Most people out there see me as a gamer geek, it’s not surprising really as I run a video game review site. However there is another side to my geeky nature and that’s my love for anime, or Japanimation as I like to call it. So when Tecmo Koei and Namco Bandai posted Plus XP a copy of Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 3 to review, you could probably imagine my excitement

Gundam is a very popular anime series that has been taking the Japanese market by storm since the late 70’s. As you can imagine since then the Gundam franchise has seen many incarnations, but the core premise stays the same. The story of the whole franchise is based around a futuristic war between multiple sides. The battles are fought using heavily armoured Mechanised suites known as Mobile suits which are driven by a human pilot. The franchise is named Gundam after the main protagonists’ mobile suit.

Much like Fist Of The North Star: Ken’s Rage did for the Fist of The North Star franchise, Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 3 does justice to the Gundam series. This title does a heck of a lot of fan service which may alienate people who don’t know the Gundam universe. However the game shouldn’t scare new comers off too much as the story is a standalone tale that brings the much-loved characters of Gundam into one simple, clean-cut narrative. Even though the storyline is quite basic this game gives Gundam and non Gundam fans alike a great opportunity to focus on character and mobile suit customisation.

Much like any other Dynasty Warriors game you can buy and give new abilities to your characters, from special moves to stat boosters which will all help in the heat of battle. However the more in-depth customisation takes place when it comes to modifying mobile suits. Each battle you play, more often than not, will unlock plans for mobile suits. You can then modify these plans in two ways. First you can up the physical stats on the mobile suit, such as defence, attack, shot, boost et cetera. These updates are limited to how advanced the plans are, and the more you battle the more advanced suits you will come across.

The second way to modify your mobile suit is by giving it upgrades, such as quicker boost recovery or a higher special attack gauge. This mixed in with the stat boosts and the character upgrades means you can pretty much have the mobile suit and pilot combination of your dreams. However, if you do want a specific mobile suit coupled with a specific pilot, it’s going to cost you. You have to buy licences for each mobile suite from the in-game shop, in order for a suit to be unlocked to all pilots. Licences as well as all character and mobile suit upgrades have to be paid for with money, known as G, earned in-game . G  is obtained by completing missions and facing the heat of battle. Of course as well as G completing missions will unlock more characters and story lines. This gives players a fantastic amount of unlockable content which is in my opinion something many video games are lacking nowadays.

The gameplay of Gundam 3 is your typical Dynasty warriors affair. So seasoned Warriors players will feel right at home here. For those of you who are not so familiar, this is a third person hack and slash game with a tactical twist. You’re thrown into the heart of battle with your army by your side. The objective is to gain possession of the whole battle field and then go in for the kill by tacking out the enemy base. In the later levels the objectives may change but it mainly consists of defending what you have and gaining more ground before going for the proverbial Jugular.

During the course of battle you will be given mini objectives that are optional, complete these and you will see the G rolling in. Some may say the simplistic mission structure might be too straight forward and may come across a bit repetitive, but the drive to unlock every single thing in the game makes the mission structure a little more compelling.

Combat wise you have a few moves at your disposal. You have the standard charge/heavy attack and your normal/light attacks. These moves mixed together can make for some epic combos that can take out a legion of mobile suits, but not only that each mobile suit is equipped with boosters to navigate the playing field faster. Combos mixed with your booster make for some even more devastating attacks. Also at your disposal you have special attacks, which deal out a considerable amount of damage. One of my favourite additions to the combat system though is partner attacks. Partner attacks are when an additional pilot flies in and unleashes a huge attack which deals a great amount of damage. Any pilot that you unlock through playing the game can be selected before the mission to come in and save you. It is a very small thing but still a great addition which I think adds to the whole Gundam fighting experience, as the Gundam franchise prides itself on team battling.

The cell shaded graphics in the game pay homage to the Gundam franchise as a whole very well ,from what I can tell there haven’t been many graphical faults in the game except maybe some slight draw distance issues. What I really do like about the Gundam3 is that it feels like a game based on an anime. Other games based on anime such as One Piece: Ultimate Cruise Episode 1 and Bleach: Soul Ignition feel typically Japanese and Gundam 3 also fits into that bracket. Its bright colours and epic Japanese style background music make for an atmosphere that no other game genre can create.

All in all Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 3 is a great homage to the Gundam franchise. Its typical Japanese anime style mixed with the game play of the Dynasty warriors series makes for an enjoyable game. The mission structure maybe a little basic and the story is not that in-depth but the sheer amount of unlockables and the fact that it stays true to the Gundam series makes Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 3 an enjoyable game.

Pros:
+ A great homage to Gundam franchise
+ Loads of unlockables, and I mean loads!
+ Great mobile suit customisation

Cons:
-Basic Story Line
-Missions can feel a little samey
-Graphics aren’t the best I have seen

Score: 7/10

Now this was only my second ever expo, and compared to Eurogamer, this was pretty different, it was also a lot quieter for one thing. As this was an Amusement and Gaming Expo, the split between actual arcade video games and coin operated amusements was about a 60/40 split, with the coin operated amusements taking the 60 % portion of the Expo floor. Which wasn’t too bad, but from a games journalism point of view wasn’t that great. Most of the gaming machines that were present at the expo I had seen before in the likes of the Trocadero and the bowling ally where I used to play arcade game back in Wiltshire.

But fear not readers, as there were some gems buried in what was a rather mixed bag of an expo. So without further ado, I shall reveal to you my highlights of the EAG Expo 2010.

Terminator Salvation: Arcade Edition.

Imagine Rambo arcade, mixed with some House Of The Dead. Once you have thought long and hard about what that interesting concoction of the FPS arcade genre would be like, throw in the story line and post apocalyptic scenery of the film Terminator Salvation, and you have what is surprisingly a pretty good game.

You are John Connor. You are heading the resistance, an army of humans who are trying to defend earth from the recent onslaught of the machines. The war against human and machine has raged on for some while now and it is time for you to make a stand. Armed with your plastic assault rifle it is time to kick some robot butt.

This arcade title is great for two reasons. 1) it’s the classic point and shoot mechanic we are used to in an arcade game - as I said before, the game play is reminiscent of Rambo arcade, in that you are constantly machine gunning enemies down, after doing so you are then faced with House Of The Dead like boss battles where you have to hit weak spots on a gargantuan machine beast in order to defeat it. It is truly a great mix and one hell of a stress killer. Reason number 2) The innovative way of using the plastic assault rifle. We are all used to arcade games where we either have to lift our foot off a pedal to reload or shoot away from the screen. In order to reload on Terminator Salvation however, you must hit a chunky button on the bottom of the magazine on the gun. Very simple but good thinking. There is also a nice red button for you to push on the side of the gun to unleash some grenade fury, everyone loves to push the little red button on the side of the gun.

So for me Terminator Salvation, is a good arcade game and defiantly one to look out for, especially if you have always dreamed about killing legions and legions of T-1000 mechaniods with an assault rifle.

Cooking Mama Arcade.

I can hear the groans already, the gamers dropping to their knees screaming “Why God? WHY!?” as they read the title of this section of the article. But can I just ask you gamers out there one question? When was the last time you saw a DS game have an Arcade machine port?

Yes the original DS version of Cooking Mama is probably going to make its way to an arcade near you soon. I had a go at it and to me, it’s not the greatest arcade game in the world, you have a chunky stylus to make your culinary delights with, and like in the DS game you have to progress through a number of mini games to create a marvelous meal. If you do well in these mini games you will have a happy Mama and some nice virtual nosh to tuck into, if however you do badly in these mini games you will then have a ticked off Mama and a meal fit for the next plague infested vermin you happen to come across.

So as you can see, the game play is not on par with good old Terminator up there, but the transition from DS game to Arcade machine is very well executed. Maybe the recent outing Cooking Mama had on the Wii was partly responsible for the idea in the first place, but with this game you still get the good clean cooking fun your used to from your handheld.

Tank Tank Tank!

This has to be the game of the show in my opinion - battletank games have always been rated highly for me. There is nothing like squaring off against your friends in a tank and blowing each other up to smithereens. So when Namco and Bandai took the idea of Battletanks and improved it tenfold I could not help but smile at this stroke of genius.

The game mode MarkBOSS and myself played was a 2 on 2 battle royale; where we were thrown into a suburban environment and left to blow the other team sky-high. All buildings that are inconveniently in your path are destructible, which is extremely satisfying. As you play, Mario Kart-esque question mark boxes fall from the sky. Once collected, you gain a new weapon, whether it is a huge laser gun, flurry of rockets, mini gun or nuclear bomb is totally set at random. I believe there are more weapon variants also but I didn’t pick them up.

What I thought was pretty good was how responsive the seat movement was. If you play extreme driving games at the arcade you are usually thrown about as the seat basically has a fit when you slide round corners, etc. But Tank Tank Tank! is in an element of its own, each weapon you use makes the chair respond differently. Normal tank fire makes the chair jolt slowly, where using the mini gun you are almost shaking so much you teeth my rattle out of your mouth. This is such a great little detail that it rounds the game off nicely.

So if your local arcade gains a copy of Tank Tank Tank! I suggest you jump straight on and destroy your friends. I believe there is a single player campaign mode also, if you just wanna kill some time in the arcade by yourself in a lunch break.

Other Worthy Mentions

Vulcan . M

The first arcade game that uses a replica turret mounted Minigun, which is fully mechanical. The turret whirls around at a rate of knots (ten revolutions a second so I am told) and a stream of bullet cases gets sucked into the machine. A very pretty looking arcade game, the game play however, I though was somewhat confusing story line wise, whether it had a story line really I’m not sure. Shooting world war planes and missiles out of the sky makes sense, but when a space ship comes out of no where in what seems to be a realistic World War scenario, it kinda feels a bit disjointed. But other than that a brilliant idea and a very pretty piece of machinery.

The First Ever Coin Op Candy Floss Machine

I had to mention it. Ivan Campbell, the director of Candy Floss Irland stopped me while I was walking round, to show me his coin operated candy floss machine. Didn’t seem that impressive to begin with but its the only one in the world and make damn tasty candy floss within a minute. Also plays some funky music while you wait. I also got some free Candy Floss. WIN!

The EAG expo was a good outing. I thoroughly enjoyed all the arcade games on offer (even if I had played most of them before. and yes Rambo arcade was there, so I had to use both 1p and 2p guns to se how long I would last using both) and it was a great day out. Will do it again next year to see if there are even more new arcade games to hit in 2011.

Garv.

Dragonball Z is perhaps the perfect anime to be converted into a fighting game – with the series devoted to almost nothing but powering up and having epic fights with more and more powerful villains, it lends itself to the genre perfectly. The two main series’ that I have enjoyed are DBZ: Budokai, and DBZ: Budokai Tenkaichi on the PS2. Budokai featured a simple side-on view and lush graphics, the third installment with the biggest range of characters and plenty of moves and transformations. Budokai Tenkaichi opted for a camera behind the character, in a free-roaming environment that perhaps allows the most accurate emulation of DBZ fights as they are shown in the anime. Tenkaichi 3 boasted the largest roster of all, featuring over 150 characters. Although I preferred Budokai’s battle system, I enjoyed Tenkaichi and it’s large roster was a great selling point.

Last year saw the release of Dragonball Z: Burst Limit, a current-gen DBZ fighter in the vein of Budokai. Having loved the previous installments and looking at a prospective “Budokai 4″, the game featured great visuals and an enjoyable battle system. However, although the engine was there, for some reason the developers failed to continue the ever-growing rosters of the DBZ fighters and instead only cover as far as the Cell saga in the plot – whereas the previous games had covered the entirety of Dragonball Z, GT and even more “what if?” scenarios. This limiting of the plot (and its resulting cast) resulted in the game having an awfully small roster – only 21 characters, well over 100 less than the mind-numbingly large roster of BT3. Now, while I understand that some of the characters in the bigger rosters weren’t major characters, the endpoint of Burst Limit meant that it didn’t even include characters such as Buu (in his various forms), Dr Gero, and many of the higher level transformations. Although the engine was there, compared to Budokai 3, Burst Limit felt like little more than the bare bones of an excellent game.

However, recently a new Dragonball Z title has been released, this time in the vein of Budokai Tenkaichi – ‘Dragon Ball: Raging Blast’, on Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. The title snuck under my radar and I didn’t even notice it’s existence until recently – but upon downloading the demo, I put on my reviewer’s hat (metaphorically) and prepared myself for the worst. After Burst Limit, I had a sneaking suspicion that this title would follow suit and become an enhanced Tenkaichi engine, whilst removing much of the content…

Upon booting the demo, I found that the only option available was Versus, and the characters I could try were Goku, Piccolo and Raditz, although I was pleased to notice a large roster screen. I selected Goku, and my battle against Piccolo began. The game has a similar visual style to the previous titles, opting for a style of cel-shading that gives an anime-like style to a 3D game – an improvement from the past games, the graphics are clean and look good, fitting the Dragonball Z style very well.

Although I have played much Budokai Tenkaichi, Raging Blast has a whole new control set, and disappointingly the demo does a very bad job at explaining the layout. After fiddling with the buttons for a while whilst Piccolo proceeded to attack me, I eventually resorted to looking the controls up online. This was a bad mark for the demo, but the full game includes an in-depth tutorial so it shouldn’t be this way in the real thing. Once I had learned the controls I could give the game an adequate testing.

As with Budokai Tekaichi, Raging Blast allows you to move in all directions, including taking to the air for some super-powered brawls. Basic attacks are performed with the Square button to chain hand-to-hand combos, while the Triangle button is used for firing quick Ki blasts, or to perform smash (guard-breaking) attacks up close. Circle allows you to perform special moves such as ‘instant transmission’ to avoid or counter attacks, while the X button can be used to dash.

In order to perform the special attacks such as Goku’s signature Kamehameha, you require a set amount of Ki energy – this was one reason I failed to perform any moves without knowing the control scheme, as I was unaware that holding the Down button on the D-pad allows you to charge Ki energy in the classic DBZ way. Doing so fills up your gauge, and then it can be used to perform all manner of special attacks. In a new twist to the gameplay, these specials are activated by using the Right Analogue stick – flicking it upward allows you to perform the first (Kamehameha in Goku’s case), left, right, or down to perform the others; such as Raditz’ “Fools Must Die”, and Piccolo’s “Special Beam Cannon”. This works very nicely and is easy to pick up, flowing well with the rest of the gameplay. There are also a number of special moves that give passive boosts such as raising attack power (i.e. Goku’s Kaioken). Lastly, pressing R3 when your Ki is full allows you to perform the characters ultimate move, such as the Spirit Bomb, which are to be as expected – cinematic and deadly.

As I would hope, it is possible to transform into higher forms, such as Super Saiyan for Goku. To do so, you have to hold R2 to bring up a menu of available transformations (in the demo, only Goku’s SS1 form was available), and press the corresponding face button (Square in this case) for a quick cinematic that shows the transformation. Upon doing so, the character becomes more powerful, and has access to a new moveset complete with more impressive moves, such as “Angry Kamehameha”. It’s also possible to choose which form to start the fight in, which I find pleasing.

It all flows together very nicely, with a mixture of fast paced combat and cinematic moves – ranging from quick energy blasts, to impressive moves with characters being juggled around the arena and blasted with gigantic energy balls. The characters seem to be true to their original counterparts, and although the transformation and general limits to each character may make some fighters better than others, I found that Raditz was able to beat SS Goku without too much hassle, so it doesnt seem too unbalanced.

Although the game’s roster doesnt look to be anywhere quite so impressive as that of BT3, it doesn’t look to be disappointing as Burst Limit was. The game covers the series beyond the Majin Buu saga, and also has some extra scenarios made just for the game. Although some more obscure characters may be missing, most of the core characters are in the mix – Goku, Vegeta, Gohan, Trunks, Cell, Frieza, Buu and Broly are among the more popular fighters, and there are also a decent amount of the less common cast such as Chiaotzu, Dodoria and Bardock thrown in as well. Although I’ll miss characters like Janemba and Cooler, there’s a good range of characters to enjoy, including various Super Saiyan forms (up to SS3), four versions of Vegeta, villain transformations such as Perfect Cell and Super Saiyan Broly, and a couple of fusions including Gotenks and Vegito.

As I said, the game looks great with its anime-like style, but I also noticed a lot of attention to detail – as well as the graphics, there were a lot of nice touches – in the arena shown in the demo, the sky went to a moody grey later in the battle, making my Ultra attack look even more impressive. As characters get beaten up, their clothes can tear and wear – its touches like this that make it that little bit more enjoyable. Characters also have access to alternate costumes, some of which can be unlocked, and they include more than just re-colours – for instance, Piccolo has access to his plain purple gear, or his cape/turban combo seen in other episodes.

All in all, I was fairly impressed with Dragon Ball: Raging Blast. Although it’s not the ultimate “Better than all the previous DBZ fighters in every aspect” that I dream of, it’s certainly looking to be a solid title that’s far from the disappointment I had with Burst Limit. It has a solid roster and checks all of the main boxes with a few nice features, and it looks and plays really well. I must admit I hope to see even more improvement upon the series in future (hopefully they’ll do a Raging Blast 2 in the future), but until that time it seems a solid title to be the first great DBZ title of this console generation.

-Leon