The Cutting Edge Starring Samurai ( Review Site )

Alba Meira

CAGiversary!
Hello CAG'ers young and old Im a former contestant on Sony PlayStation's The Tester ( Season 2 ) and I decided to actually review games in my spare time seriously while I havent done much on the video front I wanted to link people to my fan page where I review titles on.

Entitled The Cutting Edge Starring Samurai on facebook anyways if the post wont let me link I'll copy and paste an example of one of my reviews shortly.

Edit: It wont let me post links so I'll make sure to copy and paste an example.


Import Informative : Mobile Suit Gundam Battle Operation Review : By Terrence Tyrone Watson ( Samurai )

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Free to play from The Japanese Playstation Network.

Introduction: This game I managed to pick up because it was for free on the Playstation Network within the Japanese Store, much like most games are from time to time this had intrigued me quite a bit yet for most people they saw this game as a challenge. I personally wanted to dive into the info-structure of this game to understand this game on a more precise level within that being said in this review I will pretty much detail everything you need to play this game even if you are not a native Japanese Speaker. Now then without further ado lets begin! By time im done explaining this you will have everything you need to know until your ready to play this with other Japanese Players clear across the globe!


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A image of my custom Gundam its the Blue Destiny a limited edition model for this game.

Story: First and foremost the thing you need to know with this game is its strictly an online game of Earth Force Federation vs The Principality Of Zeon. ( I personally prefer Zeon myself but thats because of how I play with the choice mobile suits that are locked to The Principality Of Zeon. ) Besides that the game is a rather intricate game of crawl before you walk and walk before you can run and finally run before you can fly. If you dont know what that means then the simplest concept of this is. You wont start off with an amazing gundam you will start off with a standard issue Mobile Suit for both E.F.F and Zeon with that being said you will earn new suits through "Development" and you will progress through the ranks earning medals for your accomplished Missions win or lose you will still level up as time progresses onward.

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The how to play screen I play on "Type A" Which is the default control type


Gameplay: Now here are where things get interesting overall? The game has a loyal mix of Gundam Physics mixed in with Armored Core specifications. The closest thing I can compare it to would be Armored Core Silent Line granted it isnt as over the top dramatic as Silent Line. It still features a rather well and intricate battle system that keeps me wanting more overall. Now then this is important so do not forget it! This game is overall. "Free to play" "Pay to Continue." ( Optional ) what do I mean by that? If you are not paying the cost to continue your fight on Gundam Battle Front you are limited to 3/3 games this of course can be extended whenever you prestige or Rank Up every 10 completed levels but only once for the most part. This usually limits the average American Player like myself to 12 games per day with a 2-4-6 hour wait between each game due to the "Energy Consumption" system. Now then with Japanese players they have the option to pay for longer periods of game-play in the form of "Energy" they can also pay to earn higher rank parts. So its a matter of do you want to grind to win ( USA ) or do you want to pay to win ( Japan ) those are your options in general. I personally took the path of the grind to win because I live for this sort of challenge.

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The development line is where you get future blueprints on new items.

Fun Factor: Honestly this game has lots of different things to do and lots of different ways to go about them. But the most attractive feature of them all is the random events that are hosted by the makers of the game itself each one adding extra incentive to play more and to play often such as the current event upon the time of writing this article. ( The Lucky Haro Event ) where players who play matches and do well are given the lucky drawn in which return items would appear that normally wouldn't be placed within the development line at the end of the battles. The Development line being the line that shows you what you have earned during the end of each match. Which cannot be obtained until the status goes from 0% til [COMPLETED] Couple this up with progress through repeated battles and you would have earned yourself one hell of a game as the more and more you play the better and better your Mobile Suit skills will become better over time there are also extra options but I would rather go into detail with that into the next section as a lot of it has to cover that particular part of the review but for the most part this game is predominately trial and error.

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An example of some of the almost monthly events they have for this this one is the Haro Event.


Replay Value: With Mobile suit Gundam Battle Operation I would like to say that its replay value comes into the amount of things you can equip as there are as much as fourty different items for at least six different classes leading the possibilities to be endless. There is also the Pilot and Mobile Suit customization center complete with Decal customization so the amount of things you can customize in this game are nothing short of amazing. There are also medals you can earn and or equip within the medium of game-play each of these medals do different things ranging from increased attack power for your mobile suit to decreased time for base capturing and or base sabatoge. Within so many different things strictly unique to this game in general I had found it to be my favorite mech based game out. There is also things such as equipping weapons from your standard Dual Uzi's, To Beam Rifles , Sniper Rifles and Bazooka's in a effort to better your Gundam and its capabilities both E.F.F. and Zeon you will find yourself playing this quite a lot to say the least.

Personal Likes:

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My Personal Likes are listed below

Armored Core Like Interface. - Its one of its better aspects
Plenty of Mobile Suits to choose from. - Wide variety of Mobile Suits.
Beautiful graphics and Gameplay overall. - Its honestly amazing.
Astonishingly High Replay Value - I honstly enjoy this game a lot.


Personal Dislikes:

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See the lower left hand side of the screen that says 2/3 thats the energy section it means three plays per every 2 - 4 - 6 hour period.


My Personal Disikes are listed below

The energy system. - Its unfair really.
There is no Offline Mode - You have to play online.
There is no Gundam Testing Mode - You have to test it in actual combat.
The Development Line System ( Progress ) - 0% - 100% [COMPLETE] isnt needed.

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The end result screen where all of your scores are tallied up see that im in first.

Final Score: Honestly from an open minded perspective I give this game a 8/10 It would have gotten a 10/10 but it didnt because of the energy system and the lack of universal support for some of its features. I know and understand that the game was not meant for english players to play at all. But they should have known first and foremost that putting the game up for "FREE" on the Japanese store that people were going to flock all over this title. Im just one of the few American players that decided to stay and give the game a chance compeltely. So even with a proper sit down you can be one of the few USA Players to take the fight to the mobile suit battlefront overall. So its 10/10 without the energy system but since its imposed the final score is 8/10 due to the limitations it hampers upon its players itself this is a hinderance more so than anything as it cheapens the aspect of the actual games playability to begin with.

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Victory or defeat it all depends on how skilled you are
Japanese Games are some of my favorite games as I play a lot of them when I grow tired of American Games overall this sort of thing is that there is a challenge to be had within each and every sort of game that's possibly created. Its just that Japanese games are some of my personal favorites to tackle when im done with most American games. So if there is another import title that you feel I should look up for the PS3 dont hesitate to ask me and the fact that this one was Gundam didn't help at all either. A rather worthwhile experience if you know the odds and ends of it much like a child with a book I taught myself how to play the game and now its probably one of my personal favorite games to play as I play it multiple times a day ~ Samurai


Another Example of mines is as follows.

Warriors Orochi 3 Detailed Gaming Review By : Terrence Tyrone Watson ( Samurai )



by "The Cutting Edge Starring Samurai" on Wednesday, March 28, 2012 at 1:03pm ·

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Warriors Orochi 3: PSN Release in USA

Introduction: Welcome to my review on Warriors Orochi 3 personally this game. I thought was going to be in stores only such as gamestop and mom and pop places. But I was relieved to find out that it was a PSN only title! Soon after picking this game up on release day I wanted to dive right into it and see if it was worth the 50 USD price tag. Personally coming off of the Sengoku Basara Samurai Heroes hype train I needed a game that delivered most of the same. ( High flying asian style action ) KOEI to me delivers on all fronts but some fronts can be stronger than others. For this game being the most recent installment of the Warriors Orochi Franchise it had very large shoes to fill in comparison to the games that came before it. All in all does Warriors Orochi 3 Meet up to the standards of its fans? If you ask me? Personally I thought they did all of that and more.

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Story Mode: What you see is what you get.

Story: The Story in The Warriors Orochi Series can be summed up as The Dynasty Warriors Characters meet up with the Samurai Warriors characters in a cross over style game to defeat The Serpent King Orochi. Now the story in Warriors Orochi 3 I feel was more fleshed out as in comparison to their other games. For one without spoiling said game: The official ending to the game gives closure to this entire series. No cliffhanger endings here or endings that leave you wanting more. Everything is wrapped up with this games penultimate ending. Now that sort of thing is something that's rare in today's gaming world where every game wants to leave off on some dramatic cliffhanger all in a effort to milk the series for even more titles nope this one didnt go that way. One of the games more stronger points is that it didnt fall suit with most games that are yearly processed.

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Gameplay : 1 vs 1000 pretty much its just up to you if you want to be victorious or not.

Gameplay : Warriors Orochi 3 has the standard gameplay of a 1 vs 1000 beat up em game with the base of an entire field with loads of enemies for you to beat up upon. This sort of gameplay seems fairly straight forward but surprisingly it isnt its infact more technical than what it seems. The main critical point with this game is that what you have equipped on your weapons can often make and or break your chances of winning. A prime example being a character with 10+ Ice would have a better chance of winning that a character without anything added to his stats as the 10+ Ice character could have a chance of freezing his opponent for extra damage. With that being said this title isnt as easy as Sengoku Basara Samurai Heroes you cant just go head first into the enemy and expect to beat everyone down and out of the way. As far as stats are conserned to better your character all characters require something known as growth points to level up! If there not actually in the thick of things as in actually fighting with them. However if your actually using said character you can simply fight it out with the opponents that are given to you. for your traditional RPG style "Level Up!" one side fact which was brought up to me by my friend who was playing this game along side me most of badguys you fight however are all sharing the names of snakes ( To go with the Orochi motif ) outside of the main badguys example being. Cottonmouth , Coltan , Massciot , Etc. This starts to be come more noticeable in the later levels as those are the characters you run into quite a bit especially at the battle of Luoyang.


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Musou Attacks: A fun way to dispatch an opponent

Fun Factor: Warriors Orochi 3 Personally has a strong fun factor as in you'll be playing this game and enjoying it more so than playing it and wanting to finish it up. If simply for the large roster of characters and some of the new faces. Such as Ryu Hayabusa who is a Power Character and Ayane who is a Speed character. Which for those who are infact wondering: you unlock Ryu Hayabusa in chapter 2's The Battle Of Anegawa. If your not that far in the game you can forget about playing as him for the time being. I repeat you do not get Ryu Hayabusa off the break you have to unlock him. Other than that another fun thing about this game is The Musou Battlefields Mode where you actually get to create your own Warriors Orochi 3 battlefields. Where you yourself dictate how the battles are and how they turn out. For example I have the first stage in the game where every allied and enemy character are all Sumo Wrestlers. ( Just for laughs really ) or all Lu Bu's!

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Replay Value: If your goal is platinum expect to spend a lot of time here.

Replay Value: Warriors Orochi 3's replay value stems off of its weapon collection if your looking to make that easier you'll have to do two of the following things. Play Online for chances to get items called "Crystals" which are needed to forge the games more powerful items. Such as four star **** items and joke items such as Zhou Tai's Doctor Death. ( Which is a thermometer with a needle built into it. ) Or simply get a item which is known as a lottery ticket which allows you to get 10 weapons at random some one star some four star and some joke weapons it depends. For me personally? The later I was into the game the more ungodly good my weapon drops became to say the least. Doing this to an extent is whats going to extend the lifespan of this title. As well as unlocking the relationship missions which are a set of side missions which require your character to have a high enough bond with another character and sometimes three way bonds of friendship. This requires you to take multiple trips to the teahouse to boost your friendships up until you have to complete one mission to advance to a higher level. Needless to say you'll be going to the teahouse quite a bit in your game.

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Team Triple Attack: The way to get things done

Personal Likes:
My personal likes are listed below.

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Team Triple Attack: Strike A Pose!

Wide Variety of characters - You'll have plenty to choose from.
Musou Battlefields Mode - Create your own Warriors Orochi 3 Battles.
Ryu Hayabusa and Ayane - Guest characters from the Ninja Gaiden series.
Multiple Costumes - If you dont like a certain outfit you can choose another.

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Battle Maps: Hard to Navigate without pressing start.

Personal Dislikes:
My personal dislikes are below.

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The same map when you press start much easier to navigate huh?

Randomization of weapons - This gets tedious if your trying to get a certain one.
You have to play on Chaos for the best weapon addons. - I.E Verity , Echo , Etc.
Needs Damage Balancing - Some can kill you litterally in one Musou Attack. I.E Himiko.
Maps are Cluttered and Convoluted - Hard to know where you can go without pressing start.

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Final Score: 9.9/10 Epic Staredowns like this and more await you.

Final Score: Personally I thought this game was amazing and worth the 50 bucks I dropped on release day. Now most people are on and off about Warriors Orochi 3 personally I liked it a lot and it made my day playing it to say the least. But there is one major gripe I personally have about the game that destroys its chances of getting a full on 10/10 most if not all of the Samurai Warriors characters are their Samurai Warriors 3 Wii counterparts therefore. Koei hasen't given them a upgraded moveset. This dosent prevent them from being good in most cases like Oda Nobunaga who can still wreck shop regardless of how he's ported over. But certain characters like Oichi and Okuni kinda are left behind in comparison to the insanely good Xiahou Ba or my personal favorite Zhou Tai. And thats what makes me want to take off .1 point which turns this games score into 9.9/10 a minor flaw but too annoying not to ignore to say the least especially from a review point.

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Warriors Orochi 3 Leader Board: I was one of the first four people to platinum this game

Considering the fact I placed as the fourth fastest person in the world to finish this game. I pretty much enjoyed it the entire game itself was a fast paced non stop roller coaster of action packed fun. That gives this series its well deserved closure ~ Samurai

 
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