Review: Afro Samurai (360)
Afro Samurai feels like a game that was made in 1997 and then released in 2009. Not graphically, but in the way it plays. Everything feels so archaic. As a third person action game the camera is a priority, or at least it should be. Here if you walk next to a wall and get attacked from all sides then it has a spasm. The next issue comes with the platforming. While we don’t like being led by the hand, games should at least make sure you have a good idea of where you’re supposed to be going and doing, especially in a game as linear as this one. Time after time we found ourselves wandering around aimlessly simply because we missed an area where you can perform a double jump. Hilariously these places only appear a few times, with other places where you’d think a samurai would be able to reach closed off by an invisible barrier. You’re given a Ninja Ninja compass, where your comedy sidekick appears and is supposed to show you the way. There’s a major fault here. That being he appears further away from you and is more often than not obscured by a wall or other obstacle, so you won’t be able to see him anyway. Would it have been that hard to add a map and GPS system? The fact that characters carry mobile phones around with them doesn’t exactly make this impossible.
While navigating the environments is disastrous the combat does make up for it slightly. You have your simple weak and strong attacks, but they can be chained together to form impressive combos. Then you have the focus attacks where time slows down and you can perform a perfect vertical or horizontal slice. This against most enemies once their health is almost depleted pretty much chops them into pieces with plenty of blood thrown at the screen. The combat is hampered by the game blocking you off from other areas by invisible walls. Once again it comes back to archaic game design. None more so though when you comes across the bosses.
Each one has a specific way of beating them, and each is the most dullest thing on the planet. One has you going up against a guy with a flamethrower, this just has you repeat the same thing over and over again. Made more irritating when you get trapped on a wall and are unable to escape without taking lots of damage. That wasn’t the worst one either. One of the moves you have the ability to do is a bullet slice, which requires pinpoint timing and against most enemies is nigh on impossible. One boss encounter has you doing this exclusively. Amazingly the game barely even teaches you the move, mainly just showing you some text on how to perform it with very little practice actually given to you.
If anything the only real saving grace for the game are the graphics and music. Graphically everything is stylised just like the anime and it does look quite lovely when you’re not fighting the camera. Music is done by the RZA who provide quite a unique soundtrack. There’s nothing stranger than fighting a bunch of robotic ninjas with some rap music in the background. It’s different, and it works, but you’re hardly going to fork out the money for this alone. Why not just buy the soundtrack?
Afro Samurai is the result of a bygone era. There are reasons why some of the gameplay features here have thankfully become extinct. Being linked so closely to the story of the anime may have been a hindrance, but we feel with a better developer this could’ve been something much, much better.
Rating: 4 / 10
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