Red Steel 2

There’s no denying that Red Steel was a disappointment. Even if expectations were too high, development was rushed and it was truly the first of its kind, the game had a lot of issues and definitely didn’t live up to its promise.

Now Ubisoft wants to make amends. How do you get the disappointed consumers back, how do you put the sword in their hands and say: “This time it’s for real.”? How do you put samurais in the Wild West? Well, for starters you erase the drawing board.

Let’s cut to the chase, what you want to know about the most are the sword controls, after all this was one of Wii’s biggest pulls, we wanted the sword on the screen to mimic what we were doing with the controller (the so called 1:1 controls) . Finally, Motion Plus with its magic trinkets called gyroscopes enables us to do that. So, how does it work? Well, it works great. First of all, the attacks aren’t fully 1:1, BUT WAIT DON’T GO INTO NERD RAGE, do we really want 1:1 controls in this kind of game? Are we all devout followers of the Way of the Sword, capable of astounding attacks? I know I am, but most of you probably aren’t.

The game detects the direction of your movements- left to right, top to bottom, diagonals and so on and of course the speed and strength with which you’re attacking is also picked up. If you wanna go for the kill, fast wide movements are your friend, but you can just attack with some gentle swipes. It’s clear that the attacks themselves aren’t 1:1 because you can’t, for example, stop your swing in mid-air, but moving the sword around while you’re not attacking shows that even the slightest movements of your hand are being registered.

I can honestly say that I’ve rarely had any problems with movement detection or calibration by doing as instructed by the incredibly out of place lady in the tutorial videos: pull your arm back, use your elbow, yadda, yadda. Sometimes you might not be able to pull a move off, but everything works most of the time, unless you’re being lazy and not moving as you were told. Plus, with the option to set the playing style to athletic, normal or relaxed you can choose to swing around your living room or give your arms a bit more rest. Still, you can’t just sink into your couch and do tiny wrist flicks while you eat cheese balls.

It's so shiny!

Outside of combat if you want to wave your sword around you will have to lock-on, otherwise, you’ll be pointing away from the screen which obviously can’t end well, so initially there might be some confusion when trying to use the katana when no enemies are around.

The lock-on system prevents the camera from going bonkers when you’re flailing the katana around and can be automatic, semi-automatic or manual, depending on your play style. A neat thing about the lock-on is that if an enemy is behind you, an indicator will show up, if it’s red and you have a certain attack you can finish off your attacker by stabbing him without even so much as looking at him. So awesome.

The four guns at your disposal work great too, d-pad to change between them, point at the screen and press B to shoot, that’s all there is to it. Slash with the remote and you have your sword in hand again. It’s simple, intuitive and works great, allowing for you to get some cheap shots in between sword strikes. As you progress you can improve your health, defense and weapons among other things and acquire new, crazy attacks that work by combining a few buttons with sword swings. As you get used to the controls and do combos and finishers one after another, you’ll feel like King of the Badasses.

While you can always choose whether you’ll use the katana or a gun, the pendulum swings more to the blade and its fierce attacks but still, the game spreads out the upgrades and their affordability in a way that encourages you to try them all.

If you're gonna shoot, shoot! Don't talk!

Red Steel 2 isn’t merely an FPS with swords, in fact it feels more like an action game or a brawler from a first person perspective. Not only is the battle system with its combos and scores different from what we get in a first person shooter, the optional side missions that require us to scour the levels for trucks to blow up or ammo depots to loot add some exploration elements to the game. While these are an incentive to wander around the otherwise empty levels and offer a break from just killing bad guys, the objectives just end up repeating themselves rather lazily. Constantly returning to the same places after a mission to get new ones also gets old pretty fast, but thankfully everything is streamlined in a way that you won’t need a lot of backtracking.

The art direction is simply astounding, the concept of mixing the Wild West we know from old cowboy flicks with Japan and its Samurai and Ninjas sounds silly and would be very easy to screw up, but Red Steel’s team deserves a lot of praise for pulling it off with tremendous success. Badass cowboy samurais, Asian sheriffs, futuristic Ninjas and Japanese temples and Torii gates in the middle of the desert, everything clicks together and looks stylish as hell. Not only that, the cel-shaded graphics are up to the task of bringing that art direction to life with a great looking engine with silky smooth 60 fps, really good animations and big, detailed levels. One of the best looking games on Wii, no doubt about it.

The cheesy voice acting works very well with the game’s theme, there’s just something peculiarly alluring about a Japanese big bosomed girl speaking with a Southern USA accent. It’s probably just the breasts. The soundtrack is also a pleasant surprise with some great tracks, predictably inspired by Westerns and traditional Japanese music.

The game will last you about 10 hours and has a nice difficulty level, not too hard or too easy, but asides from some challenges you unlock, there’s nothing new to do after you finish the game. Granted, it’s the kind of the game that’s fun to play through a couple of times, maybe get some attacks you couldn’t afford or find some hidden items, but with the lack of multiplayer, a few extras would be more than welcome.

Red Steel 2 delivers what the first game promised and makes you learn new ways to play- a perfect example of Nintendo’s philosophy with the Wii. It’s a very high quality package from the satisfying and engaging sword and gun controls to the graphics and art style, this is what we can get when a team actually devotes itself to Wii’s strengths and takes the platform seriously. It might have a few problems and not a lot of replay value, but it’s a damn good action game and a completely new experience. If the first Red Steel left you scarred, don’t be afraid to take the plunge now.

Comments

Toots Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 12:36 || Total Comments: 247

Good! That's a pre-order then :) The included motionplus peripheral is gravy.

Darkflame Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 12:47 || Total Comments: 1075

Great review and sure sounds like a great game. Must get for me. I hope the (relatively) name of the first game doesn't damage its sales changes. Also, I still don't buy this argument; " do we really want 1:1 controls in this kind of game? Are we all devout followers of the Way of the Sword, capable of astounding attacks" The Wiimote is considerably lighter and easier to wield then a real sword, and enemy's can also be made easier to defeat. So I dont see "but the player isnt an expert!" as an excuse. Also, surely a good game should train us to get better? Surely we want games that teach us how to improve...how to become experts. Imho,its technical reasons stoping 1:1 in this game, not gameplay reasons. The Motion Plus can handle it. The Player can handle it. But animation and enemy AR cant. Having enemy's respond to dynamic, and not pre-set, sword attacks would be really hard! After all, WiiSportsResort did 1:1 control's and it worked great....but then again, its enemy's didnt even have arms :P

Hellfire Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 14:07 || Total Comments: 828

That's the thing, in WSR you only have those basic moves and matches only last so long, in here you have special moves that obviously can only be done with the aid of button presses and you fight i.e move your arm a lot more, if you had to do the complete motions from start to finish it would be very tiring and hard to pull off. Of course, what I mentioned isn't the only reason, what you said is true, but I'm not writing a dissertation on Ubisoft's decisions, just bringing to mind that complete 1:1 is not always a good thing in order to avoid the apocalypse of people complaining :) Thank you for your comments, I also hope this game sells well, but from what I've seen, there hasn't been a lot of marketing...

Azmol01 Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 14:18 || Total Comments: 921

Getting this once I'm back from my hols, sounds great!

Yulaw Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 16:04 || Total Comments: 177

Looks and sounds good. Think I'll wait for the price to drop as there's other games coming out I want first. I don't want to pay full price for a short game anyway

CSP Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 17:24 || Total Comments: 607

After all, WiiSportsResort did 1:1 control's and it worked great....but then again, its enemy's didnt even have arms :P oh good I was not the only one who thought Swordfight on resort was 1:1. Yet clearing all the levels was a considerable challenge so what does that tell us? That they built a really good system using blocks breaking them by moving the "sword" horizontally to the opponent's. I haven't played RS2 (the game WILL drop to 10-15Eu I am not an idiot) so I got to ask, why aren't they using the resort system on the game? Even the thought of using a nunchuck for movement would have made this game worth of standing on its own (hang on this is how the next Zelda game is going to play)

CSP Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 17:26 || Total Comments: 607

"If the first Red Steel left you scarred" Oh the horror!!! (not kidding, got the game at 10Eu and still thought it was too much for this game)

Hellfire Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 18:12 || Total Comments: 828

In WSR you don't have special attacks, you have simple directional swings, this is not the case in RS2 where you have special attacks and have to string them together fast, plus you spend more time fighting, so my guess is that their reasoning was also that doing the complete motion would be too tiring. Like I said in the review: speed, strength, direction, everything is replicated, in the end, the result is very much like in WSR it doesn't make a lot of difference if the actual swing is 1:1 or not, when you swing you're not gonna top mid-air for any good reason, so it works great. The blocking system is exactly like in WSR.

Tealovertoma Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 19:35 || Total Comments: 431

There's robots in it? What about dinosaurs?

Drift Says:
March 24th, 2010 at 22:15 || Total Comments: 299

1:1 wouldn't work. Lets think about it, with 1:1 there's nothing the developer can do gameplay wise, it's all up to the user. As you may have noticed wii wii sport resort, it ends up comming down to who can attack faster. The best way to attack as fast as possible? waggle powah! By not having the controls 1:1, the developers were able to put in restrictions, special moves, and create gameplay around the motions. Maybe 1:1 will work for other games, but for this, I believe they probably made the best choice. I've nearly completed the game, and having to actually think about your moves, pull of your motions properly, and string your attacks together, I think, is more satisfying then waggling your way to victory.

Sariachan Says:
March 25th, 2010 at 02:07 || Total Comments: 380

I believe a "7" would be a more fitting score for a game like this... I played it a bit, but I didn't like the control system. First of all, default options are horrible, and you've to spend several minutes to try figuring out how to change them to play it a little more comfortable. Anyway, after that it works better, but the camera is linked to the sword while it shouldn't (swords aren't' guns and would required a different camera, even in first person, to really work), and the result is confusing and makes it not so funny to use the sword, at least form me. It's like they put swords in a FPS without changing its mechanics, it's a weird effect. I didn't like it. Also, they stressed the "motion controls" factor in this game yet they included combos and other actions you must do with buttons: controls are incoherent and confuse the player. For example, there are 3-4 types of doors in the game, and only one of them you must open with "motion control", while all the other one with the A button. Furthermore, most actions you do with that button, even when "motion control" would have been better for them (you still use gestures for a couple of things, though, but that's not enough imho). Another thing I couldn't stand was the live-action clips with a model who explains the player how to perform some actions: clips like those completely disrupt the suspension of disbelief even if they are few (and skippable, if I remember well). A really bad design choice, as far as I'm concerned. Then, I watched my boyfriend play through the whole game, in normal mode, and he completed it in only around 7 hours without having fun at all (there are reasons he had to complete it, or he would have given up after the first few hours). At first he read what missions where about, then he gave up since they are all quite shallow, repetitive and frankly boring, and you don't need to read texts to beat the game, since it's fairly linear and simple. Areas are few and they aren't so beautiful, despise the good art style, since there isn't much care for details and elements repeat themselves way too often. For example, the white paper sheets flowing in the wind, which are all exact the same anywhere they appear. Also, natural areas seems artificial and "dead", since there aren't animals at all, not even insects or birds, which is quite strange in a game which has canyons and caverns among its settings. There are some faults in the graphics, for example shadows placed under textures, near at least one trees, and animations aren't so good. Enemies have little AI if any at all, at least in normal mode, and there are not more than about 10 types of them, bosses included. Also, the flying robots look out of place. Finally, music is good but really repetitive and with few tracks, and the Italian dubbing is horrible. As I said, a game like this in my opinion doesn't deserves more than a 7: it works but there are design and other types of faults, controls aren't so funny, and its development seems rushed.

Sariachan Says:
March 25th, 2010 at 02:12 || Total Comments: 380

Just to point out, I love Resort and it still is the best games to show off MotionPlus capabilities. It saddens me that Nintendo has to put up with such shallow 3rd party games as Red Steel 2 to promote it, but they hasn't much of a choice as for now, unfortunately. :(

Solitanze Says:
March 25th, 2010 at 06:43 || Total Comments: 1834

Was the right decision for me to cancel my preorder when I did based on critical response. This year has been a serious letdown for gaming so far with Mass Effect 2, God of War 3, Bioshock 2 and Final Fantasy XIII all failing to meet expectations and this game is consistent with this trend. Would like to trial the motion controls still so i'll most likely hire it or borrow it off a friend, but certainly won't be buying a copy...

Hellfire Says:
March 25th, 2010 at 09:16 || Total Comments: 828

Well Saria you're entitled to your opinion of course, I disagree completely on everything, but thank you for sharing :) Like I mentioned in the review it seems to me that what put you off in the sword/camera controls was trying to use it outside of combat with no lock-on, the camera isn't linked to the sword, you supposed to use it when you're locked-on in which case the camera is fixed. Drift, if you just waggled in WST you couldn't get anywhere, maybe against low level oponents, both CPU an human, but without quick reflexes with the blocking you couldn't do a thing.

CSP Says:
March 25th, 2010 at 09:27 || Total Comments: 607

"The blocking system is exactly like in WSR." thanks for that, I am a bit more interested in this game now. Also if anyone at Ubi read my earlier comment, let me clarify that while I am willing to buy this at a low price (because you trained us to expect them), I am not really going to miss it if it doesn't. Seriously though, PLEASE stop the price drops, it makes people hit their heads on the wall.

CSP Says:
March 25th, 2010 at 09:30 || Total Comments: 607

@Sariachan no offense but having paragraphs 3-5 lines each does not make the text easier to read and I am sure that had this same text had 4-5 paragraphs, I could have personally read it faster.

Eraser Says:
March 25th, 2010 at 15:30 || Total Comments: 546

This game is giving me one hell of an arm ache

Hellfire Says:
March 25th, 2010 at 17:00 || Total Comments: 828

Yeah I got sore the first day after playing too. Not enough exercise I guess xD I got used to it though, now I'm all buff... at least my right arm is.

Sariachan Says:
March 25th, 2010 at 19:36 || Total Comments: 380

I know that when you're locked-on the camera is fixed, but I don't like to always play with lock-on activated, it give me less freedom in many situations. @CSP: strange, usually people complain when paragraphs are too long. °_°

Sumo73 Says:
March 26th, 2010 at 16:08 || Total Comments: 372

I got this game today as a pre-order and even though at the start of the game it tells you to hold the wii remote in your right hand I've been playing this game as a left hander and it's ok. A proper left handed option would have been better. The odd thing about my pre-order which came with the motion plus attachment (but no codes) was that it was slightly cheaper than just buying the game without the attachment so I got a good deal. I did enjoy the first game despite it's faults and so far Red Steel 2 seems to be fine.

Eraser Says:
March 27th, 2010 at 08:00 || Total Comments: 546

I enjoyed the first Red Steel as well and so far RS2 seems like a decent purchase. I just don't really like this mission set up they've gone for. I'd rather have a game that has a continually progressing storyline. Right now it feels a bit cheap, as if it allowed them to create less levels for the game. But that's the only problem I see with it so far. The art direction is fantastic and it plays pretty well. It IS a physically demanding game to play, not something to pick up if you want to chill out, but the controls work fine. And everybody that's disappointed because you don't get literal 1-on-1 sword control hasn't been paying attention. The developers have said for a long time that such a thing is not possible.

Tealovertoma Says:
March 28th, 2010 at 11:14 || Total Comments: 431

LOVING it, this is the swordfighting game I've been waiting for. Everyone needs to pick this up right now. Maybe "Sariachan" needs to spend a bit more time configuring the controls. I set it on custom and changed everything (took me 15 minutes tops) and now it controls perfectly.

Yulaw Says:
March 28th, 2010 at 16:46 || Total Comments: 177

Regarding what Sol said: And last year was a good year for games then? I'm having a serious block in remembering any really good games except for Batman and Uncharted 2. Those game he mentioned aren't amazing, but they're not crap (well, I don't care for FF)

Eraser Says:
March 31st, 2010 at 01:50 || Total Comments: 546

Solitanze is our resident grumpy old man. Ignore him. It's the best advice I can give you.

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