Dynasty Warriors Online Review

Anybody who has played and loved the console versions of Dynasty Warriors will be wanting to download this multiplayer version immediately. Players can take part in massive battles that contain both fast-paced, live-action, tactical gameplay. Not only can you run the campaign maps PvE style but the game has a PvP slant that allows you to fight your fellow players.

Pros: Real time combat, Controller enabled, Tactical gamplay.

Cons: Can get repetitive, Long tutorial.

Storyline: The Dynasty Warriors franchise is based on a historical novel set amidst the turbulent years near the end of the Han Dynasty and the Three Kingdoms era of Chinese history, starting in 169 and ending with the reunification of the land in 280. The story (part historical, part legend, and part myth) chronicles the lives of feudal lords and their retainers, who tried to replace the dwindling Han Dynasty or restore it. While the story actually follows literally hundreds of characters, the focus is mainly on the three power blocs that emerged from the remnants of the Han Dynasty, and would eventually form the three states of Wei, Shu, and Wu. The story deals with the plots, personal and army battles, intrigues, and struggles of these states to achieve dominance for almost 100 years.

Features: The online version of Dynasty Warriors embraces some role playing elements in allowing you to create and customize your own character with hair, skin and eye options. You are able to choose your district from dozens that are available, there is no impact from differences between districts. In In the final step of character creation, you must also choose a faction from the Three Kingdoms era to align yourself with: Wei, Wu, or Shu. This choice has an effect on the overall state of the war and plot of the game.

There are no classes to speak of, or levelling, as characters start off as a soldier and progress in rank by gaining experience, and passing promotion quests. However, you can increase a weapons stats as you use it, and can gain new weapons and armour from slain enemies like in the console games. There are also no skills, as such, but there is a combo system that has several attacks using different button sequences.

The tutorial is rather long but informative and after it is over you get to the main fighting pretty fast. The battles themselves are the same as on the console games, where you enter a map and proceed to hack and slash your way through hordes of enemy soldiers and commanders. Kill counts of 500 or even 1000 are not uncommon. The action makes grinding so much fun you hardly notice that is what you are essentially doing!

There are five PvP game modes in Dynasty Warriors Online, all of which involve two teams facing off against each other for control of as many enemy bases as possible. Sort of like a multi-base, martial arts focused game of capture the flag, except the bases are also guarded by tons of NPCs and other things like war machines that breathe fire and toss fireballs at you. We're talking full on war, here. You and/or your team (you can go solo, if you like and the quest allows for it) have limited strategic options, but you can choose which bases to attack and defend, as well as where you want to grind away for upgrades.

Any way you look at it, Dynasty Warriors Online hands you a heck of a soldier bashing, boss mashing good time, definitely worth checking out!