Senran Kagura Burst – Review
Senran Kagura Burst is a game developed by Tamsoft and is exclusively for the Nintendo 3DS. The game is a sequel to the original Senran Kagura game that was only released in Japan, in 2011. The game finally makes its way to the western markets, as an improved version of the game. Burst contains both the original game and a new story titled Crimson Girls. The series has received several manga adaptations. A television anime was also made in Japan in 2013, produced by Artland.
Story
Senran Kagura Burst follows the story of the original game, a story about 2 rivaling ninja clans. Both clans are affiliated to 2 different academies: the Hanzô academy and the Hebijô academy. The Hanzô academy consists of the ‘good’ characters: Asuka, Katsuragi, Yagyû, Hibari and Ikaruga. The Hebijô academy on the other hand consists of the ‘bad’ characters: Homura, Yomi, Hikage, Mirai and Haruka. Each character of both sides has a personal reason to fight their opponents. The story consists of 2 different viewpoints: Skirting Shadows is the title of the story of the Hanzô academy and Crimson Girls is the title of the story of the Hebijô academy.
Senran Kagura’s story revolves around the rivalry between both academies, where every character completes missions given to them by their respective school. Eventually you will meet your rivals from the opposing clan, either they are getting in your way or you get in their way.
The story is rather simple, there aren’t that many exciting moments present that get you hooked on wanting to know more. However, it is quite interesting to see the back stories of each character and their relationships. Aside from that, the story isn’t all that great and you might find yourself just skipping through most of the dialogue.
Graphics
The game has good quality graphics. The art style is very anime-like and the 3D function is really well done, especially if you are into ‘sexy’ stuff.
It tries its best to get the attention of the player by making all of the characters lose their clothes during battle, making it rather enjoyable to watch. If you are into sexy anime stuff, then this game is truly something you would want to play.
The only real problem this game has in case of graphics, is the amount of frame-rate issues you will encounter throughout the game. It is rather normal that a beat’em-up like this has issues on a system like the Nintendo 3DS, but while fighting tons of enemies on the screen it gets quite irritating. Even while running around in the school, the game has its frame-rate issues.
Sound
The soundtrack of Senran Kagura is well-done. The music goes along pretty good during different moments of the game, not falling out of tone. Dialogues are voiced-over in Japanese, making it more natural for an anime-like game. English voice-overs aren’t available, so you will have to do with the Japanese voices, though that shouldn’t be a problem for most of you.
Gameplay
The game is divided in three different parts. The ‘novel’ part, gives the main information of each characters’ background stories, major plot points, and general information on the world of Senran Kagura. This section is done in the style of a 3D visual novel. It is structured like a book and the R button will take you to the next section of text, or lets you skip through to the end. It’s introduced at major plot points in the story and acts as character set up as well as progression of the story.
Next we have the ‘adventure’ part of the game. During this part, most of the main story and character interaction takes places using the in-game character models. This part uses text and fully voiced-over dialogue. It will come up before and after completing missions. Usually it starts right after the ‘Novel’ part ends and gives you more information on the story right before beginning a mission.
After that we have the ‘Action’ part, where the real gameplay starts. Like I stated before, Senran Kagura Burst is a beat’em-up style game. You choose between a lot of different missions, both story missions that progress you through the story, and optional side missions. You can switch between any character you want before starting a mission, giving you a little variation. Some missions will require you to use certain characters.
As you fight during missions, you level up your characters, learning new combos and skills. Aside from the normal ‘button-mashing’ combo’s, each character has their own special Ninjutsu art. You fill up your Ninjutsu Energy while beating up your enemies, and once you have enough Energy you can unleash it to do high damage to your opponents. As you take damage, your clothes will also get damaged. If your clothes get destroyed, you will be defenseless and you become very vulnerable.
The gameplay is much like any other beat’em-up style game. It’s really fun to beat up your enemies, but it gets really repetitive after a while. Every character is almost the same, not really offering that much variety. However, the game consists of enough content to keep you busy for a while.
Conclusion
While being a repetitive game, Senran Kagura Burst keeps you busy enough with all the optional missions you can do. Getting to know all of the different characters also helps to keep you interested. Aside from a couple of frame-rate issues, the game does have quite a lot of appeal to it, especially if you are into anime. If you love cute and attractive characters, then this game is truly a game to be considered buying. Even if you don’t like that kind of stuff, the game allows you to constantly beat up enemies in a ‘button-mashing’ way, which a lot of you would enjoy.
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