Customer Reviews

Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Do you like beautiful women? Do you like beautiful women in bikinis? Do you like beautiful women in bikinis wielding awesome swords? Do you like these beautiful women wearing bikinis wielding awesome swords running around killing zombies??! If you said yes to any of the above combinations, I highly recommend you purchase this game. (And yes, I'm aware these people are animated and not real, but if you can't understand my point... well then, maybe you shouldn't play video games in general... or watch animated films... or look at art...)

Meet Aya and Saki, these scantily clad sisters have a problem on their hands. There are zombies outside, so what is the first thing they do? They put on their bikinis, grab their swords and go on a killing rampage! This is definitely everything I expected this game to be! Still not sure why Aya insisted on the huge cowboy hat to complete her outfit... but oh well.

My review is pretty detailed so I'll do a quick breakdown of the pro's and con's. If you want to read the details on why I say this, continue reading!

Pro's:
+Co-op
+Large level design
+Characters can level up
+Characters can use more impressive looking combos in higher levels
+Free Play Mode
+Dress Up Mode: (Characters can run around in their underwear if you want them to)
+Maps are large and well developed
+Interactive load screen
+Unlockable items: (Even new characters!)
Con's:
-Split screen on y-axis
-Game dialogue in Japanese and have to read subtitles
-Camera rotation is a bit slow
-Incredibly uninformative instruction manual, resulting in long review writing

I'll admit, this game could have gone either way for me. The developer could have either screwed this thing up royally or they would generate one of the more randomly fun games released this year. My girlfriend and I sat down to play this game yesterday when it came in and we spent hours playing it. It really is a fun game and I was pleased to see it had co-op. Well it's a fun game if you're not a prude and lament the fact the girls wouldn't be running around like that in real life during this situation. Or if you can get beyond an attitude about objectifying women in video games, etc... then you might actually have some fun with this game.

As we got used to the controls I started to enjoy the game mechanics a little bit more. At first I was pretty mad we couldn't do any kinds of combos that looked really cool, but that's just because you need to level up your character! Yes this game has a leveling up mechanism that is actually pretty good. It looks like you can play this game for a long time without even getting close to completing everything. We've only made it to level 7 in the game and our characters are already at level 12 and we've barely touched getting the bars filled up, so I imagine there is the ability to level a lot.

So far I really liked the level design. The maps seem to be pretty big and there are a lot of places you can go. There is an added element that to get further in the game you have to find the key that unlocks that area. This adds another layer of challenge to the game... which usually results in wandering around looking for the key. Luckily the zombies re-spawn when you return to an area so you're not completely bored running around, plus this helps you level up a lot more as you try and get your bearings. There is an in game map to access to help you find your away around. If you hit the back button it gives you a list of items you picked up on your journeys and you can heal, stop being in a rage, and things of that nature. I really like that they infused a lot of Role Playing Game elements into this game. Another random aspect is the interactive load screen. This is hilarious and is like a mini version of Onechanbara in really terrible and old graphics. Think original Nintendo level graphics and 2-D game play! It's stupidly fun, but we're not sure you get anything for killing zombies in that screen.

As you move through the story you can unlock other playable characters. The first one you meet is named Annna, yes it has three "n's", and yes we thought this was pretty stupid too. Annna primarily uses guns and has a nice assortment of them, so if you're the type of player that prefers a ranged attack, then this is the girl for you! As you play you also unlock more costume items. There is a "dress up mode" section of the game where you can dress up and make new costumes for your girls. We played around with this function a little, and yes you can just choose to have them run around in their underwear. I tested this out; the one part I didn't like is you couldn't have them change the underwear colors or style. Otherwise this was a pretty hilarious feature and Saki will now run around with virtually no clothes as far as I'm concerned.

Why is this review so long? Because now I'm onto the cons and here's con number one. The booklet is terrible. It's one of the most uninformative user manual's I've ever seen. Rather than explain this game and it's functionality for all it's worth, they decided to write the measly few pages over and over again in different languages. I realize they want to get this game marketed as globally as possible, but still... I'd like to know that my characters level up and a breakdown of the items you can get. It really wasn't that obvious as soon as we started playing the game.

The way they use split screen co-op is somewhat of a turn off for me, though I understand why they would do this. Instead of splitting the screen horizontally along the x-axis of your television, Onechanbara is split vertically along the y-axis. The reason for doing this is probably so you can see more of your character in all of her scantily clad glory. However, it is different from what I am used to with games like Left 4 Dead, where I have the whole top screen to myself. However, this really didn't diminish the game play that much for me.

The biggest con is the fact that all the dialogue and story line movers are in Japanese. So you have to read this game in English if you really want to know what's going on. The introduction to new levels actually involves quite a bit of reading. Paragraph upon paragraph explaining what's going on in that particular level, kind of like this review! It's cool that they tried to involve a deeper story line, but it's annoying they couldn't hire English voice actors to tell me about it. The story line, honestly, is nothing to really get excited about, but I really expected this, so it really doesn't take away from my rating or my game play experience.

Another downfall, and this one is actually kind of major for me, is that the characters get split up and there is a section of this game where only one player can play. It's kind of like in X-Men: Legends when Wolverine had to go off on his own! The level is actually kind of long while the other player sits there and just watches instead of playing. This was kind of annoying, even though it actually adds a decent element to the story line. I don't like my co-ops going single player. They solved this problem for the other sequence by introducing Annna, which I thought was a great idea and didn't compromise the story.

Whew, I think that's it for my review. I hope it's informative enough to everyone that opts to purchase this game. Sorry it's so long, but there's a lot to say that you really don't know about just by picking up the game and flipping through the booklet! If you like the hack and slash styled games then this is a must get for that feature alone. We've been playing this game on Easy to start off and it's a little too Easy at this point, but I do want to get through the story and see what happens. These aren't like Left 4 Dead zombies that move quickly, they're more like Resident Evil, slow and lumbering. If you just want to kill things you can go into something called "Survival Mode" and you can co-op in there and just work on leveling up your characters. Alright I'm done... enjoy your zombie hunting!

Game was overall well put together. Maps were a bit hard to follow, since it took me a few tries to get each level right. Storyline is decent, but I would not recommend until this game hits a bargin bin somewhere.

I can say a lot of good things about this game, and some of the bad, but I am a man of few words, at least I am today, What I will say is don't be fooled by reviews from IGN and others, The is a good game, with flaws, but still enjoyable. Do not let this one slip by

honestly this game is not all that bad the gameplay is pretty fun i don't know why so many people are giving it bad reviews but thats just my opinion anyways if you like killing zombies and alot of gore then you'll like this game

This is one of those games that is hard to categorize. It's mostly a game that represents the strangeness that gets released in Japan. How it ended up over here is beyond me.

This is a game where you hack, slash, and gun your way through each level to progress. In addition at the end of every level you gain experience points that are applied to your characters, when you reach a level you are given points to distribute into various traits of your characters (Skill, Agility, Health, etc). Essentially it is something like a "lite" version of games like Dynasty Warriors and similar hack and slash titles.

The game seems to be a bit more steep in scale than most I've played from such a genre. Case in point, I have played the entire game through Easy and reached around level 37 with the main character. When I played through Normal, I ran into difficulty killing the boss on Chapter 7. I guess this in turn forces you to go back and progress through earlier levels to gain a bit more experience/levels before trying again.

This game is definitely not going to wow experienced players but for a casual gamer it is worth a romp or two. When I first bought the game I played it for a few Chapters then put it down. It wasn't until months later that I invested time in it and started into it again to finish through Easy.

Through the Chapters you'll also unlock clothing, colors, and have options to purchase characters from Xbox Live. Are they worth it? Not really. It's fun for about 2 minutes. Add to the fact that the younger sister in this looks way to young to be viewing in her underwear, you're left feeling dirty attempting to dress her. Pretty much Lolicon fanserve to the pervs.

This game's fun for a run through if but to experience it's entire storyline but only the hardcore gamer would stick around to continue opening additional stuff. Definitely rent before investing much into it.


If they make a sequal to this, hopefully they'll improve the game mechanics and make it more playable.

What do you do when zombies invade your city?
Call the police? Call the army?
Dress up in armor to protect yourself?
If you're the ladies in Onechanbara the answer is: wear as little clothing as possible and attack the zombies with swords. Brilliant!

Despite not having played any of the previous Onechanbara games, it's easy to get caught up on the story. Because most of it will be read to you, in Japanese, with a wall of text on the screen. They couldn't have hired an English cast to provide voice-overs?

As others have said: an A game this is not, but a solid B game with fun to be had if you can overlook its shortcomings.

Once you learn how to play the game, it can be quite fun if you know what you're doing. Unfortunately the included manual is little to no help. I kept dying from low health because I didn't know what any of the helpful items did or how to use them (the Back button). I didn't know how to kill certain enemies because they required you to perform special attacks on them that were never explained.

Fortunately, D3 Publisher was nice enough to come out with a downloadable PDF guide for the game that includes all the characters' moves, special attacks, items, and how to use them.
They even include maps and walkthroughs for all the levels, bosses, enemies, and how to unlock the achievements.
With this knowledge I was able to get the most out of the game and enjoy it to the fullest.

Some other shortcomings are local only co-op. No system link or Xbox Live.
Camera can be a pain sometimes.
Too much text for the story progression instead of cutscenes.

Despite just mowing down zombies the entire game, it doesn't get old. The different playable characters and their varied combo attacks add enough variety to keep things interesting.

d3 has made a couple of really amusing games along the long, not great games but fun ones. this one is no exception. i mean it's alot like devil may cry mixed with extreme beach volleyball.

there is a real combat system. but the dress up aspect requires you to unlock clothes for the characters and the quests to unlock clothes are kinda difficult to do without farming for them. which kinda sucks, also the original outfits aren't available in the dress up mode but there are already downloadable new costumes and a few new characters one of which is free and actually really good.

the co-op is where this game is really fun, some of the early levels don't have enough enemies to handle two fighters worth but that quickly changes. it's pretty easy to find yourself knee deep in wall to wall zombies

this is a great game to get a girlfriend or someone new to video games into it. the difficulty is pretty low overall and the combat system is simple but has depth if you take the time to learn it.

Okay a grade a game this is not. A very fun grade B game this is.
your gonna see people hate it or love this game.
personaly I was disapointed in x-plays score of 1. And note that when talking of game control they were using the human for hand to hand and she is slower and the weakest hand to hand fighter. when they talk about how easy and dumb zombies are they showed video from early in game before the gernades and machine gun toting zombies. Makes me wonder if they only played 1/2 the game on easy said screw this and gave a premature review.

First off the game does have flaws.
The audio loop for saki running is like 3 moans that loops so short and fast its anoying untill u get use to it and dont hear it anymore. And the almost static 3d model stading there for most story secences was not good in enchanted arms and is just as uinspiring here. u will likly skip them. the video story secence are good and unfortunatly are less then 1/2 of the story secences in game.
Playing as anna can be fustrating at first because the auto lockon feal poorly exicuted and targeting the esact zombie u want can be a pain. But once u realize that her guns hit everything in firing path u become a sidesteep fanatic and this issue disapears.

I'm note a big fan of the timed pres combo system. Some people might like this. For me trying to time out my button mashes while trying to take down 6 undead cops before they lowered thier shotguns wasn't a time to creativly time presses. most player will mash the attack button and get then same combo 80% of the time.

this game was designed to play threw multiple times. easy mode is to easy and normal is also very easy untill the second half.once the army and harder zombies start coming out then game gets more intresting. 2 or 3 guns hitting u at once will kill u from full healf. The game has i think 5 diffaculty lvls and the hard lvl up is were most the chalange will lye for most players.

Were the game is most fun is when your surrounded by enemies and dispaching them as fast as possible trying to find the cop or army zombies before u hear the loading of a shotgun or a gernade goes off in your face.I've never liked dynesty warriors, and this game will be compaird because of the symularity of fighting many foes at once. It is the same yet somehow diffrent. koi games always bored me. 20 hours later this game is still mindlessly fun.

In wrap up all i can say is I like this game despit its flaws. If they make the animations alittle more fluid. Improve the story sequinces alot and flesh out the combos more while inceasing the intelignce of the dumb hord types in game alittle it would be a very good grade A title. Intsead its a very fun grade B with a outdated control scyme.

graphics and presitaion: 4 stars. humans look great zombies need more love.
gameplay" 4stars 4 for fun but controls feal outdated unless compared to koi games
audio: 2stars while the music feals apropriate, you"ll hear alot of the same songs. and realy.... saki running is "ah ahh ah" looped?..... seriosly? can i be a audio directer for a game too???? audio is ither good or horid. they should fire the audio director for this game for his inconsistancy.
fun and replay: 4 stars. It is hard to say why esactly im injoying this game. 22 hours in and im still injoying it and just starting hard with lvl 40 chars so also alot of replay.

final 4 stars but game should be 20-30 bucks for quallity. i dont feal ripped off. but quality wise this shouldnt be a 40-50 game.

I have not had this much fun playing a game in a long time! I like games that have unlockable content, and replayability. I can't wait for the sequel! It's worth noting that the Wii version is a sequel, not a port of the same game. So you can buy both and enjoy each for it's own merits!

Bring it on! 5 stars, my highest recommendation.

I brought this game and am very happy for it. Dont play on easy mode its just to easy but the other modes are great. #1 reason i love this game is that you dont get lost. I hate playing games and because i didnt push the blue button or something stupid like that i just cant move on until i figure out what to do but just end up getting a headache. This game is so simple to follow you wont get lost and the map is so easy that a 5 year could figure out. Also if you do go the wrong way and the game also tell you your going the wrong way you turn around and you get to kill more creatures so your not bored . Also since i hate to get lost i love that the map shows you where to go. Keep pushing the map button and it shows you what your goal is then once you reach it and get the key the map shows you what door to open. So now you could walk around killing the creatures without worrying about doing nothing for 60 mintues because you didnt know that you had to press the level and then push the blue button and jump 3 times to move on.
Its fun but as you play you learn more. You have 4 things to increase. I increased health and power but when you increase skill then you really start kicking butt. Also to kill some creatures you have to turn blue and in order to do that you have to get alot of blood on you. The only drawback is that since you get stronger your health wears out faster so all you have to do is push the back button to pick the crystals that will turn you back to normal. The crytals are very usefull you keep geeting them when you kill so you dont have to look for them.
Since you switch between 2 girls you could keep one blue to kill the tougher creatures then switch right back to the other normal girl to keep playing and the blue girl doesnt lose any of her health. Also when your waiting for the game to load you could kill those blue trolls with your little man to pass the time away