Why do you play Warriors games?

[deathofaninja]

I notice there are actually a big portion of people that play these games here, and I just wanted to know why. My experience with the games has been of such:

Repetitive. Boy do I get bored playing these games. The enemies just stare at you as you pound away on the same button and win. Ryu Hayabusa was in Orochi 3, and I played that game because of it. I found his character to be a better than the average one because of his entertaining moves and look... but it didn't really make the game a better experience.

The graphics are just piss poor. This game does not represent that of a classic Team NINJA title or Dead or Alive 5, so I'm wondering how people branch off from TN games to play these games other than a few NG DOA characters being included. Every year they look the same... the graphics finally look like an original xbox game and not a PS2 game.

Goals in this game are also repetitive... it's the same shit every level... kill the leader who is just as dumb as the cronies and possibly invade a base. It sometimes takes forever to get ANYWHERE and there is nothing beautiful to admire while traversing this ugly world.

So what's your reason for playing these games?

 

[CyberEvil]

Orochi 3 was built on their last gen engine. It was pretty fugly but I played it for Hayabusa too. The games built on newer engines like DW8 and SW4 are much better looking and throw tons of enemies on screen at once. More impressive but it's never going to floor you. One Piece Pirate Warriors 3 and Arslan most recently are fairly good looking games though.

To answer your question, though, I play Warriors games for the time investment. You always move forward in these games, even when you start completely new characters. Accessories, new weapons, and mounts (to combat your slowness complaint) and some of these collectibles have specific requirements to unlock. Unlocking Red Hare or Matsukaze in a Warriors game (Dynasty and Samurai, respectively) is a feat that you can only do when you have a powerful enough character. Using them after is a reward and you fucking fly across the map with them.

It's an ever-more rewarding experience and the mission flow becomes very much a secondary thing. You are doing repetitious things but that's true of all games when you break them down. Getting all of the side objectives, protecting generals that may assist you later in some of the harder missions, fulfilling hidden requirements for rare items and weapons...it's only as basic as you want it to be. Playing on Normal is also a no-no as it does completely change the game. Start on Hard, move up to whatever is higher when you have good equipment and accessories. Much better game then.

The movesets are also far more in-depth than people give them credit for because they all play on Easy or Normal. Mashing X works on those difficulties but you're also cheating yourself out of a more fun experience. On higher difficulties you have to balance your meter usage carefully as well as your strings. You CAN juggle a boss to keep him from being able to attack you, but you deal massively reduced damage. You could also stick to canceling strings into unique abilities or Musou for the damage, but you risk them triggering an ability with i-frames or their own Musou because they're not in a juggled or guard-broken state. There's quite a bit to it but the nuance is lost when it's on a lower difficulty.

I could go on but yeah. Short version is the same as people would say about RPGs or RTS or even fighting games: you get out what you put in. It can be a mashy fighter or a deep one. It's all about perspective and investment. We deal with that mindset enough with our own fighting game, don't we?

 

[samuraihachi]

I play them because they are my favorite hack-and-slash series since 2004. It's the same reason why people buy the next Call of Duty every year: We like the gameplay. To me its a lot of fun to hack at stuff, especially with my friend/sister in Co-op mode. The Ancient China/Feudal Japan setting makes me like it more. Everything about that was awesome. The music, the stages, the stories, the character designs, etc. You could tell they did their research. Coming from a Chinese myself, I thought they did an excellent job with Dynasty Warriors. Think of the warriors games like a Japanese Call of Duty.

I've had lots of fond memories playing Samurai Warriors 1 and Dynasty Warriors 4 when I was 9 years old. Played it all the time with my sister getting all the weapons, maxing all the characters, etc. Speaking of which, I really liked the characters, particularly Yukimura Sanada and Zhao Yun. They fought like badasses and as a young boy, it was easy to relate to them. KOEI has managed to give these historical figures memorable personalities so that people would care about them. It's not like you're just playing as a random guy and beat up people. Everyone's got their own unique story to tell.

Another reason I play them is because there are just so much content, whether it be the amount of characters, weapon customization, creating your own officer, survival mode, (in some games there is also versus mode). Tons of stuff you can do, which really distinguishes the game from other hack-and-slashes. Now, I will agree these games can get repetitive. But honestly, with a hack-and-slash game, its not exactly easy to make mind-blowing changes that will please newcomers and veterans because at the end of the day, its still the same concept. You run around a battlefield and you hit stuff. But hey, we like that. We like pressing buttons and we like to hack at stuff.

 

[Argentus]

The others have said it well enough but I'll chip in.

The sheer amount of content is staggering, first off. DW 8 for example I can say actually has TOO MUCH content.
80+ characters each with their own unique weapons and move sets, their own sets of unique collectibles, and each characters level ranking is unique to them.

Then on top of that there's like 60 different missions/maps, and each one of THOSE has between 2-4 different versions depending on how many factions are in that particular map, as you can play each factions version of that particular battle.

Each and every mission has not only its own objectives that change not only how that battle plays out, but future battles as well (creating "hypothetical" routes different from the historical ones), but also hidden/side objectives required to unlock various extras such as legendary weapons.

Then even once youve done all THAT you can modify your weapon with various attributes which overhauls the entire play style from tripling attack speed to causing explosions to increasing meter build to calling down lightning with every strike to going for insane offense but reduced defense and vice versa, etc.

There's so much content I literally don't have time to get around to most of it. When I pop in dw8 I'm currently trying to get characters 6 star weapons and then modify that weapon but it is a long multi step process for each and every one because first I have to level them up high enough to do the required Hard Mode version of the map their weapon is unlocked on and practice repeatedly to meet the bonus objectives which range from easy to really difficult THEN I have to farm gems and weapon points to modify and upgrade that weapon.


Then there's spinoffs like how I'm currently playing One Piece Pirate Warriors 3 and can't wait to get Hyrule Warriors Legends on my 3ds. They don't have as much content but have much deeper and more refined gameplay. I'm done with one piece in that I've unlocked every character beat both story mode and dream mode. Only things left are collecting all the coins to level break characters but I'm not gonna bother since I don't need level 100 characters aside from the triple extreme difficulties. But since there's no weapons in that game, there's nothing to unlock so meh.


But yeah its only repetitive in the same sense as every videogame ever.


The problem is people go in wanting devil may cry gameplay but don't understand that if every enemy took that long to fight not only would you be slaughtered due to the sheer volume of enemies but you would always fail missions due to taking too long. The hordes of enemies are the obstacle not the objective, like in Dead Rising.

 

[Xhominid The Demon Within]

Alright, I'll answer your question, though this is going to be pretty short:

The main reason I play the Dynasty Warriors games? For the fun of tearing through thousands of troops.
I started playing Dynasty Warriors 3...but I didn't really like how the arrows was OP in that game, so I turned it back in when I had the chance and bought 4 instead...and I never regretted it nor buying Dynasty Warriors 5, 7, Warriors Orochi(I want to get 3...but I'd rather get the PS4 version anyway) or 8XLCE on my PC(well...past my PC not running it well in general in certain stages with particle effects...)

The games actually DO have a dearth of combat(especially after 6 with the weapon change system) and require some strategy to beat the harder stages without failing miserably(and OH BOY, you can fail so fucking miserably in certain stages, rushing in like a dumbass) and the higher difficulty modes requires mass leveling or modding your weapons(and getting best weapons themselves require patience and luck)

DW8XLCE gives a FUCKTON of content to the point that even after completing everyone's Story Mode, I haven't yet completed their Alternate Stories, fully went through Ambition Mode nor even started going after their Ultimate Weapons yet...
Pretty much, if you see DW8 as repetition, then you need to see that all games are repetitious. Me? I'm probably going to buy SW4-2 for the PS3...and just go ham on that game whenever I get the chance.

 

[THE_WORST_KOKORO]

I play it to make Ryona videos...




...what?

 

[deathofaninja]

I always feel like I am progressing in this game, but all the characters don't really do anything for me. Yes -- all games can be reptitive; but repetitive and falling asleep is the problem I have with this series. I drift off into space whenever I play them.

And seriously? You play Warriors to make ryona videos? Rumble Roses seems like a better bet for that.

 

[Argentus]

I always feel like I am progressing in this game, but all the characters don't really do anything for me. Yes -- all games can be reptitive; but repetitive and falling asleep is the problem I have with this series. I drift off into space whenever I play them.

And seriously? You play Warriors to make ryona videos? Rumble Roses seems like a better bet for that.

Maybe you're just not into hack and slash games then.

I was starting to get bored until I actually tried out the characters. Started finding ones with REALLY fun playstyles

 

[AsheMann21]

My first ever game for my PS2 was Dynasty Warriors 5. I didn't what it was at the time but I had so much fun. It was like being in one of those Kung fu movies with all the action and nonsense. I will say the PS2 era was damn harder than the current generation of games. Thus, it was very rewarding just to win and see your character's win pose.

I am a history buff, to say the least. To a certain degree, the games have been based on ancient Chinese History which was quite interesting. Playing a character's story mode was witnessing how the chaos shaped their world and their factions. The encyclopaedia helped me a lot in understanding their history. So every time I played it, I learned a bit more about The Three Kingdoms.

This kind of hack n slash is not like the super hard Ninja Gaiden or God of War games. Rather, it's just the simple concept of 1 against 1000 and to me, that's already exhilirating enough. Starting with 5, I've seen Omega Force experiment with the mechanics. At times they had it wrong but they have managed to amend their mistakes. I understand some people can't stand the gameplay and that's ok. I won't deny the fact that I get bored with the repetition from time to time but the strange appeal of the series has always drawn me to it.

Every time a new Warriors game is announced, the first things I want to know are not the graphics or gameplay. I need to know how the characters I've grown attached to are going to be updated, how they will present the key battles of the story.

I have grown to adore the Warriors series despite its flaws. Regardless of what people say, I love it.

 

[lavishlorelei]

Dynasty Warriors always had top notch music great replay value. I was dissapointed in DW8 copy & paste of DW7