Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage

by Tecmo Koei

Product Features

• In the hugely interactive environments players can smash or pummel their enemies into different objects and buildings as well as pick up
• String combos and attacks together to perform unstoppable killing moves. Power up, and then unleash furious Hokuto Shinken special attacks.
• Blistering finishing attacks that can wipe out entire gangs in one blow, or cause single enemies to explode in a shower of gore.
• Taken straight from the Fist of the North Star universe, players will be able to unlock unforgettable characters such as Mamiya and Rei.
• Faithfully reproduced Fist of the North Star visuals - Every scene and level faithfully follows the iconic visual style of the original comic series.

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B003NSECW8
• Product Dimensions: 0.6 x 5.3 x 7.5 inches ; 4.8 ounces
• Media: Video Game
• Release Date: November 2, 2010
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,663 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
  • #52 in Video Games > Xbox 360 > Action > Fighting
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Platform: Xbox 360

Prepare for the merciless action and violent hand to hand combat of Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage! Put your martial arts skills to the test against masses of bloodthirsty enemies in this no-holds-barred brawler. A ravaged Earth struggles to survive after the nuclear holocaust has left the world in ruins. Pitiful survivors band together in communities and villages, trying to live on what little resources they have left. In the wastelands beyond, vicious gangs prey on the survivors for their resources, or sometimes just for fun. A mysterious martial artist named Kenshiro, a man with seven scars on his chest and the chosen successor of the legendary assassin's art Hokuto Shinken (The Divine Fist of the North Star) has sworn to protect the weak and innocent from the malicious gangs that roam the scorched planet.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Fine Game ... If You Love Dynasty Warriors and Hokuto no Ken, December 15, 2010

By 

H. Wang "nycmode" (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage (Video Game)

Previously I bought the PS3 Japanese import version of the game (which I finished several times). I've tweaked my review below to suit the XBOX/U.S. version of the game, so I hope the comparisons help.

For those of you unfamiliar with the source material - Hokuto Musou is based on the popular Japanese comic series Hokuto no Ken - better known as Fist of the North Star here in the U.S. and outside of Asia.

In short, the story follows the protagonist Ken Shiro, who is a master of the fighting style of Hokuto Shin Ken, or the Northern God Fist. The game focuses on mostly the first portion of the comic series - which tracks Ken's progress in saving the woman he loves, and fighting a series of antagonists from both the Northern and Southern schools of fighting. The story takes place in an apocalyptic future, in a lawless land where Ken is seen as almost a messiah like figure out to save his girl, and eventually the world.

That sets the stage for the the game - which is based on the popular Dynasty Warriors series. The game plays like a hybrid of the popular DW games, sharing the same control scheme. The game also plays like Samurai Warriors in that you can evade enemies, and also features a comprehensive story mode much like what you see in DW: Gundam.

If you're a fan of DW games, you can expect the same kind of action, which is pretty much a 3rd person action game featuring swarms of enemies that you plow through, though in Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage, your primary weapon of choice will definitely be your fists and legs.

Between stages you can upgrade your characters (more become available as you play through the game) using skill points that you acquire over the course of the game (commonly found by breaking all sorts of boxes or vending machines scattered throughout the land). Again, if you played DW before, this will all be nothing new to you. However, if you haven't tried DW before, be warned, this is a pure action game featuring lots of fighting, kicking, pretty cgi story elements in between (assuming you can read japanese - if not, there are plenty of websites that can offer you a nice primer on the story in English).

In terms of gameplay, it is relatively one dimensional. You fight (a lot) and you eventually learn special moves that you can dish out once your energy or musou meter is full. The moves are faithful to the comic series, and features a lot of pretty bone crushing finishing moves that will make anybody cringe (or laugh, depending on your sense of humor). After fighting waves of battles, you encounter bosses (each from the comic series). Most of them are easy to dispatch, though usually you have to break through a cheap extra defense meter before really doing any damage to them. But overall, aside from a few opportunities to counter attacks (especially if you're using the Southern Cross/Nanto Shin Ken playable characters like Shin or Rei), this game is mostly button mashing your way to the end.

There is a wide range of customization options and you can select all sorts of finishing moves. At the end of boss battles, you also "finish them off" by using a series of Shenmue like button combinations. But for me I often find I gravitate towards one or two cool moves that I liked personally and I use those over and over again. But that's just me.

Compared to other DW games, FOTNS:KR does handle a bit sluggishly. It is understood that the creators wanted to be more faithful to the comic series, which focused more on heavy attacks and bone crunching martial arts moves, rather than the speedy weapon based style of play seen in Dynasty Warriors or Samurai Warriors games. Therefore, don't expect to use a huge sword to slice through 20 guys at once like you see in other DW or SW games. Rather, plan on a lot of punching and kicking your way through individual enemies over and over again. For some, this slower pace may be a turnoff for DW vets. For me I didn't mind since I am a fan of the comic and it does somewhat feel faithful to the series. However, it is important to keep this major distinction in mind before you commit to buying the game.

Nonetheless the game is still very fun to play and the graphics are quite impressive. The character models are faithfully recreated and the moves of each avatar are very unique to their individual fighting style. Only gripe I have about the visuals is the extremely repetitive nature of the backgrounds. Barring a few story specific areas (such as Shin's ruined city stage early on, or Souther's pyramid stage later in the game), most of the game features the same bland, Fallout-esque feel. Though it does reflect the setting of the story, it would have been nice to vary it up somewhat, or at least change some of the color palate so that it's not always the same beige washed out world that I'm fighting through.

Another issue to note above is that while the XBOX version of the game is identical to the PS3 version - the graphic quality of the former is noticeably weaker than the latter. The backgrounds on the XBOX game feel even more washed out and the character detail on the XBOX version definitely seems less crisp and clear than the PS3 version. Otherwise, the U.S. version of the game plays and feels identical to its Japanese counterpart.

Aside from those gripes, the game plays very well and is quite fun. It's a great pick-up-and-play game, and for those of you who can read Japanese, it also features other nice features such as a great story primer and character bios. Aside from the story (or Legendary) mode, you can also open up other modes such as the Dream Mode (which is like a mini-story mode for each playable character that you eventually open up that sort of elaborates more on their side stories). Overall there's quite a bit of replay value here.

Last but not least, the music is decent, but not remarkable. Kind of the generic J-rock that you hear in the background of previous DW and SW games. However, the sound of punches, kicks and screaming (and LOTS of blood splattering - this is a very violent game, though you can adjust the blood settings in the options menu - between EXTREME and MILD) will surely tune out the generic music over time. Besides one thing I also noticed about this game is that unlike Dynasty Warriors where often you feel like you're slicing through waves of people like butter, in FOTNS: KR, it really seems like you're kicking some serious butt.

I TOTALLY recommend this game for people who love the Hokuto no Ken/Fist of the North Star comic series. Even if you're not familiar with the series, I suggest you pick up the game because FOTNS is one of the most well-told manga series out there. This game really does a good job of summarizing the highlights of the first (and best half) of the FOTNS comic series (from Ken's revenge with Shin up to his final confrontation with his brother, Raoh) and newbies will enjoy the nice storyline. I'd venture to bet it might motivate some to even read the series as well!

For those who like DW and SW, it's also definitely worth picking up as well. Just keep in mind the somewhat different pace of this game versus the other ones in the musou/DW/SW series.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars ATATATATATAT!!!! WATA!!!, November 3, 2010

By 

LuvRnadaFighter (Gainesville, FL) - See all my reviews

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage (Video Game)

Fist of the North Star fans and fans of the genre, FOTNS: Ken's rage is pretty awesome! My only complaint so far and the reason I give it 4 instead of 5 stars is that the camera can be a pain at times and the repetitive nature of these types of games can turn some people off. It has a couple of different modes, legend mode is the story mode and I have to say it follows the story really well, the stages are more linear than Dynasty Warriors which are usually more open battle fields with both enemy and ally units running around fighting, in legend mode its pretty much just you against a ton of bad guys and let me just say the game isn't easy, in Dynasty Warriors normal enemies just walk around and wait for you to kill them but in FOTNS regular enemies will attack and do attack and are very capable of kicking the crap out of you, last night I taunted a group of enemies which enrages them and causes them to attack like a pack of wild dogs, needless to say i'm not sure why anyone would want to do that and I will never do it again as I found myself dead in a matter of seconds.

I've heard some reviewers complain about boss fights being hard and cheap but so far I have found them to be a good challenge but fun. You don't gain levels in FOTNS like you do in the dynasty warriors games either, instead of leveling up you gain skill points in levels by killing guys and completing objectives and then you can use them on a kind of Final Fantasy sphere grid to unlock new abilities and upgrade your health, attack power, defense, ect. I really like it, I feel like I have more controll over how I want my character to develop. The other mode I tried out last night is dream mode which is kind of a what if game mode, it is stories that aren't from the original FOTNS story and this mode plays like Dynasty Warriors, huge battle fields with both enemies and ally's and your goal is to conquer all of the enemy bases, I quickly found out that this mode is better suited to be played when you have leveled you character up significantly because I got trashed and came no where near beating the first chapter.

So i'm really enjoying the game, it is different than Dynasty Warriors in many ways and similar in others, the story and characters you play as are obviously far more interesting than anything in DW and you have some pretty flashy/brutal attacks that I have yet to get tired of unleashing on the bad guys and with so many super disapointingly short games coming out recently, i'm looking at you Vanquish, Force Unleashed 2 and 007 Blood Stone it's nice to get a game that you can sink a good 50 hrs into. So if you are into the genre or love FOTNS picking this up is a no brainer, it has been easily worth my 60 bucks so far.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars its a better game than you think, September 18, 2011

By 

Unicron "P" (NJ) - See all my reviews

= Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars 

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage (Video Game)

I've spent like 90+ hours powering up & unlocking as much as i could on this game. thats even before buying the DLC that i have yet to buy. and this game in 2 player split screen is even more fun. taking over the bases & rushing to help them cause a boss has suddenly appeared is really crazy.

meanwhile I've spent much more money on a $60 title & have not touched it after 3 days cause either i beat it too fast or it was horrible.
but this game was worth it.

lots of things to unlock & the story is really good.

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