Dynasty Warriors 7 - Story Of Conquest

I bet you thought I was dead. Truth is things have been very busy at work and seeing how this blog is a side project of mine it got relegated to back burner status. Can't guarantee that I'll be able to post more often, but I'll sure try.

Dynasty Warriors 7 has two modes of play, Story and Conquest. I've played a lot of Story and a little of Conquest. In past Dynasty Warriors games you've been able to select your character and get the story from that characters perspective.

Dynasty Warriors 7 changes that up. You are now given a pre-selected character and the story is told in a more chronological way. It really gives an idea of how things flowed for each kingdom, but there is this huge disconnect for the 4th kingdom of Jin.

Story mode is broken up into four kingdoms. The first three are the main forces of the Three Kingdoms era of Ancient China, Shu, Wu and Wei. The fourth kingdom, Jin, comes at the very end of the Three Kingdoms era to wrap everything up. I don't know much about Jin as I'm still in the middle of their story mode. I have studied the Three Kingdoms era a little of the years so I do have a rough idea how the story plays out.
While I liked being able to understand the order of events, you only get to play a handful of characters during the Story mode. If the character doesn't do anything until the the Jin era he's just flat out of luck as being playable. This is a big disappointment. Story mode is where I got to know and like the various characters of this world. You no longer get that full opportunity.

Plus I like unlocking characters. I always enjoyed seeing who I unlocked after I beat each character's scenario. Now extra characters are unlocked only in Conquest mode and unlocking them isn't hard or challenging. Just keep playing through Conquest you'll eventually be handed all of them.

The fact that no character truly has a set weapon is also bothersome. Koei promised no clones in this game. Problem is, you can equip anyone with any weapon, so everyone is a clone. I can't believe how  many characters use the same basic weapons. The basic sword is an insanely popular choice for characters. Sure characters get an EX attack if they have a specific weapon equipped, but beside that and a characters musou attack there's nothing to truly make them feel different. Having two weapons equipped doesn't really seem to help since I very rarely use the second weapon.

Weapons have always been a way to connect with a character. You picked Zhao Yun because you liked how he used his spear of Jian Wei. Now it doesn't matter. They both have the same basic moveset. Weapons don't help a character stand out anymore. Liu Bei and Cao Pi both use dual swords as their main, so they have the same moveset. I really hope Koei goes away from this style next game and gives each character back their own unique weapon and moveset. If doing that for the 60+ characters in this game is to hard, then cut characters. Sell them as DLC later on or something.

The oddest thing that happens during story mode is that after a stage is done, you might get voice over occurring on top of a blank screen. I kept thinking my game was broken, but every kingdom has stages like this and I just don't get it. What player would want to stare at a blank screen for so long? Before a stage you're given a slideshow of how the war is progressing. That's nice and informative, but what's with the black at the end of the stage?