A fun action game that becomes deeper in both gameplay and story the more that you play it.
The story in this particular game is somewhat reminiscent of an anime-type story or a few Western fantasy movies. The heroine of the story, a young woman by the name of Nariko is the direct protector of the sword in a small clan. The protectors are supposed to be men, but because she was not, she is seen as a curse by the clan, but that does not stop her from fulfilling her duties, at the beginning at least. The small clan that protects a sacred artifact, in this case the Heavenly Sword, is decimated from attacks by a new, oppressive force coming into power that wishes for the power that the sword can give to create a world they deem perfect. Nariko, along with some others of the clan, such as the young girl Kai, set out to put an end to this new tyrannical force while trying to keep the sword safe from them at the same time.
While the story itself starts out rather generic, as it moves along it becomes quite engaging and will really begin to grab your attention the deeper you go. A lot of this is because of the characters. They are all quite well done and the voice acting is wonderful throughout the game. Nariko is the first of note, a very strong-willed woman that is put through much hardship throughout the game, but always faces it down with a rather calm, collected look and a brandished sword. The young girl Kai is quite cute and could be describe as feral in that she runs around on her hands and feet, or if just on her feet is always leaning forward. She likes to jump and leap a lot and has facepaint and a headband that add animalistic-type features. She also refers to shooting her crossbow at enemies as "playtime," a tad morbid, but it definitely adds to her character. The main villain, Bohan, is also quite interesting. His character, while quite cruel and evil, is a great source of dark comedy throughout the scenes in which he is present and is quite reminiscent of Zorg from The Fifth Element in his mannerisms and speech. Beyond that are a group of warriors that Bohan keeps, Flying Fox, Whiptail, and Roach whom are all very distinct in personality, looks, and abilities. Somewhat like the bosses one would encounter in a Metal Gear Solid game. Flying Fox is a somewhat flamboyant, older-looking thin man that has blades that spring from his suit and seem to move by his will. Whiptail has carvings in her face that look like gills with an eel-looking head on top of her own and the long, snake-like body trailing from it down against her back. It seems like only a costume, however the tail twists and moves like it is a part of her. Finally, Roach is a very very huge, morbidly obese man. The story, complete with plenty of twists and the characters keep the game very fresh throughout the playthrough and is quite a pleasant surprise which this title holds.
Next up is the graphics. For the most part, they are quite amazing. The landscapes and buildings are all rendered beautifully. Everything has a nice shine, but the graphics overall have a cloudiness to them that seems to fit the game and it's movie-like presentation very well. Items within the environment are very destructible such as tables, carts and such and break quite realistically. You can even use the broken pieces as weapons to throw at enemies. The character models are very well-done as well. You will notice this in the cutscenes where at times it is almost hard to tell whether the people were filmed or rendered, they really look that good, and when it shifts back to in-game, the graphical level is only slightly below that same level. The only problem with this is the camera. It is a stationary camera to add to that movie-feel. While it certainly does it's job in that respect, and does not hinder your ability to play the game in any regards, not having a movable camera keeps you from enjoying the good graphical work and sometimes the camera pulls so far back to give you a view of the surrounding area that Nariko literally looks only slightly larger than a small dot. This does not occur during times when you have to fight, but again, it takes away slightly from the graphical detail in favor of trying to give the game a more epic feel.
The last thing that must be spoken of is Nariko's hair, which was one of the biggest points by the developers. Yes, the fact that they were able to make it so free-flowing is very amazing and probably took insane amounts of code, but really, Nariko's hair is the low point of the game's graphics. The hair sometimes freezes in place and moves like a block for a second, it will very frequently clip Nariko or anything nearby, it will sometimes move in rather unnatural ways, like an end might move upwards a bit or it might move sideways, and all in all it is quite a glitch-fest. Also, her hair simply looks unrealistic and out of place with the art style. The hair flows behind her in only 10 or 15 strands of varying thickness, from as thick as a person's leg, to as thin as a twig. It should have been far better rendered so that at least the hairs in each clump could be seen moving a bit so that it didn't just look like a block of red, since obviously coding the hair as they did for every single one of hundreds to thousands of strands would simply be asking too much. However, as it is now, Nariko's hair is easily the worst part graphically about this game. Everything else is quite beautiful.
The sound in the game is well put together. Good background music that really captures the epic feel of the title and the action when you are fighting opponents. The sword-fighting sound-effects all sound quite spot-on and as said before the voice acting is simply superb and could even be quite acceptable for an actual movie, let alone a video game.
The gameplay is quite good, but parts are hit-or-miss. You'll encounter both sword fighting and shooting as you play through the game. First to be covered will be the sword fighting as it is the most prevalent. Let it be known, you can play through, and beat this game in terms of the sword play sections with essentially nothing but button-mashing. And it is easier to do so than not button-mashing. However, if you try to look for it, there is a deeper fighting system to the game that, while harder to master and use correctly, will provide much more satisfying fighting to more hardcore or experienced action game players.
As you play through the game you will encounter more and more combos for all your various weapons. You start out with generic swords that you will gain more moves for and soon after move on to the Heavenly Sword which has three forms, a large singular form that is slow to swing but very powerful, a default, middle form that is split into two smaller swords that Nariko double-wields, and a third form with two swords on either end of a long chain that is weak but quick and good for ranged fighting. As you play, combos will be unlocked for all of these, giving you the ability to string a good amount of moves together in many different ways and providing great depth if you choose to try for it. By not attacking when an opponent strikes, Nariko will block and while blocking you can initiate counter-attacks with your own weapons and you can also dodge attacks with the right analogue stick, which is helpful as some enemy attacks cannot be blocked. All of these various elements can make for deep battles against the rather large groups of enemies that the game frequently throws at you as long as you consciously make the effort to not button-mash. If you don't, then you will most likely slip into button-mashing and find the fighting to be rather shallow. While fighting, you can switch between the three modes of the sword on the fly, so in the middle of an attack sequence you can go right from the large heavy sword taking a couple swipes at an opponent straight into the chains whipping into everyone around you. You also freely target opponents, so you can be attacking one character and in the middle of a combo shoot straight over to someone else and finish it up on them. So the battle system is what you make of it, if you just decide to pound the attack buttons you will find a mindless mash-fest, but if you look deeper and concentrate on how you are fighting and think about your strategy, the game becomes much, much deeper in its combat.
Along with sword fighting, you will also do some shooting with both Nariko in a couple parts, and Kai whenever you control her. Shooting is controlled by simply firing off a round at someone or by using "aftertouch" using the six-axis motion control to guide the projectile to it's location as you follow behind it. While simply shooting will work most of the time, it is hardly accurate and you will use a lot more time and ammo (though ammo is infinite) and will get hurt more if you do not use aftertouch for enemies that are farther away. Aftertouch will take practice. You will be horrible at it at first but after doing it for a while you will get the hang of it, most likely by the end of chapter 2 you will be somewhat mastered at it (though you'll have needed to spend probably a good hour or so losing on an earlier level with Nariko firing on catapults before having gotten the hang of it enough to pass that level). Once you do master it, aftertouch becomes rather easy and will be actually rather fun to use, though it WILL be frustrating in the first levels you are introduced to it.
Finally in terms of gameplay is the enemy AI. While it is certainly not the most sophisticated AI out there, it is very well implemented for this game. Unlike most action games last generation, enemies won't just sit around you while you take out one of their buddies. They will come at you and surround you from all sides attacking whenever they can. This also adds to the deepness of the battle system as you need to try to time your attacks accordingly and switch targets to other enemies in mid combo to keep from getting sliced up. Archer AI isn't quite as good, as it is slower to react, but this is most likely due to the fact that you are normally fighting them with Kai and it will take you a while to take them all out, so it is decently balanced.
All in all, the game is not perfect, but it is a very very fun game that will grow on you the more you play it. It has an enthralling story with great voice acting and a battle system that can be as deep as you are willing to make it. Don't go buying a PS3 just to play the game, but if you like action games and have a PS3 this one is worth picking up right now.