"Koei's major slack-off: Dynasty Warriors 6"

Dynasty Warriors games are famous for their hacking-and-slashing and the awesome visual effects of moves. Sticking to the same one-man-army gameplay, all Dynasty Warriors games also stick to the storyline of the popular Chinese novel, The Romance of Three Kingdom. Though every Dynasty Warriors games are almost the same in some ways, they are still popular, particularly in the Asia region. Dynasty Warriors 6 has changed a lot, comparing to its previous installments. However, the innovations didn't bring many positive effects to its popularity.

This review is separated into five sections:
Gameplay
Character
Graphic/sound
Replayability/unlockables
Conclusion

Gameplay (3/10)

Like other Dynasty Warriors games, you can choose to play each character's unique storyline or choose a battle yourself. Either way, you, the character, kill all the foes in your path, generals and soldiers alike. You can kill them with attack combos or use a special attack called Musou. Dynasty Warriors 6 is no exception, but it does have changes in its battle system.

Replacing the combos that differ with the number of normal attacks executed, they are completely replaced with the Renbu system. Because of this, you can only choose from two combos: attacking with a short but more powerful special attacks, or attacking with a long but weaker normal combo. With Renbu system in place, moves have no excellent visual effects anymore. Even Musou attacks are now normal attack combo that is empowered, not the exotic moves in its previous installment. Because of Renbu system, Dynasty Warriors 6 is a true button smashing game, because you are forced to stick either with S or T.

Character (6/10)

Instead of adding new characters, as Koei did in each game, a number of characters, including Jiang Wei, have been deleted in this game. “Weapons” have also been deleted; most characters are clones of another. For example, Ma Chao has the same attack moves Zhao Yun has. This also applies to most characters, and replaced many unique weapons, like Zhou Tai's katana and Zhen Ji's flute. The only differences along the clones are the identity, appearance, and voice. Additionally, not all characters are available in Musou mode.

Character innovations have both positive and negative effects. For example, Diao Chan, who uses batters in the past installments, now uses a thorn whip, which improves her range and power. However, some characters have also weakened, mostly done by “clon-ification”. Lu Bu now uses a four-bladed halberd (looks cool, but not useful), which greatly reduces his range.

Graphic/sound (10/10)

The graphic is excellent, especially if it's compared to its previous installments. You won't see the annoying fog in front of you and be surprised by enemy “ambush”, because they appear suddenly due to bad graphic. Even in two-player mode, you can still see what's in front of you. Even if the map is dark, you can still see your enemies, unlike the previous installments, which you can't really see in the dark.

As for the game's sound, it's something that you can have or not, even though the character's fighting sounds can be irritating because they are repetitious. The background music is nothing dramatic; it isn't good enough to listen to individually or bad enough that you have to mute your television.

Replayability/unlockable (4/10)

There is really nothing to do in this game but training characters to the max level of 50, finishing the few storylines in Musou mode, and unlocking more clones. 4th weapons are now nonexistent and horses are now completely gained on chance. Replayability is low, comparing to the other Dynasty Warriors games.

Unless you had only one game, which is Dynasty Warriors 6, you will eventually play your other games instead.

Conclusion

If you played DW6's previous installment, then I recommend you to just rent this game and see it yourself before buying it. Otherwise, it's an “okay” game, if you don't compare with the other Dynasty Warriors games, though I would recommend you to buy them instead of this game.

You can definitely tell that Koei didn't put any efforts in developing this game, from the character development and battle system. Still, the Dynasty Warriors series remains fun and enjoyable.

Overall rating: 5.75/10 (About 6/10)

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 08/01/08

Game Release: Dynasty Warriors 6 (US, 02/19/08)