it. Battle sounds the same.

Longevity: This game has many characters and some added features to make this game worth playing through a few times. Die-hard fans will enjoy this game and will most likely play through it many times.

Overall, I would give this game an 8.5/10.