Review #788: Soul of the Samurai

 Onimusha before Onimusha.

 Samura protagonist with a Ninja sidekick? Check(It's actually a Ronin, but...). Battle samurai zombies? Check. Pre-rendered backgrounds? Check. No, this ain't Onimusha, this is Konami's Soul of the Samurai, and you wouldn't believe how tough getting a complete copy of this game was, much more one that would ship to Uruguay! Thankfully, it was all worth it, for this as a 3-D action game that's a little bit around the edges, but a whole lotta fun.

 The game sees you playing as either Lin or Kotaro, don't worry, as after finishing the game with either you'll get to pick characters again. And you should really pick the other character, because the only way to fight the true final boss and get a real ending is to play the game with both. Afterwards, each subsequent playthrough on the same file will become a New Game+ in which you keep your goodies. Kotaro is a Ronin that returns to his birth land, only to find out that something is not quite right with the people in the fiefdom, and even his childhood friend is behaving weirdly. Lin is a Shogunate Ninja who finds out about the zombie villagers the hard way, her clansmen being in peril from this threat. The story is pretty underwhelming, but it gets the job done.

 The game is pretty linear, you're always told where you should go. Exploring might yield a few bonus healing items, which come in limited quantities, but sometimes the damage you'd incur on the way might overweight the value of the healing items. That said, both characters can come across an NPC that will grant them 4 bonus costumes each, and their ultimate weapons require a bit of exploring, well, in the case of Kotaro, first you must be able to defeat 300 enemies on chapter 3. Lin, instead, gets Unlimited Kunai should you accomplish the same feat. Contrary to what you might expect from reading that, both characters have completely different storylines, routes and bosses, but they share that one enemy endurance chapter.

 Square is your basic attack, R1 blocks and Circle uses your selected item(Healing herbs or, in the case of Lin, projectile sub weapons too). There's a mana gauge under your health bar that builds up as you deal damage, and you can use super moves with it, you earn super moves by mowing down enemies. Super moves are neat and all, but the best super is the one you start with, mash Square when your health bar is flashing red. Depending on your timing, you can parry attacks or even instantly kill enemies by blocking and pressing attack just before they strike you... like Onimusha.

 Combat rewards waiting. Running towards an enemy and mashing square will probably get you hit before you hit them. The best way to approach combat is to make your way towards your enemies holding down the block button to block most incoming attacks, and after you block counterattack with swipes of your own. Once you get the hang of it and learn to deal with multiple enemies, the game will become much tamer. Bosses, however, will probably murder you until you understand how to battle them. It's a bit annoying how quickly they can deplete your life bar and how much it takes to return to your save file from the Game Over screen, but after you learn how to dodge their attacks and figure out their opening you'll get the hang of it. It probably took me a bit longer than necessary because a lot of times I just had to defeat a boss without using a healing item, I just knew I could manage.

 Lin is probably the easier playthrough, she has 6 chapters instead of 7, and she has an easy to pull off 5 hit combo as well as sub weapons she can shoot from long distance. I mean, you can even unlock unlimited Kunai, which will trivialize most basic enemy encounters as well as her final boss. I just stood rooted to the ground mashing Circle and it could do nothing against me. On the other hand, she unlocks less weapons and a few of her bosses are made up of two-enemy and three-enemy battles that are a bit tougher than Kotaro's man-on-man/creature boss fights. Kotaro is a bit tougher to play as because mashing square won't make his 3-hit combo come out, you actually have to time your presses as soon as each slash ends, and different swords have different timings. But then again, Kotaro can also find a pair of double Katanas, if you fight his optional boss fight in chapter 3, as well as a Iai-striking Katana, so he has a bit more variety.

 My first playthrough with Kotaro took me 1:30 hours to complete, not counting my many deaths, while my second playthrough as Lin only took me 1 hour, once again, not taking into account my deaths. The Final Boss can be beaten in about a minute or less. Needless to say, this is a very, very short game. Thankfully, the game is pretty darn fun.

 Soul of the Samurai is a game barely mentioned nowadays, which is a shame, because it's REALLY fun. I searched around to see how it scored back in the day, because I couldn't fathom why nobody ever mentioned this game, and one of the lowest mainstream reviews I could find was Gamespot's, who disliked the game because....it wasn't Tenchu? Alas, Soul of the Samurai is great because of what it is, and not because of what it isn't: a fine action game that did Onimusha before Onimusha did Onimusha.
 7.5 out of 10