Review #612: My Hero One's Justice

 PLUSSSSSS ULTRAAAAAAAAAA UNITED STATES OF SMASHHHHHHH!

 Bleach may have turned into garbage, Naruto may have left us and One Piece... well, it's still One Piece, but now it's time for a new generation of Shonen manga to take their place, enter My Hero Academia, which is basically Naruto but with Super Heroes(It's a gross oversimplification, but it works.). A delightful manga that loves to toy and play with tropes of the genre, only to twist them over its head! As is the destiny with any Shonen worth its salt, it needs its mandatory fighting game, and here we are!

 The game offers most of the modes you'd expect: Offline and Online versus, Training and, of course, a story mode. There's also a Map Mode, in which you tackle different maps(6 + Score Attack on the base game, more with DLC) by bringing along a team of 3 characters. Characters level up in this mode, and as you clear fights, each with different objectives("Defeat the enemy with a Super", "Defense decreased", etc) you'll unlock customization items as well as items to use in that map. Maps tend to have different routes that all take you to the same place. Clearing more fights means more unlockables and more points(For even more unlockables), but your health doesn't restore between fights unless you find restorative items, so it's a bit of Risk VS Reward. There's one more mode, Customize Character. You can actually take any of the 20 playable characters and tweak their looks a bit. It's nothing to write home about, but you can give them silly accessories, like masks from other characters in the series or even accessories. It's very limited, but it's a neat novelty. Each character also has access to a few color presets, albeit they are shared between characters: Everyone has a white color, a All Might color, a Villain Color and, a few, have a single distinctive color. Most of the students also get their uniforms as bonus costumes. Downloading one of the patches nets you an Arcade Mode, so there's that. Me, being a man of impeccable taste and a great disdain for anything digital-only, ignored it. But it's free!... not that it excuses it from not being on the disc from the get-go.

 Story mode is the game's biggest letdown, the game picks up after Todorki VS Midoriya, and covers everything up to the 'Rescue Bakugo' arc. The story is told via lame comic-book styled panels. What hurts the most is that the story mode has three proper cutscenes, and they are great, so it sucks that we're stuck with lazy anime stills. That said, each fight in the story mode hides up to three unlockable customization items(One for clearing the stage, one for getting an S rank and one for a 'hidden objective') which means you might want to replay these stages.... and you're never allowed to skip these cutscenes! Clearing the story mode lets you play the same story from the villains' points of view... and you're not allowed to skip the SAME three cutscenes either! Once you beat both story modes a few fights from the Festival Arc, recontextualized as Deku viewing footage from the event. Leaving the lazy presentation aside, the Story Mode fails at presenting the story to newcomers. The introduction chapter skims over a lot of important details, and the pre and post fight scenes fail at providing the necessary information. Proper enjoyment of this mode requires prior knowledge of the series.

 The game offers a rather small roster of 20 characters, something that would be alright in a normal fighting game, but this being an licensed-anime fighter makes you wish for a few more characters. DLC adds three more characters, Shoot-Style Deku(Free), Endeavor and Inasa. Considering that Shoot-Style Deku and Inasa have important roles in the upcoming story arc makes me guess that Namco is already thinking about expanding on the series.... which might not be a bad idea at all, because, despite how disappointing the story mode is, there are really strong foundations here.

 This is an arena-based fighting game, which means that you and your opponent are free to move around medium-sized arenas as you pummel each other. Square is your basic attack combo string, while triangle and circle perform special moves and the X button lets you jump. Square+tilting the analog stick in any direction produces a super-armored strong attack. Characters have about three specials each, one for each button and another one by tilting the analog stick as you press the buttons, or, sometimes, by holding down one of the special buttons. L2 and R2 can be used to summon 'sidekick' characters, that jump in for a single attack before leaving the screen, R1 can be used to block, or, when coupled with the Special move buttons, used for suppers. Lastly, L1 is used to dash around(Running animations are beautiful) or, if you are on the air, dash directly towards your enemy.

 Those are  the basics, but there are a few other advanced techniques, like Perfect Guarding, which is a parry and is done by pressing R1 before an incoming attack hits... which can also parry super moves. L1 can be used to cancel your attack string and thus perform longer combos, and there's a lot of nifty things you can do with this, like popping an enemy into the air and follow them for an aerial combo. Occasionally when you land a particularly strong move, you'll slam the enemy against a wall, which allows you to fight ON the wall. Fights can get incredibly dynamic as  both fighters dash around each other, over walls and on the air, leading to some incredibly exciting moments. What makes it better is that every stages is almost entirely destructible, so as both fighters dash and jump all over the place, everything comes falling down. It's amazing. And it runs at a mostly steady 60 fps on the PS4. When footage of the game came out I was worried because it looked very, VERY slow, but the game is anything but. Once you get the hang out of cancels and air dashing the game turns into one of the most arresting licensed fighters I've played. There are about three stages that feature ring-outs, and those are the worst, since you can't get the most out of the engine... even if one features a crumbling ground that breaks as you duke it out with your enemy.

 Every character but one comes unlocked from the start, which is a bit divisive between people that love unlockables and people that just want to take the game anywhere and not deal with the hassle of unlocking characters. Considering how many unlockable customization items there are I think the game struck a nice balance, most characters are there from the outset, but you have to work for their colors and the privilege of having Mineta hanging on to your leg as an accessory. On the other hand, as much as I liked the over-saturated colors, the characters look a bit bland and undetailed. The character models are very clean and simple, but I would've like more details or something that made these characters stand out. As it stands, you could pretty much take any character but All-Might(Since, just as it's in the manga, he's drawn in another style!) and paste them on a game like Naruto Ultimate Storm and you wouldn't be able to tell they came from another game.

 If you know what you're getting, namely a very basic anime licensed-game, you'll probably have fun with My Hero One's Justice. It's a very solid, but lackluster anime fighter that doesn't push the envelope but lays a strong foundation for future game in the franchise, which, judging from the DLC, we know is coming sooner than later.
 6.5 out of 10