X-Blades

Back to basics...

There seems to be a lot of hack 'n' slash titles available for the PS3 at the moment, and X-Blades is the latest addition to this ever-growing list. Let's hack our way in and see what new angles the game can offer on this sometimes maligned genre.

Ayumi is a treasure hunter who we meet while in the middle of her latest adventure. The cel-shaded cut-scenes do a good job of explaining this, but we don't immediately find out much about the backstory - if, indeed, there is any. In short, Ayumi is a cel-shaded version of Lara Croft, who wears less clothes and uses swords and magic as well as pistols.

Combat involves either Ayumi's swords or her pistols, each mapped to the Square button and R1 respectively. The vast majority of enemies can be dispatched quite easily by mashing on either of these buttons, it is fairly obvious which will be superior, depending on whether your opponents are near or far.

As the game goes on, however, Ayumi gains spells and magical powers. The magic system is based on elements like fire and ice, and enemies of certain properties will need to be countered with the appropriate element. Ayumi does not have unlimited magical power, and must build up her Rage bar to be able to use her magical attacks. This is done by engaging in standard combat with enemies.

As the story progresses, the game takes you through a number of different environments where it boils down to killing every enemy in the area. During this process, it is possible to find upgrades scattered around the level which give Ayumi higher damage or higher health (for example).

Killing enemies and smashing up objects allows Ayumi to collect Souls, which act as the game's currency. This is required in the main to purchase new spells once they become unlocked as the game moves along. You can choose up to four spells to map to certain buttons, and can change the spells you have loaded on the fly via the pause menu, if you come up against enemies that require a different approach.

Sadly, however, this is not often the case. The vast majority of enemies can be destroyed by mashing on the Square button with your swords and with very little thought. The other main alternative is enemies with ranged attacks who can be destroyed by mashing on R1. The environments look okay but are nothing special, and, without spoiling too much, you have to go through every level a second time later on in the game. It's appropriate in the context of the story but as less time needed to be spent on level design, I would have expected more effort to be made on making the game pretty.

X-Blades is, in summary, really just one long button-mash-fest, and doesn't require much subtlety as a result. Unfortunately the story and graphics do not do enough to make up for this simplicity - the game is of a decent length but sadly just gets very samey towards the end. Nothing special, overall; one for genre fanatics only.

40%

By Richard Bright