About 5 hours of sword slashing into Onimusha 2, I believed to myself, “Boy, they don’t make them like this anymore.”
Whereas Onimusha could not have the identical title recognition as Capcom’s huge hitters, it’s secretly been one of many writer’s weirdest and most revolutionary franchises. However even within the bigger sequence, Onimusha 2: Samurai’s Future is a splendidly weird little recreation. A sequel that was unafraid to vary all the things within the title of innovation, one thing you seldom see in trendy gaming franchises. It’s a recreation brilliantly forward of its time, brimming with persona and unforgivingly obtuse mechanics that demand experimentation.
Whereas this remaster is pretty simple, Onimusha 2 completely embodies Capcom’s quirky spirit, and it’s nothing wanting a masterpiece. However curiously, going again to the sport many years later jogs my memory of a newer Capcom recreation, Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess. It made me notice there’s a transparent by way of line between the 2 and the way Onimusha 2 set the stage for a few of Capcom’s extra eccentric experiments.
Onimusha 2 takes place immediately after the occasions of Onimusha: Warlords, however the video games are pretty stand-alone. Should you’re unfamiliar with the sequence, the core idea is mainly a narrative that takes place in feudal Japan, the place demons and supernatural entities exist. In Onimusha 2, you play as a samurai named Jubei Yagyu, looking for revenge towards the demon hordes of the warlord Nobunaga Oda after they destroy his village.
Finding out the Blade
The pre-rendered backgrounds of Onimusha 2 have been lavishly up to date for the remaster and look genuinely beautiful.
Capcom
A easy option to describe the primary Onimusha is samurai Resident Evil, and whereas that type continues to be right here a bit, Onimusha 2 is the place the franchise actually broke off to do its personal factor. The sport is damaged up into a lot of completely different chapters by which you progress by way of completely different interconnected areas, the place you’ll be able to oftentimes loop again to locations you’ve been. Like early Resident Evil video games, every space makes use of beautiful pre-rendered backgrounds and stuck digicam angles, however Onimusha 2 is extra of a lightweight motion recreation than survival horror. There’s nonetheless an enormous emphasis on exploration, although, and the whole thing of Onimusha 2 typically appears like one huge puzzle it’s important to put collectively.
To get the plain out of the best way first, it is a pretty simple remaster of Onimusha 2 that provides visible updates and quality-of-life components. The one “new” characteristic is the absurd Hell Mode, the place you’ll be able to solely take a single hit — one thing just for the staunchest of followers. However the visible improve is genuinely fairly spectacular. The pre-rendered backgrounds, specifically, look jaw-droppingly beautiful, given additional crispness to pop off the display. There’s a captivating quirkiness to Onimusha 2 that got here from numerous these early PS2 video games, with voice performing of questionable high quality that finally ends up solely including persona. This remaster additionally unlocks all minigames from the beginning, and it has a gallery of artwork, music, and extra to peruse.
Pulling off an Issen assault nonetheless feels uniquely satisfying.
Capcom
Onimusha 2 nonetheless locations an emphasis on stock administration, as issues like therapeutic gadgets and ammo for ranged weapons are restricted, and also you don’t need to simply use them willy-nilly. On the identical time, Jubei will get entry to 4 completely different Oni weapons that every have distinctive skills and combos — in addition to their very own magic bar for a magic assault. That inserts one other fascinating layer of useful resource administration, as it is advisable decide and select the place to make use of magic assaults and how one can price range every weapon’s gauge.
Onimusha 2’s fight nonetheless feels nice, with a deliberate emphasis on timing and studying enemy combos. One of many defining options of fight is the Issen system, by which should you assault on the actual second an enemy does, you utilize a devastating assault that eliminates them in a single hit, additionally yielding extra orbs so that you can take in. Executing Issen requires some apply, nevertheless it feels phenomenally satisfying to drag off — and provides an enormous profit to getting higher on the recreation’s fight.
A Tangled Net
The gift-giving system has actually hidden depth and integrally adjustments your expertise with the sport. However you may as well learn to break it in enjoyable methods.
Capcom
However the secret sauce that actually makes Onimusha 2 shine is its branching storyline, and also you’ll must experiment wildly to discover all of it. The sport has 4 facet characters who all play main roles within the story and have playable segments in case your bond with them is excessive sufficient. You construct that bond by giving every character presents, which leads to a sprawling buying and selling system by which you get gadgets in return and construct affinity. It’s astounding how deep this buying and selling system is and the way a lot it impacts the story itself, however Onimusha 2 tells you actually nothing about the way it works. As an alternative, it is advisable experiment, see how characters react to presents, and intuit what they like.
This additionally implies that two playthroughs of Onimusha 2 may really feel drastically completely different relying on the presents you’ve given. In a single playthrough, you may play because the gun-toting Magoichi Saika, saving Jubei after he’s petrified. In one other, you may tackle the position of the ninja Kotaro Fuma, fixing puzzles in a forest of illusions. There are prolonged sections of the sport that solely seem should you’ve given presents correctly, and I genuinely love how obtuse the whole factor feels. It offers Onimusha 2 an nearly unpredictable really feel. Plus, the sport solely lasts roughly eight to 10 hours, so it’s straightforward to replay it a number of instances and really feel such as you’re seeing one thing completely different.
However other than the precise mechanics of all of it, these 4 characters have some surprisingly touching tales. Every one will get their very own arc that may change your interpretation of the general story, from the warrior monk Ekei’s tragic household previous that has given him lasting trauma, to the harrowing cause for Kotaro’s abrasive persona. There’s a richness to those characters that will get enhanced by the branching story, with every playthrough feeling such as you’re attending to know them a bit extra intimately. That’s one thing I don’t know if I’ve ever seen in one other online game, the thought of replayability getting used to truly improve characters.
Jubei’s likeness is definitely based mostly on considered one of Japan’s most well-known actors, the late Yusaku Matsuda — whose company gave Capcom permission to make use of him in Onimusha 2.
Onimusha 2: Samurai’s Future
What I discover most fascinating about Onimusha 2 is how its absolute lack of explaining something truly turns into a power. Fashionable video video games are obsessive about tutorializing all the things and ensuring the participant all the time is aware of precisely what they’re doing and why, however Onimusha 2 straight up doesn’t care. You need to piece your method ahead by way of the story and uncover how the sport’s mechanics all match collectively, and it’s a greater recreation for it. Onimusha 2 unabashedly does its personal factor, and the extra you purchase into that, the extra entrancing the expertise feels.
Onimusha 2 is the type of recreation that the blockbuster facet of the gaming business feels prefer it’d be averse to lately, an bold sequel that fully leaves out all the things the primary recreation did, and retains gamers at midnight. Even all these years later, I’m nonetheless blown away by the sheer gutsiness of the sport, and on this case, I respect the selection to easily use this remaster as an replace and never alter something in regards to the core imaginative and prescient of the sport. If something, I hope selecting to deliver Onimusha 2 again on this method serves as inspiration for Capcom to re-embrace the sequence’ sense of experimentation as they revive it with Onimusha: Approach of the Sword.
On the very least, experiencing Onimusha 2 once more all these years later has solidified in my thoughts — it’s considered one of Capcom’s largest unstated masterpieces.
9/10
Onimusha 2: Samurai’s Future launches Could 23 for PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Change, and PC. Inverse reviewed the PS4 model.
INVERSE VIDEO GAME REVIEW ETHOS: Each Inverse online game evaluation solutions two questions: Is that this recreation value your time? Are you getting what you pay for? We’ve got no tolerance for limitless fetch quests, clunky mechanics, or bugs that dilute the expertise. We care deeply a few recreation’s design, world-building, character arcs, and storytelling come collectively. Inverse won’t ever punch down, however we aren’t afraid to punch up. We love magic and science-fiction in equal measure, and as a lot as we love experiencing wealthy tales and worlds by way of video games, we gained’t ignore the real-world context by which these video games are made.
