It’s really only the cut-scenes that extend the game to its around six hour playtime, and for only a fraction of those six hours you’re actually in real, 100% control. These are fairly basic too, but break up the melee combat and cut-scenes.īecause of the limited level of actual gameplay found here, to say Asura’s Wrath is a short game in an understatement. It’s not all melee combat though, and the game does mix things up a little, including several Panzer Dragoon-style on rails shooter sections spread throughout. It’s a simple combat system but one that works well, and the variety of situations and enemies makes it appealing for all the right reasons, it’s just a shame there’s so little of it. You can fight with fists and can also use a ranged attack that can be manually aimed for rapid fire assaults on hard to reach enemies.Įventually, in many confrontations, you’ll build up the Burst meter, and once this is done you can hit RT to unleash Asura’s mighty rage to inflict massive damage upon your foes with a QTE attack that often ends the battle, and continues on to the next section.
![asura wrath unlock episode 19 asura wrath unlock episode 19](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/oKF_sdsrPhE/maxresdefault.jpg)
Light and heavy attacks can be mixed up to keep foes at bay, whilst you charge up Asura’s power meter to allow him to unleash endless heavy attacks for a period (usually you have to cool down after such attacks). When Asura’s Wrath does let you take control and mix it up in combat, it’s really rather good, with a combat system that focuses more on brute force, and powerful abilities than complex move sets or speed. The bottom line here is I want to actually play a game.
![asura wrath unlock episode 19 asura wrath unlock episode 19](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/asuraswrath/images/e/eb/Episode_19_Cover.png)
I did enjoy watching the impressive scenes, and the action, as OTT as it can be is always absorbing, but if I wanted to watch an anime, I’d go watch Fist of the North Star or something. And, even if you fail these button events, it rarely makes any difference, and the scene carries on regardless, and you’ll simply get a worse rating at the end of the level. Most cut-scenes do, admittedly, have QTE-style events in them, and so have some interaction, but these are often very basic ‘press this to punch guy in face’ or ‘mash this button to pummel big, evil creature to death affairs. This is no exaggeration either, and even the notoriously cut-scene heavy, Metal Gear Solid 4 had a better gameplay to cut-scene ratio than this. You see, for the majority of the game you’ll be sat watching cut-scenes, and for a relatively small amount of the game’s length, you’ll actually be taking part in the action. Needless to say, Asura, who isn’t the most pleasant man around at the best of times, is a little upset, and he directs all of his considerable rage towards seeking vengeance. He’s then banished from his own world and awakes thousands of years later to discover the world in ruins. Asura is, perhaps, the most powerful of his kin, and is, for sinister reasons, betrayed by his allies, framed for a crime he didn’t commit, while his wife is killed and his daughter kidnapped. You play as Asura, an ultra-powerful demigod, who fights alongside eight other demigod generals to protect the world against the Gohma, and impure and evil race of creatures. This is where Asura’s Wrath instantly appeals, and it’s a game that isn’t afraid to buck the trend. That’s outside of indie downloadable games, anyway.
![asura wrath unlock episode 19 asura wrath unlock episode 19](https://www.denofgeek.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/316135-1.jpg)
In a gaming era ruled by sequels, play-it-safe military shooters and zombie mashers, there’s little room for niche titles it seems.
![asura wrath unlock episode 19 asura wrath unlock episode 19](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/014-17LPZVM/maxresdefault.jpg)
It takes guts to put out a game that tries to legitimately do something new these days.