Dynasty Warriors 9 Reviews

  • Hazar KhallHazar Khall2,479,553
    10 Aug 2019 10 Aug 2019
    7 1 0
    Hello and welcome to my review of Dynasty Warriors 9. It's hard to review a series game because it has to hold up to not only a game itself, but the title its from. In this instance, What came before, and what is now, both have to affect my score. Playing this as game one for ones self would introduce you to a fun hack and slash, but a poor DW game.

    For those uninitiated with the series, or similar series such as Samurai Warriors or Warriors Orochi, the Story portion will answer WHAT Dynasty Warriors is, and the first portion of every section explains the basics of what section you are reading.

    If you HAVE played a DW, SW, WO title, then I have labeled where to jump to next, via bold wording or the wording next to the review brackets, simply to try to avoid an inclusive review.

    Wasting no more time dear reader, Lets buckle up and dive into the what, why, when, of this game.

    STORY know me, skip me
    Pronunciation:
    Wei - Way, colored in game as blue
    Wu - Woo, colored in game as red
    Shu - Shoo, colored in game as green
    Jin - Gin, colored in game as light blue
    (I sadly can't confirm if these colors were historically accurate to the armies of the time)

    Dynasty Warriors is a Hack and Slash game based around the very real Han period of ancient China. The year roughly 200 AD.
    Shorthand, you play as the Chinese kingdoms of Wei, Wu, Shu, and later Jin, all 4 being the largest factions who had an actual chance to control China.
    And, by hack and slash, I mean you use the X button 85% of the time. 90% in titles where X even skips cut scenes.

    This is done in campaigns, where you typically play one faction, through what is typically agreed as the beginning of the "Three kingdoms era", usually you putting the stop to a rebellion known by history as "the Yellow Turban rebellion", and ends either at the historical Wu Zhang Plains, histories last greatest clash between the Shu and Wei empire, or PAST that, which is when Jin, the final winners of the era, officially make their moves to be on top.

    Playable characters are "Officers", famous officers, strategists, and otherwise incredibly important people of the time.

    *** Spoiler - click to reveal ***


    As the game is based in China, the locations of the battles that take place never change, and outside of some games having "hypothetical routes" they play out as they play out. Meaning, "Battle of Chibi" really WAS a naval loss for the kingdom of Wei against the much, MUCH smaller kingdoms of Shu and Wu.

    As this is a fantasy take, however, things get a little... different.
    Officers are basically super powered. You can "K.O" (Koei censoring "kill") 500, 1000, 2000 enemies in a single map. Basically rank and file troops are filler, meant to be there as actual troops while Officers go toe to toe. Officers go by an RPG leveling system, and in many games have tiered weapons as well.

    There really isn't too much else to add, and in reality it is something you can google and get all the info.
    As its a fantasy game, its worth noting here, some traits or feats were exaggerated, some officers present didn't actually exist (Example, Bao Sanniang which no I can't pronounce), a few battles didn't happen, though those ones are usually special stages.
    An example is the Wu officer Sun Ce (Soon Say) dies early in his life, thus having his brother take control of the Empire. Well, in some games, you fight literal ghosts. In others, you PLAY Sun Ce, get ambushed, and mission over. In others, cut scene and boom he's gone. Others don't even HAVE the stages, its just Ce in control one mission, Sun Quan the next.

    Controls / Game play my review starts here
    As a hack and slash title, you run around the map, capturing bases, defeating enemy officers, and following objectives during battle. These range from helping execute a fire attack, helping your allies get from one part of the map to the other, overtaking an enemy army or taking a castle.
    All of this is done in chapters, split between the factions as well. Any objective usually had SOME historical relevance (outside of fetch quests)

    You use the left stick to move around, the X button to attack, the B button to preform special attacks referred to as "Musou" (Moo-So or Moo-Sow, early game dependent), You call a horse to you by holding the left trigger, and you collect items, new weapons, and experience as you finish quests, beat officers, and progress in the story

    Veteran players will remember the mission system of previous titles, cut scene, battle, cut scene. Later we had map tiles to play around with as a free mode, then an ambition mode that turned it all back into cut scene, battle, cut scene. For the most part, we were put directly on the map we were battling on. Si Shui Gate was a gate, New He Fei Castle was an enormous castle map, Escape of Changban was a long roaded map with a ton of ambushes.

    New to the title of Dynasty Warriors, We now have an open world map to deal with. Something of a living battle map, the open world is the entirety of the country of China, showing you points of interest, where officers are, missions, fishing spots, places to buy hideaways (houses, new to DW) and even shows where the historical armies were clashing. Every now and again if you idle, some unnamed officer here or there loses, but otherwise the story and the battles don't progress without you.

    Now as stated before we play by factions. Well, When you explore the map, you unlock places, in the same fashion as Assassins Creed. With me so far? From grey to green you can see the entire overview of China, an impressive amount of land to trek, even WITH a horse you can call and level up...
    You also get fast travel. Also new to the title.
    Your officer also gets a grappling hook, usable by right bumper. ALSO new to the series. Oddly, also much like AC. Most of the walls, castle or otherwise, can be grappled over.

    Any area of the game you have previously unlocked is open to travel to. By anyone of any faction, anytime, in and out of combat. Play.... Chapter 5 Wei and start in a camp? Quit, load up.... Shu 3, and bam, whoever you pick can travel RIGHT to where Wei 5 started. Immediately.
    Fast travel is ONLY limited to the DIRECT location a battle takes place but nothing stops you from fast traveling to a position mere yards away. As side missions are optional and truthfully only really 4 in the entire game are required for achievements, you could in theory run through chapter in minutes as opposed to the hour or so of doing everything you can.

    If any of the above sounds broken in the least, you can understand one of the reasons this game isn't doing so well.

    A positive note is the character roster. It showcases even more officers than DW8, already a step past the initial intro of Jin and its many additions a few games prior.

    The game tried to offer fishing, animal taming, crafting, and other bits of exploration to help make the games attempt at open world work, but it's done in such a fashion to be awkward. It's really, really hard to try to get into fishing, inviting officers over to your hideaway for tea, going out looking for a blue tiger to tame (really) while you hear, from the map away, an assault officer say he needs reinforcements. As the ENTIRE series has been about you going through the story of Ancient China, the everyday life simulator parts they added were just flat unneeded. More assaults, staged ambushes, anything would work better.
    Duke Nukem Didn't take an entire level knitting scarves, why would Cao Cao (Cow Cow, or Sow Sow, depending on which game you believe tbh) fish for 2 hours.

    The battles are, as stated before, historical and roughly accurate. You play them at the pace, with the officers, at the times that they happened in history, roughly.
    However, You NOW only have to play the main missions... So a very quick breakdown:

    In past titles, Battle of Chi bi. You fought navy vs navy, with the game making magic the cause of a change of wind, letting a fire attack happen. Boats are chained together, a tiny fire boat hits the large Wei navy, huge fire, LARGE Wei loss.
    In previous titles, it all happens on the map. Pang Tong is chaining WHILE Zhuge Liang (Zhoo Gae Lee-ong) is chanting for wind, WHILE Huang Gai is boating.

    In DW9, You are tasked with finishing the battle via targeting Cao Cao.
    *The Fire boat doesn't succeed unless you back up Huang Gai
    *The winds don't change if you don't go TO the alter and finish the side quest.
    *Don't find Pang Tong, the historical chaining doesn't happen.

    Remember I said things were leveled? Well you can be level, 12. The story has the story mission set at level 20, side missions level 12.
    THE ONLY penalty for not doing side missions is that the missions level stays up.
    Doing side missions makes the living battle map change, you get rewarded, and the level of the enemies you fight at the chapters main mission lower. Otherwise, story advances, cut scenes and all, as if you did EVERYTHING. Even FAILING a mission shows a CUT SCENE WIN at mission closure.

    GRAPHICS / SOUND
    Koei is well known for putting rock music of sorts into their games, and this Chinese inspired sound track does not disappoint fans of the series. Every song is meant to either inspire you, or set a somber tone for what you know is going to be tragedy.

    The graphics are pretty well done, rain is rather awkward because of how sharp things look and snow just looks out of place, though.

    A recurring theme of recent titles, on the other hand, is lag, clipping textures, and low enemy level counts. This game shows us this in spades.

    The game doesn't like its own awkward rain, so many times, the few occurrences of enemy troops that surround you also cause the game to lag.
    As well, should there BE a decent number of troops, you can actually watch them vanish if you travel too far or spin your camera too fast. Honestly. It's rather awkward to go to use a special move, only to have a vacant space in front of you.

    The voices acting is decent, The lips aren't synched but thats hardly something you notice, the floating heads with dialogue, clearly heard from wherever on the entire map its said, though, is a little uncanny because of just how few generic faces are used. Get ready for the enemy assault commander, your relief commander, and your named but not important general, to ALL look the same.

    DIFFICULTY
    Dynasty Warriors is known for its "chaos" difficulty, a difficulty that turns even the weakest, lowest level peasants into a threat on par with Lu Bu, historically a man of grand stature known for INSANE SCARY strength. SAYING Lu Bu is portrayed like saying Voldemort to certain people. "Nintendo hard" comes to mind

    This is one of the few Dynasty warriors titles what does not require you to beat any stages at all on chaos difficulty, thus, this game is a grind, pure and simple.
    Adding in idle time, with which I admittedly had quite a lot of, my in game time states 115 hours. None of it was too challenging, 2-3 out of 10 for most of the game. You can grind for levels, and items and equipment are used between all characters and factions, so only the initial game should pose a challenge, as everything can be done on easy.

    In truth its a test of patience. There is an achievement for killing 100,000 troops. Even taking my time in a chapter lead to about 1000-1500 tops.
    Fishing 100 fish is something that will net you cash but you have to go out of your way for.
    Getting 20 relationships to max with one person is also something you have to go out of your way for.

    As far as hack and slash titles go, this one at least offers the chance to learn history while your brain turns off and your thumb mashes x.

    SCORE / COMPLETION
    Things would be different if this were a title of any other name. If this were a game of armies, this title would receive a higher score. As Koei's baby, Dynasty Warriors has a lot of standards to hold itself to. You can't use more expensive paint on a crappier house and expect only make bank.

    This game gets just under 3 stars for the title it is. The length of the 100%, being anywhere from 80-115 hours to get everything, ends up being a grind, and as that grind isn't put towards the game setting wise, story wise, even relevance wise, the extra game fluff ends up falling short. How so?

    You wouldn't play Dragon Ball Z and spend 5 hours making pies. Training? Sure.
    You wouldn't play Halo and spend 3 hours inspecting shuttle cuffs. Firefight and emblem swap? Sure.
    You wouldn't play Forza and WALK around the block for 2 hours, discussing the weather and pie recipes with people passing by. Idle in the garage making upgrades? Sure.

    The open world aspect added to Dynasty Warriors could have been so much more but it was implemented in such a fashion you'd expect from games such as Assassins Creed, Fallout 3, My time at Portia, Lego batman... you know, anything with a REASON to bunk around.

    The CORE of Dynasty Warriors is its hack and slash nature, set in ancient China, where you learn the history and kick ass.
    The unnecessary additions look as though they were meant to fill in an enormous map, with little impact on the story. Many of the tasks and achievements in game are a hassle, and not in the rewarding sense.

    My best advice would be to play Dynasty Warriors 6 or 7 if you want a pretty decent, RECENT DW game, or play Warriors Orochi if you are looking for hack and slash in its glory, as WO mixes multiple games (Dynasty, Warriors, Samurai) into one game with a custom story, thus, taking out the need to be on point.

    Dynasty Warriors 9? It looks nice, it plays decent, but it tried to add so much from where 8 left off without fixing many of the issues that you dealt with in 8.
    To be honest with you, I finished this title because I could, so I could understand its dislike.
    3.0
  • KENT HAMMERKENT HAMMER526,947
    16 Feb 2018
    2 12 0
    Hello, I decided to make a video review for this game and also show some Lu Bu Game play. Hope this helps someone decide if this game is for them or not.

    This video was first shown on my new YouTube Channel "Dynasty of Warriors"

    I am a long term fan of the series going right back to Dynasty Warriors 3 on PS2. Its also really good news for the series that they have finally brought back an English Dub and its a nice new twist being open world for the first time.

    It's the huge feeling of scale that hits you this time around.


    Thanks for watching guys!
    5.0
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