Theoreview - "Mugen Warriors 2: This Time It’s Personal"

Disclaimer: The following content is entirely fictitious and not to be taken seriously by anyone save for roaming yetis, epileptic trees, and alien colonists locked in peace talks to decide the fate of humanity. All non-existence threatening entities should look elsewhere for content that actually reflects reality.

Ever wanted to see Hatsune Miku beat the ever loving crap out of Master Chief with her hair? Well then, read-on…

This might be the single strangest phenomenon in the history of gaming: 12 developers from different studios across the world banded together to create the Dynasty Warriors equivalent to Super Smash Bros. And then did so again…and it. Is. AMAZING. Somehow, someway they managed to improve every problem with the original game, and then built layers and layers of thick, juicy depth on top of it. It’s the sequel everyone asked for, but no one ever dreamed we’d receive.

For those unfamiliar with this beautiful Frankenstein’s monster of a franchise, Mugen Warriors 2 (my fingers refuse to compose that god-awful subtitle) borrows characters from the franchises of Koei Tecmo, Nintendo, Bungie, Capcom, Platinum Games, Ubisoft, Sega, (yes, the list keeps going) Namco Bandai, Valve, Square Enix, Sony, and now Lucas Arts (oh have we missed you so) and shoves them all into a Dynasty Warriors style beat ‘em up. It’s less manic than Smash, but even more over-the-top than standard Warriors games.

The premise is decidedly simple: Orochi from Koei Tecmo’s other spin-off franchise, convinces the heroes of feudal China and Sengoku era Japan to unite against a common threat from across space and time that threatens to conquer their land. This “common threat” is, naturally, the smorgasbord of characters from the various developers franchises, who themselves are summoned by a mysterious deity named Elosnoc Ved and told to eliminate these warriors and their god before they destroy the fabric of reality. Naturally, backstabbing occurs and both groups reconcile their differences to unite against their “true” enemy, and return to their own universes. Thankfully, the developers recognized how absolutely trite and facile this plot was, and as such don’t take it too seriously. However, this is not to say that they left the writing to one over-imaginative otaku and called it a day.

Rather, where KT and co. go the extra narrative mile is in the Hero Quests. For context, there are about 150 characters in total. A little under half of them are from Dynasty Warriors and Samurai Warriors (though modeled after their Sengoku Basara counterparts, courtesy of Capcom). Of these, the 80+ non-Warriors characters each have their own brief (4-5 battles), but unique stories where the player can watch them interact with each other. These stories are generally amusing (a personal favorite being the repeated incredulity and jokes about Aiden Pierce’s name) occasionally side-splitting even, though due to the sheer amount of them, only the most hardcore of players will conceivably drudge up the time and patience to view them all.

However, considering that each story also serves as a sort of tutorial for each character they are always worth returning to whenever you want to understand a character you are unfamiliar with. And this is pretty much necessary due to almost every character possessing some sort of unique gameplay mechanics reminiscent of their home franchise. In a somewhat ironic twist, the franchise that I suspect the fewest players are familiar with (Musou) are also the easiest to pick up since they all utilize the same combat mechanics from Dynasty Warriors 8 (albeit slightly adjusted so that they all have one unique, but fixed weapon and one that you can replace from a list of 60). In contrast, the other characters run on a different battle system entirely.

As with the Warriors characters, combat consists of pressing a light attack, heavy attack, and super attack button in a rhythmic (read: frantic) fashion. But, unlike their KT counterparts who could probably be played competently by a squirrel duct taped to a keyboard, the guest characters of Mugen Warriors 2 allow you to finally press the square button after pressing triangle…

…I know, it’s revolutionary stuff. In implementing this Ninja-Gaiden esque combo system, players can now string together a staggering amount of visually stunning, free-form combos that drag enemies into the air and beneath the earth, all in a glorious locked 60 fps (yes, even on the WiiU).

But wait! In addition to these movesets characters can swap between a second (or occasionally third) weapon/stance on the fly to create more advanced combos should the opportunities present themselves. Platinum Games and the Devil May Cry team, must have been working overtime, because the resulting system is something akin to Bayonetta on a cosmic scale.

And in that wonderful absurdist universe lies something no Bayonetta game or DMC has ever possesed: customizable weapons, Dynasty Warriors style. But now, with universal attachments that have their own transferable abilities that make cosmetic changes (e.g. adding fire damage to a weapon). It isn't much more more advanced than their Dynasty Warriors counter parts, but the inclusion enough is titanic from a longevity standpoint with respect to the volume of well-developed characters.

But it is not only the player characters that are looking better than ever. The enemies have received a massive overhaul as well. In standard Warriors games, if you scored 1000 KOs on a map, your friends would laugh at you for being so lazy. But in this game, such a feat practically warrants a lifetime achievement award, as these mooks most certainly do not wear red shirts. The standard enemy AI has been improved to make them block, attack, evade, and even initiate their own super attacks. On the lower difficulties you can still pick most off, without too much trouble, but they take a bit of a concentrated effort to put down. Fortunately, this grants one both the time and the impetus to learn a character’s strengths and eccentricities so that the army of animators’ hard work will not go to waste. Indeed, this is easily the most technically advanced and rewarding Warriors game to date. And in more ways than one.

Players can now issue orders to their generals around the map in real time, which goes a surprisingly long way towards speeding up engagements and handling troublesome objectives. You can even queue up commands for a general if you prefer to play the game more tactically, though bear in mind that since the game does not pause while issuing orders, an enemy in the area could interrupt you while you’re ordering Gordon Freeman to lead an elite team of koopa troopas to assassinate Guybrush Threepwood. Nowhere does this feature become more central though than in the competitive multiplayer.

Do you remember those “duels” from Dynasty Warriors 3 and 4? Of course not. They were terrible, completely halted the flow of the battle, and gave some unlucky individuals radiation sickness from all the awfulness. Okay, maybe not that last one, but they were a far cry from a true competitive multiplayer mode. So how does Mugen Warriors 2 handle it? By pitting 2-4 players against each other in a standard Warriors style engagement on a dozen or so super-sized maps. Due to the greatly expanded tactical options and player customization for serious players, in accordance with the various automatable functions for the not-so-serious ones, this mode offers a near endless amount of competitive and casual enjoyment.

And, if that wasn’t awesome enough there’s even a miniature Empires mode consisting of a series of battles and grand strategy territory claiming ala Civilization or Age of Wonders III. At the time of writing I can’t comment on how the community will react to such a mode, but considering that some typically single-player features like alliances, betrayals, bribes, gambits, and commander capturing are functional in this manic multi-player landscape, I suspect that it will go a long way towards extending the game’s longevity.

If there ever was proof that developers can come together to make something beautiful without simultaneously defecating on it just prior to release, this game is it. From the stupefying breadth of detail placed into each and every gameplay mode to the bizzare, yet brilliant decision to excise all Sonic characters from this franchise, Mugen Warriors 2 embodies a visible leap in AAA game design. It’s as if KT (the leaders of this developer super-group) wanted to make one Warriors game to end them all, as Mugen Warriors 2 makes almost every Warriors game (and even a few character action games) obsolete by comparison. I cannot recommend this game strongly enough.

EDIT: It just hit me that this game is essentially the spiritual successor to Guilty Gear 2: Overture, right down to the amazing assortment of remixed music. If you're unsure of what this game is like, check it out.