High School Girls + Demons = Fun!
Via ign
Games based on anime titles aren't the most elegant of experiences, and the really successful ones have their roots in fighting games. It's worth mentioning that if you have even a moderately successful anime series in Japan, the odds of it getting a video game are really high. It doesn't matter if it's something super popular like One Piece or a niche title. So along comes this new anime series, called Blood+.
For those who haven't followed the development of this series, Blood+ is the follow-up anime series to the 45 minute animated short movie entitled Blood: The Last Vampire. The characters share the same name, but they're totally different in demeanor and looks. Other than the fact that both feature young high school girls slicing up demons, they don't really share any similarities. Based on the anime series, SCEI recently released Blood+: Souyoku No Battle Rondo to eager anime fans and gamers alike.
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Otonashi Saya is the main character of Blood+, and she's a raven-haired goddess of destruction, with the ability to wield a katana as if she was a 16th century samurai. With her mentor Hagi and their organization called Red Shield, they have to take on legions of monsters called Chiropteran. These monsters suck the blood out of their victims much like vampires, but they can actually disguise their grotesque figures by assuming the identity of human beings.
Unlike other anime-based games, Blood+ does a good job of progressing its story, but it does by overloading the player with tons of cutscenes with some gameplay sprinkled on the side, instead of the other way around. The game is really story-driven, and the cutscenes can be long. Worst of all, they can't be skipped, even during your second run through them. Luckily, the story is actually well written, if you can understand Japanese.
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There is quite a bit of interaction during the cutscenes too, so you won't be sitting around, waiting for the next battle to happen. Most of the interaction comes from Quick Time Events (QTE), which force you to press a button at the proper time. In one scenario, Saya will be chasing after a classmate through the woods. During the chase, pressing the Circle buttons at the proper times will allow you to jump over fallen trees to gain ground, but pressing it at the wrong time will result in Saya falling over.
These events are handled a little differently in the game compared to other titles. You can't press the buttons on reaction; instead, there are specifics zones that you can press the button in, and if you don't press it within those zones, you'll get different results. In addition to the QTE, there will be times where you will have the choice of two solutions, although your choices won't affect the ending of the game. They will change how you get there though, so by choosing, say, Hagi's scenario first, you'll go through that without seeing what happened to the other characters. It would've been better if this had an affect on how the game ended, but it's only a slight thing.
When you're not watching the story go through its motions, you'll be fighting hordes of Chiropterans in a variety of locations, such as Saya's high school, the subway and even in forests. The action takes place from a 3rd person perspective, and fighting is your typical mashfest. Pressing the Square button will allow Saya to swing her katana around, and pressing it repeatedly will allow her access to different combos. If you hold down the attack button, Saya will perform different moves, the strongest being multi-hit combo that can decimate a foe. She also has a projectile attack, and your typical evasive moves, like the ground roll and jump.
The action starts to pick up once you gain enough power and unleash her special combo attack by pressing the Circle button. If this attack connects, the action shifts to a cool cutscene where you have to press the buttons on the screen - much like during QTE - to inflict more damage. The further along the chain you get, the higher the damage. You will also gain life back from this attack too, so it's essential to get the sequence down pat. Finally, for a real treat, if there's only one enemy left in a battle, you can use Saya's Finishing Move to deliver the coup de grace. Although it's pretty much the same scene each time, it's flashy and cool to see.
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However, with only two major types of enemies in the game (hey, no one said that the Chiropterans evolved quickly), the action can get boring quickly, despite the easy to understand system. There are about half a dozen characters to choose from too, but Saya is the only character that has any significant depth to her, since she possesses several combos in addition to her special moves. The other characters, on the other hand, don't have such powers, and are usually regulated to their fists or guns. It's too bad too, because characters like Hagi and your high school friends do give the game more variety when it comes to battles.
Oddly enough, if you take out all of the cutscenes, you'd probably spend a good hour or so actually fighting. The game takes place over the course of a week, and each day is a different chapter. By the time the fourth day hits, the number of times you've actually fought (assuming you skipped the tutorial) can be counted on one hand, with fingers to spare. The game is definitely all about the story, but that doesn't mean the gameplay - what little of it - is bad. It's actually very competent and enjoyable, but why the developers decided not to utilize it more is a mystery.
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Visually the game resembles a certain Disney RPG by Square-Enix a lot, especially when it comes to how the characters are modeled. Instead of using the traditional cel-shading that is so prevalent in licensed anime games, we get something that's much softer and pleasing on the eyes. The animation is definitely not of the same standard as that other RPG, but it's passable. Overall the cutscenes are well-directed, with a lot of extra animation to give characters a more life-like personality. Similarly, the voice acting is spot on, but that's to be expected considering the source material.
Featuring an easy-to-use combat system and excellent story, Blood+ is a good title, but for full price it may not be worth it to importers when you take into consideration how long the game is. You can probably finish the game within five hours, and that's being generous. The game does have some replayability with an unlockable survival mode and a hidden character, but there isn't enough in the game to justify forking over the cash for the import.
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