One Piece Pirate Warriors 3 and Saint Seiya Soldiers' Soul Coming to PC

So, it seems like Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 Full Burst, as buggy and unoptimized as it is, actually did a lot of good as it finally convinced Japanese devs that there's a lot of money to be made on the PC platform regardless of the piracy problem.

And it's not no-name devs that produce non-licensed games either. We're talking big names here. Bandai Namco has been releasing games for the PC platform since ever, but they're now releasing anime and manga-based games that in the old days would have been exclusive to consoles. OTOH, One Piece Pirate Warriors 3 has been confirmed to be coming out on PC a few months ago, but it's exciting to know that the Steam store page is already live.

We also have the less popular in the West, but generally more popular and iconic Saint Seiya coming via Saint Seiya Soldier's Soul:

So right now we have Dragonball Xenoverse, two Naruto Games, a Saint Seiya, and a One Piece game coming up? It seems like the next couple of years is a good time to be a PC gamer and a manga/anime fan at the same time. That's just the confirmed games, though. Rise of Incarnates, if it's successful, may finally convince BAMCO to bring the Gundam VS games to the PC. And what about Bleach? Surely whoever is the license holder right now will see how successful Xenoverse and the Storm series is even if they're buggy messes? Come on, devs. Our wallets are ready. Get to porting.

Bleach: Soul Carnival 2 (PSP)

Bleach: Soul Carnival 2 is an enjoyable – if somewhat relatively short – sidescrolling action RPG for the PSP, based on Tite Kubo’s Bleach franchise. The game looks visually appealing and goes for a “cute” look by using chibi versions of the characters. Despite the simplistic visuals, there’s depth in the gameplay and you’ll be amazed at the kind of fights that you’ll take part in as a bobble head-like version of Ichigo hacks, slashes, busts out getsuga tenshous, and even transforms into hollow mode while mowing down armies of hollows and the occasional Arrancar.

Go Games’ Bleach Online (PC, Browser-Based)

I’ve been seeing Bleach Online pop up in a lot of places these days (including my own site’s ads). Receiving a personal invite from a friend claiming that it’s “similar to Marvel Avengers Alliance, but with Bleach characters” was the straw that finally broke the camel’s back, as I have spent quite a bit of time mucking around with MAA. Bleach Online seems like something that I’d enjoy even if I don’t have enough free time to delve deep into what the game has to offer. I also figured I could post an entry about it given the theme of my site, maybe even help people who want to try the game but aren’t sure if it’s a real game or just a scam. If you're one of these people - it's not a scam. It's a real Bleach game that can be played on your browser.

First Things First: Legal Issues

Now, anybody who’s familiar with Bleach and the handful of anime games online knows that the characters, names, symbols and any other copyrighted IP in the games are being used without permission from the owners. Bleach Online is no different, and this one is particularly noticeable because it uses assets (namely from the audio) from other Bleach games – which is something that a big name developer will not give away freely (and something that is unnecessary for a legitimate online game developer because it’s easy to produce on their own.)

Basically, if you’re going to play this game, don’t expect too much and don’t get attached to your progress as it could disappear anytime, especially since Japan has started bolstering their online campaign against copyright infringement for manga and anime-related properties earlier this month.

Now, let’s get on with discussing the game itself.

Bleach: Dark Souls (Nintendo DS)

Technically, I’m supposed to review both Bleach: Blade of Fate and its sequel, Dark Souls. But after getting my hands on both, I realized that it’s essentially the same game, with Dark Souls getting minor upgrades such as a new story and additional characters. Unless you’re collecting every Bleach game in existence, there’s really no point in getting Blade of Fate when you can get Dark Souls instead.

As for the game itself, Bleach: Dark Souls is a 2D fighting game made by the same people behind Yuu Yuu Hakusho: Sunset Fighters for the Sega Megadrive, and it shows not just in the level of polish but also in the game design. For instance, the 4-way free for all fights through the use of foreground and background stages (granted, this mechanic has been around before Sunset Fighters, and has been around in many fighters since then).

Bleach: Dark Souls is a little bit hard to objectively review due to the timing of its release. On its own merits, the game is well-designed and will give you hours of fun. It features a ton of fighters based on Tite Kubo’s hit shonen franchise, and the graphics do a good enough job of letting you know which character is which, as well as showing off some of the trademark attacks and moves you’ll see on the anime/manga. It uses 2D spritework, so the Nintendo DS’s limited 3D capabilities is not a factor. The 2D graphics are as good as you’re going to get on the handheld.

Bleach: Versus Crusade (Wii)

Bleach: Versus Crusade is a 3D fighting game based on Tite Kubo’s long-running and extremely popular shonen franchise. It features 25 playable characters taken straight out of the Bleach manga and the anime as well as several of their alternate forms/transformations.

The game primarily uses the Wiimote and nunchuk for its controls, with the nunchuk’s joystick controlling the movement while the shoulder buttons and the wii mote buttons control the jumps, teleports (sonido and flash steps, actually), and special attacks. Normal sword attacks are handled by the wiimote’s motion controls, with the direction of the attacks corresponding with the direction of your wiimote slash.

The controls in Bleach: Versus Crusade is a significant step up from Bleach: Shattered Blade, as matches will no longer devolve into wagfests, mainly because the game now rewards strategic use of the attacks instead of being dependent on how fast you can shake the wiimote. However, being a fighting game, it’s still not as intuitive when compared to a gamepad setup, which is why it’s a good thing that the developers included support for the gamecube and the classic controller. I don’t use numbers to rate games but if I did, that move alone should be worth a point or two.

Visually, Versus Crusade had the right idea when it went with cel-shading – not just because it provided anime-like visuals, but also because it meant that the visuals aren’t hindered by the Wii’s hardware limitations. Versus Crusade looks as good as you would expect a Bleach game to look on a seventh generation console.

Bleach: the 3rd Phantom (Nintendo DS)

Bleach: the 3rd Phantom is odd in the sense that it’s both a side story for Bleach’s story during present time (right after the Soul Society arc, at the time of release) and a flashback to Soul Society’s past, back when Urahara Kisuke was still a captain and *SPOILERS* Aizen still hasn’t shown his true colors.

The flashback delves into the story of three characters that are made specifically for the game – a pair of twins, male and female, one of which will be controlled by the player (you can choose which one to play before starting a NEW GAME), and a shinigami captain. After the flashback, the story will skip straight to the series’ current timeline and follow Ichigo and crew at Kurakura town, where they will have to deal with the consequences of things that happened during the flashback.

If you’ve played any installment from the Super Robot Wars series of turn-based strategy role playing games (particularly the 32-bit ones), Bleach: the 3rd Phantom will be very familiar. In the interest of simplifying things, Bleach: the 3rd Phantom is basically Super Robot Wars, but instead of various mechas from a wide variety of anime and manga franchises, the game puts you in control of Bleach characters. Like most shonen animes, the power levels and fight scenes lend themselves well to turn based combat, because now you can use numbers, affinity, and a bunch of other stats to decide how powerful one character is compared to the other, while still making sense.

Bleach Shattered Blade (Wii)

If you’ve ever played Bleach GC: Tasogare ni mamieru shinigami on the Gamecube, Bleach Shattered Blade for the Wii will be very familiar. Barring a few graphical polishes and higher resolution, Shattered Blade looks like it was made on the same engine. The presentation is sleeker, and the supers no longer come in the form of crappy FMVs. In fact, they finally went ahead and added transformations (or power-ups, in the case of most of the characters). Unfortunately, all the updates and tweaks to the game are for naught because Bleach Shattered Blade for the Wii is significantly less enjoyable than its Gamecube predecessor.

The main culprit, and why it’s not even worth reviewing any other aspect of Shattered Blade, is the controls. Like many third party Wii games, Bleach Shattered Blade suffers from a forced attempt to use motion controls. There’s no option to use a classic or Gamecube controller (even though fighters tend to play better with buttons than waggle).

New J-Stars Victory VS. Video Features Fist of the North Star’s Kenshiro

Namco Bandai has just posted a new promotional video for their upcoming 3D brawler, J-Stars Victory Vs. This time around, it focuses on a bunch of its playable characters facing off against their respective adversaries. One of the more interesting parts here is the sequence featuring the characters Kenshiro and Raoh, the protagonist and main antagonist from Fist of the North Star.

You can check out the video below:

Bleach Heat the Soul 7 (PSP)

Bleach: Heat the Soul 7, as the name indicates, is the 7th (and possibly the last) installment in the ‘Heat the Soul’ line of Bleach fighting games on the PSP. There’s no need to do an introduction of the earlier installments of the series as the games have mostly stayed the same except for additional content (in order to keep them up to date with the manga/anime) and a few tweaks to the combat mechanics. All-in-all, it’s still a 3D cel-shaded fighting game featuring your favorite characters from Bleach (also, Sado.)

Changes, in a Nutshell

If you’re already familiar with the series and just want a quick rundown of what you can expect with HTS 7 compared to its predecessor, there are minor tweaks to the combat that, sadly, tend to slow down the pacing of the matches a bit. But it’s still enjoyable so don’t fret. It still runs in 30 frames per second - if you want smooth as butter 60 fps, you have to go back to Heat the Soul 4 and older, back when the games still lacked in-game transformations. Speaking of transformations, Ulquiorra now has one, so does Harribel and Ichigo can now turn into full Hollow. Additionally, there are now 4-way free for all (as opposed to 2 vs 2 tag) matches and special matches against giants, namely Allon and Yammy’s ressurecion.

Bleach GC: Tasogare Ni Mamieru Shinigami (Gamecube)

Don’t ask me what “Tasogare Ni Mamieru Shinigami” means. I don’t know either, but it doesn’t matter because Bleach GC Tasogare Ni Mamieru Shinigami is a 1 vs 1 fighting game based on Tite Kubo’s extremely popular shonen franchise. This means that A.) you don’t really need to know the reason why they’re hitting each other with swords and B.) even if you did, there’s already a wealth of backstory available via the manga, the anime, and all the websites on the Internet dedicated to the franchise.

As for the game itself, sadly, this is not one of the better Bleach games out there. Sure, it looks really impressive visually (taking full advantage of the Gamecube’s capabilities as you get smooth, buttery 60FPS and crisp cel-shaded visuals), but as a Bleach fighting game, it’s not very enjoyable. Even as a straight fighting game, it falls flat.

The gameplay itself is sound in concept – you get to control your choice of character, out of a bunch of choices available (well, you technically need to unlock majority of them first, but they can be unlocked via passwords or simply by going through the single player mode so it’s not a dealbreaker). Each character stays somewhat true to the series when it comes to the powersets, but only on the surface level. They all move as fast, hit as hard, and move like each other. It makes for a balanced game, but also a boring one. There’s also no transformations in the game, which is a mortal sin because one of the main selling points of the series are the various power-ups and transformations (such as shikai, bankai, etc.)

Bleach Blade Battlers 2nd (PS2)

Bleach is one of those anime franchises that is practically made for fighting games. Virtually every single character is a swordsman with flashy moves, with distinctive designs and their own specific transformation. Bleach Blade Battlers 2nd TRIED to take advantage of said rich videogame-oriented designs and somewhat succeeded.

The Game and the Story

If you searched for this game, chances are you are already familiar with Tite Kubo’s Bleach manga and anime franchise, and it’s one of the most popular shonen franchises today so there’s no need to provide the backstory. As for the game, it takes the characters from the Soul Society arc all the way to the first appearances of Grimmjow, Yammy and Ulquiorra, and puts them in a Super Smash Bros-type game.

Let’s get this out of the way first: the game is Japanese, but it’s a fighting game so you can play it even if you can’t read nor understand a single word. Besides, the menu has English text so you will be able to navigate it well enough to get into a match.

It does the characters justice – the moves are true to the series, and this is one of the first Bleach games to have actual transformations (as opposed to transformations that only occur during cinematic super moves ); Ichigo and the shinigamis that have bankais can go bankai, Shinji can use his hollow mask, and Grimmjow can use resurreccion. Of course, around the time that the game was made, many of the characters like Yammy and Ulquiorra have yet to show their transformations so you won’t find it in this game.