Muramasa

This week I sat in on a demo for Muramasa: The Demon Blade. The Ignition Entertainment title is headed exclusively to the Nintendo Wii on September 8. The action game is developed by Vanillaware whose previous work was the much loved and very difficult, Odin Sphere.

Muramasa: The Demon Blade takes place during the Genroku era on the main island of Japan. Kisuke has lost his memories and is being chased for a crime. He only knows that he wants to find a certain katana. Momohime is possessed by a foul swordsman, and gets to know him during the journey. Each will explore half the map and meet in the middle.

In the game there are 108 different swords to find. The swords all have different abilities and take damage. It’s possible for a sword to break during battle. When that happens, it takes 30 seconds for the sword to heal. We were shown the sword tree which will look familiar to gamers that have played Final Fantasy X. Using a sphere grid like map, you unlock the new swords.

Muramasa

To be expected from the team that worked on Odin Sphere the game is visually stunning. It’s pretty amazing that it looks so good on the Wii. The team did heavy research about the time period and artists that they used as inspiration for the game. Many of the scenes were inspired by woodblock art. While the movement is in 2D, they did create 3D backgrounds to add depth to the levels. Levels will also go in many directions. So it’s important to have the map HUD up. Levels go from right to left, up and down, it can be pretty confusing if you aren’t paying attention.

Being on the Wii, gamers can use the Wii Remote and Nunchuck or the classic controller. There is a learning curve to the controls for the game but don’t let that scare you. The most frustrating part for me was pressing Z to change swords instead of the C button. Z controls the map which isn’t so useful in the middle of battle. But once you get a handle on the controls, Muramasa: The Demon Blade was really fun to play. The fighting action is fast and the boss battles are challenging. The boss battle that we saw had three stages.

Ignition Entertainment kept Muramasa: The Demon Blade with the original Japanese voices and subtitled in English. I did find it interesting that there isn’t a Playstation 2 or PSP port. But hopefully Wii gamers will give Muramasa: The Demon Blade a chance.

Here is a gameplay trailer for Muramasa: The Demon Blade: