Bleach: Wii Shiraha Kirameku Rinbukyoku
Writen by Kaitou Ace
Posted on March 16, 2007 at 04:03:31 pm
Bleach: Wii Shiraha Kirameku Rinbukyoku / Bleach Wii 白刃きらめく輪舞曲
Game homepage
Summary
Bleach Wii, is a unique fighting game based on the rather popular
Bleach anime & manga series. I believe it is the only fighter of this nature right now, and is certainly the first to incorporate sword slashes via the wii-mote in a two player figher. It is also a sequel to a GameCube title.
Neither of these games have been released in the US, and I am not sure if they
will be, so at this time it is an import only title, and you either need to have a
modchip (I think only one currently allows you to play imports) in your wii, or
have a Japanese wii to be able to play it. The single player mode is fairly
basic, with character-centered episodes, and an arcade mode. Most of the fun in
this game, as it is in most fighters, is the two player vs mode.
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The Main Game Menu. Every option is subtitled with English to assist importers. |
The Starting roster of characters. This gets a lot bigger quickly |
Controls & Gameplay
The game is entirely controlled with the wii-mote and the
nunchuck addon, and you can�t use the classic controller or a GC controller.
You have three gauges for your character. One is the
standard health bar, and another, on the bottom of the screen is your reiatsu
(energy, charka, etc) which grows as you take damage, or attack your opponent.
In addition to this, there is a small bar underneath your health, which goes
down as you attack, and goes up as you defend, or strategically retreat. Once
it runs out, you can no longer attack, and you need to wait a bit for it to
restore. This can work really well with most characters, and it gives you
incentive not to swing the wii-mote around like a madman.
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Hitsugaya-taichou vs Komamura-taichou
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Ichigo vs Matsumoto
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You run around by using the joystick on the nunchuck, and
you can run faster by holding the Z button, or block with C. Also, if you shake
the nunchuck you will charge your reiatsu.
You have three basic attacks done by swinging the wii-mote,
a stab, a horizontal strike, and a vertical strike. Then you can augment the
attacks by holding down the A button, which makes them a bit stronger, and a
bit slower.
Another interesting gameplay dynamic is that if you both hit
at the same time, it enters a sort of rock-paper-scissors mini game, where both
characters strike each other non-stop, and you have to do one of the attack
swings when the timer hits green. This goes on five times, and whoever wins the
most rounds does the finishing attack, and deals some decent damage. The
formula seems to be horizontal slash > thrust >vertical slash >
horizontal slash.
Once your reiatsu is fully charged, you can shake the
nunchuck again to activate bankai mode. If you haven�t watched bleach, bankai
is what some shinigami can do to greatly increase their power. Their sword
usually reveals its true shape, and their attacks become much more powerfull.
In the game, characters that don�t actually have a bankai (Yumichika, Orihime,
Rukia, etc) instead just use their shikai (first release) attacks on a higher
power level. When a character in game enters bankai mode, the stage transforms
also, into a desolate field, with broken boulders and lightning strikes in the
background. All of your attacks are improved, and one of the B button + swing
combinations becomes a cinematic attack for rather great damage. While in
bankai your reiatsu keeps running out, but it is possible to do two cinematic
attacks on a single bankai charge.
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Hihou Zabimaru! |
Daiguren Hyourinmaru!
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You can also combo in the general game by chaining several
wii-mote swings together, usually ending with an A + swing or a B + swing, but
it is very hard to do combos in this game because of the control system.
Wii-motes aren�t fully �real-time� and there is a bit of a delay to the moves.
Also, you can�t go from swing to swing, as if you were using a sword, you have
to make a motion, stop, then make another motion, which is very
counter-intuitive, so in my experience most battles end up being a bunch of
single strokes. You also can play without actually moving your hands much, just
by using your wrist to make the proper motions with the wii-mote. This isn�t
quite as much fun tho.
While most of the characters do use swords, there is a
number of characters who do not, such as Sado (Chad), Orihime, Ishida and
Yorouichi. It takes a bit more to get used to fighting with them, as the
attacks aren�t quite as intuitive as the swings are for the sword moves. Ishida
especially is a hard character to use, because he has no close range melee
attacks at all, and has to spend his time either shooting arrows, or running
away. He is stronger and more useful then he was in the GameCube game, but I
wouldn�t play much with him.
Graphics
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Chire, Senbonzakura Kageyoshi! |
Kokujou Tengen Myouou vs Hyourinmaru (note the ice flowers over Hitsugaya's head, they vanish one-by-one as the bankai time runs out.)
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The game is cell shaded for the characters, so take that as
what you will. It looks nice. Not X-box 360 nice, or PS3 nice, but better then
GameCube, and nice, being based on an anime, there isn�t much that�s necessary really
to stimulate the style of the series. This sort of graphics combination really
works well for the wii, as the graphics can be quite impressive, without
straining the system. It especially shines in bankai mode, for the giant alien
baby that is Mayuri-taichou�s bankai, or the giant knight for Komamura-taichou.
Unlike the GameCube game, the characters mouths do move when they speak now,
which certainly helps. The voice talent from the series does the acting for the
game as well, and the audio is fairly good.
Story & Gameplay Modes
You basically have two single player modes, an episode (i.e.
story) mode, where you play a story line as a particular character, and then an
arcade mode, where you go through a preset number of battles (9 I believe)
gaining points for damage dealt.
For the episode mode, you start off with having four
episodes unlocked: Kurosaki Ichigo, Abarai Renji, Zaraki Kenpachi, and
Hitsugaya Toushiro. Each episode has anime panels between the fighting, and
they all end in a battle with an Arrancar that was created just for this game,
by the name of Arturo Plateado. The stories are fairly basic, but it�s a fighting
game, so there isn�t that much depth to be expected anyway. As you complete the episodes, you unlock
episodes for other characters, such as Yorouichi, Kuchiki Byakuya, and
Hanatarou.
Yes, Yamada Hanatarou. For those unfamiliar with the anime,
Hanatarou is a shinigami from the 4th squad, which is the medical
team of soul society. They aren�t known for their fighting prowess, and in fact
in the show, Hanatarou is without his sword most of the time, having forgotten
it somewhere. In the game he is even more useless. All of his basic attacks
will heal his enemy, his powerful attacks involve him spinning around, and
making himself dizzy for a bit, or throwing himself head-first at the opponent,
with both ending up on the ground. He is a joke character, and one of my gaming
pet-peeves is being forced to play through missions as the joke character in
order to unlock things. With his attacks being useless or nearly so, it makes
even the easiest of foes extremely difficult, and it was playing his episode
that frustrated me the most about the game. I have no problems with joke
characters being in fighters, but they have no place in the story mode of the
game.
Final Thoughts
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Orihime vs Shiba Ganjyu |
Arturo Plateado, the new Arrancar, created by Sega with help from Kubo Tite
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This is a fun enough of a game, but I would say it�s a lot
better if you have multiple people, then if you are playing it by yourself.
Unlocking characters can get tedious of course, but the method for it is quite
standard: pass episodes, pass the arcade mode with a character, or a few
characters.
There are 32 characters in the game in total, and an
additional 8 alt character modes (mostly shinigami in their gigai states) which
is a decent increase from the GameCube game, which had 25 characters. They
dropped Shiba Kaien from the roster, and there were two versions of Aizen in
the GC game, and only one now. Also there are three Arrancar in the roster,
with Grimmjaw and Ulquiorra making an appearance, in addition to Arturo.
This is not the type of fighter that a person can get �good� at
though, by which I mean memorizing move combinations, mastering a character or
characters, and so on. Combo-wise, the characters are about the same, and I can�t
imagine a skill-based tournament for this game, of the sort that are possible
with say, the Naruto: Gekitou Ninja Taisen series. It takes a bit to force
yourself to make only the wii-mote motions that the game recognizes, and your
hand does get a bit tired after a few matches. Also while the concept is undoubtedly
cool, it does seem to degenerate into rapid swinging matches fairly quickly.
That being said, it�s a great Bleach game, and a lot of fun
if you know the characters. In single-player mode, I can see
getting bored with the game shortly after unlocking everyone, but it makes a
really good party game, in part due to the lack of skill required to play it.
Overall, I�d give this game a 6/10 if you are playing by yourself, or an
8/10 if you have other people you can
play against.
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