Dynasty Warrior 6
April 2008 Issue
Features
- From the Editors
- Craft Check: Friendship Bracelets for Gamers
- Gaming in the Media: Worried About Miss Bimbo? Don't Be.
Interviews
- Interview: Tracy Whitelaw of Lesbian Gamers
Articles
- Romancing the LARP
Author: Stephanie Pegg
- Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition: A Paradigm Shift or a Step Back?
Author: Ben Larsen
Stephanie discusses how romance plots played out in the Sanctuary LARP.
Ben analyzes the upcoming 4th Edition of Dungeons & Dragons and discusses how the changes made to the D&D formula will impact gamers.
Gamer Stories
Reviews
- Diner Dash: Hometown Heroes
- Dynasty Warrior 6
- Retro Review: Mario is Missing
Odds 'n Ends
Dynasty Warrior 6 is the latest installment of the Dynasty Warrior franchise and the first designed solely for next generation consoles. It pretty much sticks to the same formula as the previous games but tries a few things out in hopes of improving that formula.
The Good
KOEI changed up the combat system: they’ve added renbu and made it a straight button mash fest for combat and combos are only used for blocking and breaking enemy’s defensive stances. They replaced saddle items and bodyguards with warhorses that you collect and can level up, that have special attributes and rare horses can be unlocked. Also you can now summon your horse if you are separated from them during the fighting.
Characters also have a bit more dimension now. Instead of just leveling with straight stats, your abilities change as you level based on the skills you choose in that character’s skill tree.
The battlefields are more interactive. You can climb ladders, swim, and the bases you take have more of an influence in on the over all battle than they have had in previous installments. The graphics engine has been ramped up and a lot of the battlefield scenery looks really nice.
The Bad
KOEI dropped quite a few characters in this installment, and including the whole Nan Man campaign and all of the characters associated with this campaign. They removed bodyguards in favor of warhorses. Personally I like the warhorses better than bodyguards, but some people would prefer having both I’m sure. Lots of characters are just clones of other characters and the only way they are different is that they have skill trees that don’t affect the character enough to make them feel really different from the character it’s cloned from.
Each character only gets two outfits instead of four like in the last game. And all the additional items you could use to increase stats of a character have been dropped. There is also no longer the fourth weapon that is the absolute best for each character. You can get better weapons off harder maps at harder difficulty levels but there isn’t a “best” weapon that gives a max level character that polished finish.
There are only 17 story modes. 5 for each kingdom, and then 2 extra, Lu Bu and Diao Chan. Sure 17 might sound like a lot, but when story modes aren’t really that long, and each kingdom has closer to 10 characters and previous installments had story modes for every character.
With the lack of story modes, items to hunt for and all of the cloned characters it seems this installment lacks some of the replay value that previous installments had.
The Ugly
Dynasty Warrior 6 is based off a great classic, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, with lots of different characters and personalities for these characters and you can see that in the male characters but when we get to the female characters that range is missing. Of the 5 female characters we have a small scale that ranges from anime school girl who fights in a short skirt to grown lady who fights in an evening gown.
What irritates me the most is how the game will take details from the book, insert it into the cut scenes or the loading text biography of the character, and then make the character completely contrary to that bit of detail that they had given us from the book. Like Sun Shiang Xiang was said to have had her ladies in waiting wear full armor and in one cut scene it shows her surrounded by ladies in armor and guess what, her ladies in waiting wear more armor than she does. Her armor is a short pleated skirt with platform sandals. And she has definitely been pushed more into the anime school girl stereotype where as in previous versions of the game she was more mature and wore a pants suit.
Yue Ying, the wife of Zhuge Liang, was known as the wise lady. Despite rumors of her being unattractive Zhuge Liang pursued her for her wisdom and not her appearance. So what kind of armor do we put a character such as this in? Thigh high boots and a mini skirt. Sad thing is this pretty much the most reserved any of the female characters get. Also her move set is just a clone of Sun Shiang’s.
Zhu Rhong, who in previous installments provided us with the archetype of the tough barbaric woman, was dropped.
Diao Chan and Zhen Ji are two very similar characters. One is a dancer and the other is a musician. They were both given the same move set and same new weapon and similar clothing. Even though the new weapon is fun it’s disappointing to have two characters that were very different before made so much the same.
Overall
Dynasty Warrior 6 is still a fun game to play especially if you’re a fan of the franchise. If you are a fan, you will probably find that this game feels shorter than the previous ones. And I hope in Dynasty Warrior 7 KOEI does more to bring the replay value up more and to put more of the story back into the game. I also hope they bring back more outfit choices and make the women of Dynasty Warrior more warriors than dynasty models.
