You start the game and after one level you’re dead. Now I knew this game was meant to be short, but this is ridiculous. Relax, it’s all alright though, you go back in time, and play through the events that lead to your untimely demise. I’m not going to lie to you; this is a shot game, with no multiplayer and one which features limited environments. However the experience, while it lasts, is an engaging one, full of interesting characters, beautiful settings, God of War style combat, the best cut-scenes in the business and sections with literally thousands of enemies of screen at once. So another Playstation 3 exclusive and another mixed bag, but which way will this one go?
You play through this game as feisty female warrior Nariko. Your clan are the protectors of the infamous heavenly sword, but are now being tracked by the hordes of the evil King Bohan. With a little help from your rather quirky, crossbow yielding, friend Kai; you have to destroy these hordes, save your clan and stop the King, all before the sword kills you...
The story in this quest is quite something and is enhanced by the truly remarkable production values. You meet a variety of interesting characters in your travels, most take the form of Bohan’s henchmen, who take the form of most of the bosses. I actually found myself liking Bohan’s character, despite him being the bad guy, and there are some subtitle elements of humour in the dialogue. Kai is a cat-like young women who likes playing ‘twing-twang’, interested? Well I’ll let you figure out what all that means. Throughout the whole story there are issues with Nariko and her father. However I did find the character of Nariko could have used some more work, you don’t immediately establish a connection.
The gameplay is God of War style, though certainly not a carbon copy (some would argue that perhaps it should have been, given that the God of War games have been so good). Combos are the name of the game and there are many of them to learn. These take the form of three main ‘stances’ as soon as you start wielding the Heavenly Sword. Default is Speed stance; Range stance is activated by holding L1 and Power stance by holding R1. As you might expect these different styles of attacks work best against different types of enemies and attacks. There is no block button; some attacks are blocked by default if you don’t do anything, others blocked by using the Speed stance and others you have to evade. Also no jump button, you perform aerial attacks with a flick of the six-axis during certain attacks. Confused? You haven’t even tried to learn all the combos yet.
The game does utilise the motion sensitive controls well however. A pleasing feature though is for those who do not like them, they are entirely optional. You can move the camera left or right by tilting the controller, independent of your movement of Nariko. The star of the show however is the use of missiles. You can pick up items of debris or weapons and armour lying around and throw them. Holding down the throw button activates a aftertouch feature, here the camera follows the projectile and you tilt the controller to alter its the path, hopefully into the head (or other vulnerable area) of your opponent.
One particularly weak area is the games boss battles. They are very old school, and not in a good way. They pull off a standard series of attacks, you have to learn how to counter them and then strike the boss. They will then use the same attacks again, only faster or stronger. They don’t like to adapt, and so as soon as you learn their techniques, the bosses are easy enough.
This game is very pleasing on the eye, there are some beautiful environments and the characters look superb, with most the work looking as it went into Nariko’s hair. There is some slight screen-tearing evident, however nothing too off-putting. The cut-scenes here are the best I have seen in any game, you can tell a lot of money and effort have been put into them. The facial animations are the best I have ever seen. There are a lot of them as well, however without breaking up the gameplay too much.
Just as much effort has been placed into developing the audio for this game. All the sounds are crisp, clear, sharp and numerous. With all the characters being treated to some very professional voice acting work. A few more yells and taunts from the rank And file you attack would have been appreciated though.
The game however, is short, there is no denying that. 7-8 hours (or even less), is acceptable when you have a multiplayer like that of Call of Duty 4. However there is nothing of the such in Heavenly Sword. You do unlock a Hell Mode after your first playthrough and there are a load of other unlockables. These usually consist of making off videos and concept artwork, these are of great quality and I am a huge fan, however most should be available after a single playthrough, and there is nothing to unlock that effects the gameplay, unlock Uncharted.
So if you enjoy God of War, don’t mind the investment and can get your head around some confusing gameplay, then Heavenly Sword will offer a top quality experience, just don’t expect it to last too long.
