I have a weird history with Asura's Wrath in that playing it was the first time I ever learned what a "bad used game disc" was, where they are so badly damaged that reaching up a certain point in the game, it will simpily freeze and not load up the next section of the game. I thought it was my PS3 not being able to run it but I later learned what this was and this is one major reason why I don't care for physical copies of games nearly as much as I used. I thought there was something wrong with game itself or my PS3 but it was neither. Other than that, there are other much more infamous hurdles regarding the game in that the ending was locked behind paid DLC. This was during Capcom's "heel" run after all. On top of this, there is no modern version of the game with the DLC included which hurts the game even more. Anyways, I decided to play AW again with me buying and beating the Part 4 DLC this time since I doubt there will be a modern port of the game.
With that out of the way, the best way of describing Asura's Wrath is that it's basically about as much of a 6 out of 10 game as one can get, however, it is a entertaining and enjoyable 6 depending on your suspension of disbelief levels.Since this a CyberConnect2 game when it comes to production values as usual, it's top notch. The way characters look and are animated are very expressive and since this is not based on an already established license, it's rather impressive how many of the characters I can recall based on their looks alone. The music is also some of their best. The main theme and Yasha's music in particular is great stuff. The level of over the top scale the game has is really commendable, there will be parts where the player will be fighting enemies as big as planets or ripping through large fleets of spaceships. AW is definitely one of those where the visuals and specticle carries much of the game which isn't too far off for CyberConnect2.
The story is decent but it is mostly carried by the production values, music and immense scale. Contrary to popular belief despite the game being compared to God of War, outside of featuring "angry" protagonists and being based on myths, AW's story is a combination of the Gungrave anime and fighting shonen anime like Dragon Ball and Naruto among other media. The thing with AW's story is that it's not so much "bad" is that I just wanted to know more since a lot of the characters and their relationships aren't really shown that well in the game itself. Outside of Yasha and Augus and maybe Durga and Mythra, a lot of the characters usually have one or two scenes that don't do really do enough to create attachment towards them. The villains like Deus and the Golden Spider are on the underdeveloped side and don't really do much outside of monolouging or just angering Asura. The interludes don't do enough. It is awesome that there is an interrupt monologue button, I'll commend it immensely for having that.
The scene at the end of Act 2 where, the girl that looks like Mythra dies and causes Asura to go full on rage mode falls flat since there was barely any interactions or anything to the girl other than looking like Mythra.
A large part of me wishes the game got an anime adaptation of some kind with adaptation expansion and a protracted prologue like the aforementioned Gungrave since I can picture it improving the story. AW's story is arguably too ambitious for the kind of game it is.
The gameplay is where things get a little on the dull yet frustrating side. AW is basically a shoot em up and a 3D beat em up. Both of them are basically a means to an end for QTEs. The concept of building up your rage is interesting but it never goes behind being nothing more than a "win" button. The shoot em up sections is just dodging projectiles and spamming fire until you press the rage burst button.
The 3D beat em up combat has slightly more going on but not much. AW's combat is basically what if the Kingdom Hearts 2 reaction commands system was the basis for the entire combat. It's a cross between that and the Naruto Storm games' QTEs.
When not using the QTE reaction commands to build up rage, your fist attacks don't do much damage. The "heavy attack" is a 360 degree area of effect swipe which can't be chained with light attacks. Projectile attacks needs player to stand still in order to hit things and is only needed for flying enemies.
The hardest enemy is the camera since the bosses can move at high speeds faster than the camera can track them and the lock will follow them making them harder to keep track of. They can dart across one end to another end of the battlefield and Asura's has no distance closing moves making combat more of a game of, "waiting for a QTE prompt to pop up to do massive damage". You get no new abilties or moves on top of level design being scripted.
Overall, it's funny how a game where it's major selling point was being an "interactive anime" was better off being an anime.
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