Samurai Shodown V

If you have an XBOX or PS2, go look at it for a second. Isn't it wonderful? It pumps out amazing graphics, though somewhat dated, in seconds just so you can sit there and move a 3D character around a 3D space on your TV. It can make graphics as beautiful as in Splinter Cell, Black, Final Fantasy X, and Gran Turismo 4. Isn't that just freaking awesome?

So when I heard that Samurai shodown Zero (Known to us in the US as Samurai Shodown V) was floating around in Japan, I about peed in my pants. The original Samurai shodown was pretty fun, not being as great as, say, Street Fighter, but it passed as a fun diversion in the 2D fighter market. After all, there's never a lack of 2D fighters in my opinion, because nothing beats getting a friend and slamming on buttons for a while, where a pretty good looking pixelated character wails on another pixelated character.

Well, SNK (Technically SNK Playmore) fans, guess what- this game screwed us 2D fighter game fans over. Samurai shodown V is the best example I can give of a poorly done fighting game, from the graphics to the sound to the gameplay itself, because when the Neo Geo, an ancient system that barely anyone even dusts off and plays anymore, beats the XBOX in terms of overall gameplay, it's like watching a cripple in a wheelchair win every medal at the Olympics, blindfolded.

So here's the concept- a bunch of Samurai in the Japanese Feudal Era fight each other. Just completely forget the story, because it's stereotypical- each character wants to go against the Shogun, but for some reason kills everyone that could possibly be his/her ally. That's one way to hold a war against the Feudal government of Japan, you just kill everything in sight and then run off and take them on one by one. No wonder Japan's been militarily neutered, they have absolutely no tactical skills whatsoever. The whole game is basically run like every other fighting game on the planet- you just run and kill things as one of approximately 20 characters in your own little way and restarting every time you die.

Actually, let me be frank here- the engine isn't worth a dime. Any decent programmer could create this form of gameplay with two seconds in any coding language out there, and probably make it better than what this game delivers. The only thing, and I mean the ONLY thing that is beyond jumping-and-attacking is an Anger system, which seems to rely on how pissed your character gets to do major combinations- but it's so unwieldy and irritating. The fights all turn into slow somewhat clunky block-and-attack-fests, so don't expect any kind of Guilty Gear X style gameplay- Samurai shodown V is something like Bushido Blade in that you'll fall asleep between attacks before the second one lands.


Samurai Shodown V really has nothing going for it in terms of gameplay, which is disappointing. It's predecessor, Samurai shodown IV, had so much going in the battle system, it somewhat trumped the other 2D fighters in pure originality. Well, this is no longer- Samurai shodown V is a tit-for-tat port of the Neo-Geo classic, which explains why playing through this game, at least to me, felt like I was off on my SNES again. Everything is based around the old methods, especially the control scheme, which on my 12 button XBOX controller (The four face buttons, black, white, the pressure sensitive triggers, the buttons on the joysticks, and the start and back buttons, respectively), means that I only get to use four buttons. The entire time. Oh, and SNK never really took the time to port the controls to the joysticks on the pad, too, so that leaves us with the old school layout that we've always dealt with- the directional pad and the four face buttons. Just great- even the SNES had more buttons.

The whole overarching theme of Samurai shodown V is that SNK is lazy and wants to make money with the least amount of effort possible, and if that means performing virtual necromancy to revive a dead and gone game. While the graphics would have been understandable on the Neo-Geo, having an inherent color limitation on the models on the XBOX is stupid. We've moved past that. Plus, good old SNK never actually made the effort to upgrade the sound, so basically what we have here is a tit-for-tat port, like I said above. Considering this game is marketing as a full game, that's somewhat stupid- I wouldn't pay $10 for this game, considering it's original source.


The one thing that makes this game get any score above 0 is the XBOX live, which makes your XBOX like a virtual arcade. It's not phenomenal and it feels very tacked on, but it will provide hardcore Samurai shodown fans a fun diversion, if you can get around the inherent flaws of the port itself. At this point, though, XBOX Live really only consists of people playing Splinter Cell, Halo, and any given Sports game, so have fun trying to find like minded geeks wanting to play some old school Samurai shodown, but, if you can, more power to you.

At the end of the day, most will agree- this game is lazy porting, and nothing more. Honestly, with such good fighters out for the XBOX such as Dead or Alive Ultimate and Guilty Gear Izuka, this is the last fighting game you need to be buying for your XBOX. Samurai Shodown V is just it is marketed- a port- and a poor one with that. This is one of those games you use as a coaster.

2 star(s) out of 5

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