DP Challenge 30/100 - Muramasa: The Demon Blade

Game: Muramasa: The Demon Blade

Ranking: 45/100

Score: 81.94%

Have you ever spent time playing a good old hack-and-slash game and thought, part way through dismembering an enemy, "If only this game contained more beautifully hand-drawn art inspired by Sumi-e paintings?" Then Muramasa: The Demon Blade is the game for you!

Representative of actual in-game art.
(source: ign.com)

Intro

The game seems to hark back to the old arcade days, as there is actually very little to the intro. The pre-game credits and trailer show off the unique art style and hint at the story, but there is very little information on the game or the prologue. The manual is well-spaced out, colourful and has lots of information on the controls and actions you can perform within the game.

When the player is ready to start the game, they have very little idea what is going on. Even the manual is no help on this front; having read through the entire thing, it still wasn't apparent exactly what the game was about. Although the manual explains what you can do in the game in detail, it doesn't explain why. For example, there is a good paragraph on how to cook in the game, but not a word on why the player would want to do this - does it increase health? Is it used to bribe people? Is it just some mini-game? The player has no idea without simply jumping in and hoping for the best.

Although this lack of up-front information appears to be of intentional design, the game could have used that other arcade-style example of pre-game explanation; the automatic demo. Some brief footage of gameplay within the repeated credits would have shown the player a glimpse of what to expect without adding a lot of exposition. It would also have been nice to see a brief premise and game objective in the manual somewhere.

Okay, so you're about to get your head kicked in, but look at how pretty everything is!
(source: ign.com)

Getting Going

The player has two characters to choose from, which sends them on a completely different story depending on who they choose. The player can also choose two modes; an easy mode which focuses on the story over combat strategy, and a hard mode where players are expected to master the moves and play tactically in order to progress. From this point on, after an interactive tutorial which familiarises the player with the moves they can perform, the story begins and the player takes control. The game plays like a standard hack-and-slash (a la Golden Axe), but with Metroidvania elements thrown in; to progress to different areas, players must gain specific swords to break through barriers. In easy mode, this plays very much like the Sub-Space Emissary mode of Super Smash Bros Brawl, only with some vague RPG elements thrown in where players can equip various weapons, accessories and power ups. The game contains map features that point you in the rough direction of where you're meant to go, so it's quite difficult to get completely lost. Fighting in the game feels fairly pleasing, and there are plenty of satisfying thwacks and crunches when the player makes contact with their enemies, as well as clear flashing red graphics when a hit point is taken or dished out.

Sometimes the feedback is a little over the top. After every bout of combat, a stats screen is displayed showing how many XP the player gained, along with extra points for an unscathed victory, a quick victory, and all manner of other win conditions. This utterly breaks the immersion and happens so often that, if the player is anything like me, aggressive button mashing becomes a staple of the game just to get through all of these information screens. Speaking of screens, the simple act of equipping your character is somewhat unintuitive. There are several menu screens where the player can view their collected items; they can scroll through these items and when highlighted, a legend at the bottom of the screen informs them which button will select it and which button will return them to the menu. When you try to select an item, nothing happens; no cue it has or hasn't been selected, no information. Turns out, one has to go to an entirely different screen to equip and use items or weapons; pity the game didn't make this clear. I only discovered this through trial-and-error; a fine way to master a game, but not to master the menu screens. The tutorial is also a bit of an info-dump; although interactive so the player can get a feel for the controls, all moves are shown to the player in one fell swoop at the beginning of the game. Good luck remembering all of those when you fight your first enemies about ten minutes and a bunch of cut-scenes later. Oh, and one thing I feel compelled to add; in the forty-odd games I have played on the Wii up to this point, this is the first one where I experienced a crash. During the tutorial. Hadn't even got into the game.

A simplified menu would be of great use, or even just a message telling the player they need to equip items on a certain page. The setup is that there are menu pages to provide information on collected items, and a page to equip them; just state this and separate the menu into information and equipping. Or, be really radical and just show information for a highlighted item on the equip pages. Given that the sheer number of information pages shoved in front of the player during gameplay could do with being pared down, a tutorial which introduces players to new moves as they progress would probably add to the problem of pulling players out of the game. Perhaps adding a feature where players could recall the tutorial if they so desired might be handy; available to players if they need it, but not in the way if they don't.

"Umm... Hi?" This is one of the less weird bosses in the game. Get used to it.
(Source: ign.com) 

Fun

The game throws the player into the action, as they have to navigate their way through the many 2D screens which comprise the game world. There are a number of random acts the player may need to perform on each screen - collect soul power and items lying about, fight enemies, or talk to other characters in order to find out more about what's going on. The game is very story-driven, and the player finds out more about who the character they are playing is and the predicament they are in as the game progresses; there are two characters to choose from, and they both have very different stories. The player cannot draw their sword unless enemies are present (helpfully denoted by an exclamation mark and sound effect heralding their arrival); when this occurs, they can perform numerous ground, aerial and special attacks. Defeating enemies gains the player XP and it is in their interest to level up frequently. The higher the player's level, the more health, power and vitality they possess. This not only affects their strength and durability in the game, but the type of swords they can wield. This is the major gimmick of the game; players have to gain specific sword types to progress through the game, but they gain the ability early on to forge swords. The swords the player can forge is based on their soul points, their level, and the swords they have forged beforehand, meaning that players have to choose a unique path of sword creation which can be different in each playthrough. The swords that the player collects during the gameplay are used to break certain coloured barriers; this puts a heavy emphasis on backtracking and exploration, although a handy map is provided which is filled in as the player progresses and points them in the right direction for each task.

Although in theory there is a lot for the player to do, in practise there is an awful lot of gameplay where the player is just waking from screen to screen, backtracking but facing no tasks or obstacles. On one hand, this allows the player to get quickly from point A to point B, but on the other, it gets boring and repetitive very quickly. The combat itself is rather manic and doesn't lend itself to the tactical strategies the tutorial postulates about. Furthermore, the player's blade is automatically sheathed if there are no enemies about, so good luck trying to practise any of those moves the tutorial threw at you before encountering any enemy characters.

The player could easily face additional threats or be able to find new collectibles upon revisiting an area; this would cut down on the noticeable amount of simply walking from one location to another to advance the game along. There is a power that allows players to transport to specific shrines (powers which have a one-time use and have to be collected or purchased in the game), but as it's not apparent from the map where these shrines are in relation to significant areas, it has limited use. Making these clearer on the map would make their use more viable. Another thing which would make getting to grips with the character's moves easier would be a training area either within the game world itself or as a separate option. Being able to fight against a practise opponent without the tutorial forcing you to perform certain moves would be helpful in getting to grips with moves the player might have forgotten since the initial tutorial.

"Who died and made me Samus?" You need to acquire a sword powerful enough to break this barrier; guess what you have to do now.
(source: ign.com)

Visuals

The whole look of the game is very striking; reminiscent of the scrolling 2D hack-and-slash games of the early nineties, but with distinctive Japanese-style brushwork which almost makes the game feel like playable paper puppetry. The maps in the game are also designed in keeping with this theme. The in-game world is vivid and colourful without appearing twee.  Anything the player can interact with is clearly labelled upon collision with the button to press and the action that will perform (usually entering a room or pathway, talking to a character or picking up an object). Whenever an enemy threat is approaching, the player is notified by a large exclamation mark and sound effect, which means the player is unlikely not to notice an imminent attack.

One minor niggle with the display triggering when you can perform and action is that it doesn't detect when the player has visited an area. There are some places with several rooms that the player can access, and all the entrances look identical. The collision display will change when the player has just left a room, but will look the same on all other rooms, regardless of whether the player has entered them before. Also, the menu screens do not reflect the artwork style of the game and maps, which is a bit of a shame; this might be a translation issue, however.

It would be really useful if the colour or description changed when the player collides with a room or pathway they have already used once. In areas where there are numerous identical entrances to rooms, it would make it simpler to keep track of where the player has visited and where they have not. Using the same style to show the menu options both in and before entering the game would also have been a nice touch.

Hmm. Maybe there's an impeding swathe of enemies here?
(source: explosion.com)

Intelligence

The game offers two modes of play; an easy and a hard mode. The main difference between the two are that hard mode makes it much more difficult for the player to block an enemy move, and the player will take ten times more damage when attacked compared to easy mode. In easy mode, a player can easily block an enemy attack by attacking said enemy; this would not work in hard mode. The two different modes cater for all types of players. Although the enemies themselves don't really behave different whether in easy or hard mode, they each have some different methods of attack; some are aerial, making the player leap up to reach them; some attack in swarms; some can teleport around the scene using smoke bombs. There is a specific style to each enemy type that the player can get to grips with and use to anticipate the kind of attack, while there is still an element of surprise if a certain enemy type suddenly wields a different weapon.

The main issue with the AI in this game is that the enemy characters do not really react to the player at all. They have their methods of attack, and never seem to deviate from this. Even in hard mode, the player can advance a great deal simply from just mashing the attack button and avoiding being hit too much. In easy mode, they don't even need to bother with the latter.

It would be interesting if the enemies changed their attack based on the player's behaviour. For example, if the player kept spamming aerial attacks, the enemy character would learn to dodge this and perhaps try to keep the player grounded. Given that easy mode is clearly geared up towards players who just want to enjoy the story and don't particularly play games a great deal, a 'medium' mode would have been a nice feature; something between so easy it becomes dull and so hard the average player could end up frustrated.

Each sword has a unique special move. Just like that one there.
(Source: ign.com)

Immersion

The game allows the player to choose one of two characters to play as, and upon starting the game, the player knows next to nothing about them. As they progress, they discover more of the characters' back stories, what is going on in the game world, and how the two characters' stories intertwine. This creates a level of intrigue that draws the player into the world and keeps them coming back. Although players don't exactly learn new skills as they progress, they are able to gain new swords. These provide new special attacks (each sword has a single unique special attack), and players can choose to equip these based on both power and the action of the special skill. There are a few nice touches when it comes to replenishing health, which help to tie the actions into the game world. Players can enter tea houses and purchase snacks to consume; these are accompanied by a cute interactive animation. They can also find or purchase cookery books, which allow them to make health-refilling snacks from the raw ingredients found throughout the levels and store them in their inventory for later use.

Despite this, the game feels somewhat flat. There is a considerable amount of walking about without any other immediate task to perform, and very little of the in-game information imparted to the player is done in a way which fits the world. Often, text explaining new power ups, swords and events are shown through pausing the action and flashing up a message which is very literal in content; this pulls the player out of the world somewhat. The goals also don't seem to vary; find an area, kill a boss character, gain a sword. Besides fighting other enemies to increase XP, there isn't really much else of importance to do; cooking up health items or forging swords hardly count as side quests and in this area, the game feels very prescriptive. This also creates a problem with achievements, as there are very few short term goals in the game. Players generally have to keep going for quite a while, gameplay wise, before completing any kind of goal. Coupled with the use of save points as opposed to a save game option, this means that players can't treat the experience as a casual half-hour play session, yet the longer they play, the more noticeable it becomes that there is little depth to the game.

Providing more objectives, or even more story elements such as lore items, would increase playability and keep a player's interest. The idea of fighting enemies to increase XP could be expanded on to include a variety of tasks or side-quests to create a more immersive experience. Perhaps allowing the player to find different ways to interact with the existing environment upon gaining new sword powers would help to distract players from realising they are constantly backtracking between locations. Generating new obstacles upon revisiting a location would also help with this.

Once again, video games bombard fox spirits with unrealistic body expectations.
(Source: siliconera.com)

Camera

The camera is 2D and focuses on the player, so each screen will scroll according to the player's movement. The camera movement is smooth and keeps up with the player's movements around each screen.

There is one massive issue with the camera, however. For some reason, the action can take place outside of the boundaries of the player's TV screen. This means that attacking an enemy when the player cannot see the enemy, or even their player character, is a common occurrence. Many a time I have defeated an enemy attack by blindly mashing the attack button while both my player character and the enemy I'm attacking are off-screen. Having changed all the settings on my TV screen and had the same results, I'm fairly confident this is a game resolution issue and not a TV problem.

The safe zone for displaying the game needs to be more restrictive to stop characters wandering off into areas where the camera doesn't follow, thus preventing the issue of having fights occur off-screen.

Well, that sucks. Good job I can stop and forge some more.
(Source: ign.com)

Controls

The controls are fairly simple to use; direction buttons move the player, and there is one standard attack button, one special move button and one button to swap swords. The use of the 'A' button as an 'action' button makes gameplay decision simple - any item in the game which the player can interact with is triggered with the same button. The game also supports several controllers, so the player can use the Wiimote and Nunchuck, a classic controller, the Wiimote alone or a GameCube controller.

The menu controls are not so simple, as there are options the player simply cannot access using the controls stated on-screen. For example, setting equipment can only be done on one specific screen, but there are on-screen instructions which imply the player can do this on other screens. Another missed opportunity appears to be configuring the game for the Wii motion controls; the fact that these are not used suggests that game is a port from another system. It seems a crying shame that a game so heavily focused on swords and blades doesn't allow the player to fight enemies by waving the Wiimote around.

The addition of Wiimote sword controls has been done in other games (Twilight Princess and Red Steel spring to mind), so it isn't an unheard of mechanism. It seems a real pity that this kind of control feature wasn't added into a game where the major gimmick is based around swords and swordplay. Given that so many different controller types are supported, the potential negative implications (such as RSI) would have been easily avoided by the player simply switching from a Wiimote and Nunchuck setup to the Wiimote alone.

Not sure which is creepier - an enormous centipede boss, or an enormous centipede boss which puts its two pincers up to physics.
(Source: ign.com)

Ideas

The artwork throughout the game is interesting and creates a consistent theme. One interesting feature is that the player's sword is damaged slightly with every attack - once it has been broken, the player has to switch to another sword until it has 'recharged'. This prevents players from going through the game using only the best possible sword available to them. Other gameplay elements such as the sword forging add a little uniqueness to each playthrough, as different skills can be accessed depending on which sword path the player chooses to go down - players have to commit to a particular sword lineage when forging more powerful weapons. The different difficulties, along with the ability to switch between them during a playthrough, allow players to choose how they wish to progress through the game; they can either power blindly through the game and enjoy the story, or face a real challenge with harder hitting and stronger enemies. Another nice touch comes from when a player visits the hot springs to recharge their health and soul power; sometimes the other character will show up and engage in a little banter with the character currently in play.

The gameplay features seem to be spread very thinly across the whole experience. There is limited capacity to explore the occasional different route or enter buildings which may conceal power-ups or enemies (or sometimes nothing at all), but overall the player just spends their time dashing across the screen and sometimes hitting things. This repetitiveness becomes noticeable rather quickly; at some points in the game, it feels as though the only purpose to continuing to play the game is to uncover the story by reaching a point where another cutscene will be played.

If the intention of the game is to make developing the story the reward for the player, then adding elements of this outside of the cutscenes would make the experience more interesting.  Players could discover lore items which give them more information, or talk to characters hidden away in the optional areas. Even some visual cues which appear upon revisiting an area could add some intrigue in this regard.

Momohime is having a really bad day.
(Source: gamefaqs.com)

Memory

The whole art design of the game is beautiful, unique and gives the game a distinct identity. The atmosphere of a cartoony feudal Japan is created through the art design of the levels, characters and maps, as well as the sound effects used. The characters have an almost puppet-like feel to them, which adds to the mystical, fantasy feel of the game. Boss fights are incredibly over the top, with players often fighting monsters which barely fit on the screen. In one case, the player has to face off against a huge centipede-type demon, which coils around itself and stretches over several screens. This kind of design - where players have to tackle bosses of vastly differing speed, power and size - makes it difficult for the player to guess what they might be up against, and makes the boss fights some of the more interesting parts of the game.

Although the game world has been created in painstaking detail, sadly there isn't a huge amount of things to do in it between boss fights.  There are the standard RPG tasks of grinding through enemies to gain XP and therefore take on more powerful bosses, but that's pretty much the only thing a player can do to advance. After a while, the game simply becomes repetitive, regardless of what difficulty level or character you choose.

The lack of depth to the game is the main area which would require addressing. Developing aspects such as different tasks or quests in addition to simply attacking enemies, or including different ways to uncover lore and story, would help greatly with this. Adding new challenges or discoveries when players revisit an area would also make the backtracking areas of the game feel less of a slog.

The world map is also in keeping with the art theme of the game. Although I'm not quite sure where I am...
(Source: theicecave.org)

Overall, this game has a beautifully crafted world with a unique art style and a slowly unfolding story. The hack-and-slash game mechanics, coupled with the ability to create your own swords and unlock new special moves is also fun, but overall the gameplay lacks depth. This is a shame, as it results in the actual gameplay not marrying well with the rich game world which has been created.