Asura's Wrath

Title: Asura's Wrath
Platform Played On: Xbox 360
Release Date: February 21, 2012
Date Played: July 2012
Time Played: 6 hours
Completed (Y/N): Yes
Score: 4/5




Opinion:
If I had to describe Asura's Wrath in one word, that word would have to be "insanity!"

Asura's Wrath is like no other game ever made. It is anime at its finest in a video game form. While there have been numerous anime series adapted into video game form, they all tend to do just that, adapt the motion picture to a video game. In other words you basically get a typical fighting, or flying or adventure game with the characters from that particular anime. Asura's Wrath takes a completely opposite approach, it molds the video game into the motion picture.

Asura's Wrath takes about four to six hours to experience once. There are numerous mechanics that would make you want to play it several times, but I didnt feel the urge to do so and only played it once on normal. Ninety percent of the time you will spend watching a mind blowing anime movie rendered entirely in engine. The reason I say anime movie is because only anime gets as insane as Asura's Wrath (the art style also reinforces the anime motif). It has everything, from a planet being pierced all the way through by a sword to a human sized guy destroying someone larger than the planet. While watching the story unfold you perform context sensitive quick time events. What is unique about them is the fact that even if you fail the quick time event the story just keeps going. In essence you can not really lose (at least not during the quick time events). In between the story beats you will find yourself fighting some creatures in a God of War style beat em up. However these portions are very small.

As you make your way through the game you will basically watch a season of an anime show, it is broken up into 19 episodes (plus DLC) and even features commercial breaks half way through the episodes (not to worry though there aren't actual ads).

Asura's Wrath utilizes the Unreal Engine 3, and it looks phenomenal. The characters are very detailed and unique looking. The presentation as a whole is very well executed with context sensitive quick time events actually making sense and the button placement on the screen actually reinforcing the action being performed. Presentation in Asura's wrath is great, both visual and sound. It is equally enjoyable to watch as it is to play.

I am not a huge fan of anime; however I really enjoyed Asura's Wrath. It does have a few things that rubbed me the wrong way. For instance the fact that you have to beat the final level 2 times, and the excuse for doing so is extremely lame. And the fact that in order to get the true full ending you have to buy the DLC in addition to buying the game. Nevertheless Asura's Wrath is worth a least a rental. It's episodic nature makes it easy to pick up for 10-15 minutes and its anime craziness keeps you and whoever is watching engaged. The story is fairly decent (although nonsensical).

Bottom line is that there has never been a game such as this one, and everyone should at least give it a rental. If you like anime, I think you will love Asura's Wrath, but even if you dont give a damn about anime you should check it out for its uniqueness.