Dynasty Warriors: StrikeForce (2009, Koei)
purchase from Amazon

I was going to write a real review for this game, but here’s the deal: it’s too fucking hard. Not writing about it, mind you, but playing the damn thing.

Dynasty Warriors: StrikeForce has much stronger RPG elements than the previous DW titles, because this one puts you in the shoes of just one warrior. (I personally chose Zhou Yu because I find it hilarious that he’s gone from scholar to marching band leader, with his raven black hair and swirling baton like a bo staff of pain.) You will find yourself in the middle of a small town with just a handful of pedestrians and a few shops. There is a also a message board where you can accept small challenges for (at the time) small gold rewards; complete a few of these, and you’ll finally get to accept a mission or storyline quest. Like all the other Dynasty Warriors, it begins with the Yellow Turban rebellion.

On the gameplay front, it seems like they decided to take a few elements of Monster Hunter, where you can farm resources from your enemies and wooden crates thoughout the level and use them to craft weapons, abilities and even expand the shops. Expanding the shops will allow them an even larger selection of items, skills and weapons to choose from. Fighting in the game is at times very much like your traditional Dynasty Warriors game as well, until you’re introduced to jumping, and the game’s new frustrating platformer additions. It can seriously take awhile to figure out just how the hell you’re supposed to get to certain areas in the game. The jumps they ask you to accomplish can be equally ridiculous, forcing you to combine a dashing charge and double jumps to help you leap beautifully from one ledge to another. Just pray that you don’t hit the invisible barrier, sending you crashing down to ground level and giving yourself a fun chance to try the whole thing over. Sweet!

StrikeForce’s great new addition is the ability to do these missions with up to four players online. That may have been a lot of fun and really helped get past the harder missions, but whenever I went to one of their online towns, no one was around. So much for that idea. Now I’d love to give you a detailed description of just how the game progresses and all of its great features, but you see, after hours and hours of attempting to beat Zhang Jiao as he and his three brothers flew around the room shooting large fireballs everywhere, trying keep me from destroying the tower (which occasionally sends large electric waves that also hit me), I gave up. Even if you manage to take down the tower and then the three brothers, those three assholes come back to life immediately — except this time as Super Saiyan versions. So until I can find someone to help me with it, fuck this game and fuck this review.

Peace.