Onimusha 3: Demon Siege Review (no fat)

Game Description

Warlord Nobunaga, the arch-enemy you persistently battled throughout the first 2 Onimusha games but could not totally defeat is back, ready to start chaos and mayhem through-out Japan. Samanosuke, the Japanese hero, will have the job to take him out…again.

The story does not take place in Japan only and Capcom brings a new setting that gives Onimusha 3 an original feel. In your journey to end evil, a French commando named Jacques will fight by your side.

Onimusha 3: Demon Siege Gameplay

One of the most important gameplay factors in Onimusha 3 is the difference between your two main characters: Jacques and Samanosuke. Both of them require a distinct playing style, which involves both brute force and tactics to be applied constantly.

Samanosuke will prove unshakable in close combat, especially in sword-to-sword duels, but a powerful archer or a mace will quickly strike him down, even before he has the chance to close the gap between him and his opponents.

Jacques on the other hand makes excellent use of ranged weapons… In fact, he proves to be quite indispensable in ranged-to-ranged fights, or when there are multiple enemies in different parts of the room. However once an opponent closes down on him, you might want to try some alternative fighting means, since he is not a big fan of close combat. So, a perfect combination between the two protagonists is essential in order to successfully progress through the game.

The introduction of the character of Ako is a completely new addition to the Onimusha series. Little Ako serves to guide Jacques in addition to performing several different tasks, including becoming a target indicator to help get rid of the enemy demons quicker.

Onimusha 3: Demon Siege Graphics

The first thing that will strike you when you first play Onimusha 3, is just how much the game’s graphics evolved since the second version of the game. Whereas Onimusha 2 offered completely 2D environments with only the characters being rendered in 3D, Onimusha 3: Demon Siege offers a completely new 3D engine, which fully renders everything from characters, monsters, environment and visual effects.

The game lives up to the visual standards of 2004 and its graphics play an important part in making you feel present. Some really great light and shadow effects double the gloomy atmosphere of the whole game, giving that danger impression a lot of action-adventure games fail to produce.

Onimusha 3: Demon Siege – Audio

The main pitfall for the game is the change in voiceovers for a character when he speaks in a different language. Although it’s not quite as obvious when Samanosuke changes from Japanese back to English, the difference between Jacques French and English voice-overs is amazingly poor. There are a few points in the game where Jacques will be rambling in his mother language with a touched voice and the come-back to English will be so abrupt that it will make you ask yourself how hard it was to find a voice actor that could speak both English and French fluently.

Onimusha 3: Demon Siege Conclusion

It doesn’t matter if you’re a fan of the Onimusha series or not, you will find Demon Siege to be a great action-adventure title that will get really addictive, really fast. If you’ve played one of Capcom’s Resident Evil games, control will not be an issue and you will find smacking zombies around quite familiar. Onimusha is an excellent title to have for your collection, no doubt.

Onimusha 3: Demon Siege Cost

Onimusha 3: Demon Siege currently retails for $12.99US at the time of writing.