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Same Fun with Improved Graphics

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 64 / 67
Date: April 02, 2005
Author: Amazon User

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

Dynasty warriors 5 the ups and downs

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 2 / 13
Date: April 02, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Dynasty warriors 5 is awsome! The good thing about this game is every character has a musou mode thats different from others. The bad part is to "beat" the game you have to use characters that you hate or arn't good with their style(spear,sword,club,ect.ect.) which means like take Lu Bu hes grate hes powerful why not pick him his fighting style i can't hit enemys that well with him but, when i unlocked Jain Wei i kick butt because his attacks are fast and strong. Well to get back to the point the Dynasty warriors series is grate i've beaten everyone i have like 3 people left on 5 tho but overall i give it a 4 becase
- you have to play with everyone to beat it.
+ more characters i would tell you but then wheres the fun.
+ awsome storyline and plot.
+ good bashing moves.
- it can get really slow like on dynasty warriors 4 but not that much.
+ cool cover desine on front.
and thats my reveiw on dynasty warriors 5! E-mail me at krispy2b@aol.com if your new to the series to let me fill you in.

Fantastic

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 5 / 14
Date: April 03, 2005
Author: Amazon User

This game is probably one of the best games i've even played. It gives so much more than the other dynasty warriors games. I recommend you get it as soon as possible. I got it and I am loveing it. So get out there and get the best Koei product at the momment. You wont be dissapointed

China in a new light

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 14
Date: April 10, 2005
Author: Amazon User

this game is based on Romance of the Three kingdoms. You can be anyone! no one is the "bad guy" and you just fight whomever! it rules to take a break from games where you play as "evil" or "good" and just be "you". if your sick of good evil games, than this is the game for you. if not, this is still the game for you, and you can pretend who you pick to play as is good, and everyone else is evil. Loser...

A better DW

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 17 / 22
Date: April 12, 2005
Author: Amazon User

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.

Notable features

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 3 / 15
Date: April 12, 2005
Author: Amazon User

*game varies by the character you play.
*characters can own multiple weapons.
*no coustom player.
*more or less the same as other DW games.

Huge leaps and bounds, major improvements in gameplay.

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 62 / 65
Date: April 18, 2005
Author: Amazon User

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.

More dumb fun, but a bit hackneyed now...

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 7 / 11
Date: May 04, 2005
Author: Amazon User

CAVEAT: I love the DW series, having purchased all of them (even the original for PS1). I love this game as well, although it seems to be the most shallow of the bunch.

48(!) characters join the fray this time as you once again take control of a personality of the time of the Three Kingdoms and do battle with your nemeses. Each character has their own storyline, complete with events seen only in that character's story (this is a plus, as it was quite tedious to fight through each kingdom multiple times in order to see all the characters in DW4). Weapons no longer need to be upgraded (another plus), and orbs are now rare items found by playing on hard mode. A "chaos" mode has been added, and it is NOT for the faint of heart (the difficulty is more like Very Hard mode in DW3:XL, as opposed to DW4:XL, but no one drops any meat buns!). The graphics are much better in this installment, and True Musou is actually more valuable than Musou in this game.

However, this game suffers from the same slowdown issues as the previous games (which is really unforgivable now, as this is the same game engine that has been used for six previous installments of DW). The siege weapons are even more useless here than in DW4 (unfortunate, since I thought that this could add a bit of depth to the strategy portion of this game). The camera is incredibly frustrating (not as much as, say, Samurai Warriors, but it's still pretty bad). Character balance is rather poor, though not as bad as previous installments (Lu Bu and Zuo Ci are incredible, Zhang Jiao and Meng Huo are horrible, the rest are OK). While large battlefields are nice, the game is frustrating until you obtain a horse saddle (another rare item).

All in all, I love the game. Why 3 stars? Well, I'm trying to diminish my bias. The fact is, if you are a fan of these games, you've probably already purchased this. If you didn't like the others, you won't like this one. And if you have never played a DW game before, this is probably the best of the lot. Still, I would have enjoyed a bit more originality and variety in this one (really, it plays exactly like DW2, which is five years old).

Dynasty REPEAT

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 3 / 16
Date: May 05, 2005
Author: Amazon User

DW. 2, 3, 4, all great. But this is the same hack n' slash gameplay we've seen! I'm sick of this game! I could buy DW 4 and save some damned money!!! I'll leave it at this. It's like watching the same movie over and over and over and over and over and over and over again! The camera angles sometime get annoying. If your a DW fan, pick it up, otherwise, this game isn't going to turn you into one.

A droning and lifeless series continues

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 1 / 18
Date: May 30, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Koei has made several games for the series Dynasty Warriors, 7, if I remember correctly. The games in the series and Koei's new Samurai Warriors series have all been very fun games. However, so many games in this line have been made, the series is becoming stale.

The entire game is some linear button-smashing killfest where you run to enemies for them to attack you, such horrendous AI. You fight along an army, however the soldiers rarely attack and are quite stupid. It is impossible for your allies to really do anything and to win the battle, you seriously have to design some quick, blitzkrieg battle 'strategy' to kill the enemy commander by cutting a thin line in the enemy troops. True, killing masses of enemy drones around you is fun, but it just gets old rapidly.

In each series, there is a sort of graphic improvement and is a large factor in my favor of a game. There is a better storyline for your character, another major factor for me. There are also many bodyguard options, that is rare for this series. You can also learn some history from the events which this game is based on, but there are several inconstincies in the story and I found it much better if you want this information, to buy a cheap book, this story is popular in China.

Still, this game is a complete disappointment. The sound is awkward, the gameplay is old, and there is little the preivious games did not have. Someone who continuously buys the games in this series and still is addicted to this game has a very weak taste in gameplay.

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