Isn’t it strange how some people just might be Dynasty Warriors fans, without ever having played a mainline Dynasty Warriors game? For any other series that would sound like an absurd statement, but Dynasty Warriors is one of the only long-running game series that has dozens of spin-offs, many of which ditched the “Warriors” moniker. There’s Hyrule Warriors, Fire Emblem Warriors, One Piece: Pirate Warriors, Samurai Warriors, Warriors Orochi, Fist of the North Star: Ken’s Rage, Persona 5 Strikers – to name a few – and many of those games have direct sequels, if not multiple.
If you’re a die-hard Nintendo fan, it’s entirely possible that you’ve played four Warriors games featuring Nintendo characters, without ever touching a single mainline title. And that might be for the best. Despite Koei Tecmo and Omega Force’s incredible ability to develop these games quickly and to a high standard to please partners, the mainline games have suffered. 2018’s Dynasty Warriors 9 was a critical low point for the series, and seven years later, it’s up to Dynasty Warriors: Origins to redeem the mainline games.
Omega Force’s litany of spin-offs and co-developed games might seem like an aside, but those games have influenced Dynasty Warriors: Origins more than the mainline series ever did. 9’s missteps have informed the series as a whole, and the most successful mechanics of the spin-offs have made their way here.
Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity allows you to use Breath of the Wild’s slate abilities to counter enemy attacks, allowing you to stay on the offensive for much longer than usual, and certain abilities in Origins allow you to counter enemies, opening them up for a raw combo. Age of Calamity was previously my favorite Warriors game – when it was actually able to hold a steady frame rate on Nintendo Switch, at least – and the smart combat tweaks that allowed me to crush enemies there have been brought over.
I can’t nail down the source of each and every combat tweak made here in Origins, but it’s clear that Omega Force’s experimentation with different franchises and combat styles have coalesced here and broadly improved what was seen as an ailing franchise. And those are just the minor details.
The Dynasty Warriors series has always been best known for comboing and juggling dozens of enemy soldiers at a time, and that’s a struggle on less powerful hardware. I’m pouring one out in memory of the Nintendo 3DS as you read this. Omega Force reportedly made this game to take advantage of PS5 hardware, with 10,000 soldiers able to be rendered at once. On paper it’s a meaningless number, but if you’ve played an older Dynasty Warriors game, and now play this one, you’ll fully understand the difference.
When in a populated area, it’s like a crowd crush. You can’t clip through enemy soldiers, so when trying to walk or dodge through a crowd, you’ll get stuck. It feels incredibly claustrophobic, but also liberating, because a few attacks can send those soldiers into the air. You can cause a Sharknado of people with a simple button press, literally carving paths through the crowd like Moses parting the Red Sea. It’s so silly, but feels incredible.
Charging through a crowd on horseback sees enemies flicked away like boogers, but when you’re attempting to face an enemy officer and you’re unable to dodge properly, the crowd suddenly becomes intimidating. Enemy officers can utilize tactics to make those usually harmless soldiers become more formidable challenges. They can bring soldiers together to bombard you with arrows, or have a brigade of spearman charge you. These tactics are surprisingly effective, too, as you just might find your combos cut in half. You can use abilities to counter these tactics, which leads to wiping out dozens of soldiers in a second, but it’s easier said than done when you’re up against multiple officers in addition to the crowd.
You get to use your own tactics too, though. You can order soldiers to break down doors to bases, bombard locations with arrows, and charge. You can play the entire game without ever actually using these, but if you aim at the right location at the right time, you can cripple enemy officers moving on your location.
As you fight your way across the map, so will your allies. They will independently take bases and move towards the primary goal, usually taking diverse routes. While they’re quite capable, you will often need to jump in to help. You’ll have to keep an eye on your map at all times, as battles between your ally officers and enemies are highlighted, in addition to who has the upperhand. You have to use this information to prioritize who and what needs your attention the most. Do you help your officers secure bases on the map, or do you disable the enemy catapults before the castle walls get breached? The longer you spend in any one area, the worse the situation will get in other areas. It might be a battle between thousands, but you’re the only soldier that truly matters.
That’s contextualized in the story, too. You don’t dip in and out of historical figures here, instead you play as a member of a warrior tribe that is destined to bring peace to the land — only you have amnesia, of course. You have no strict allegiances, only siding with those that will end the fighting, and this may have you come up against precious allies and fighting alongside future foes. The mercenary viewpoint is a good one, allowing you to get a look at each faction without betraying anyone directly. Plus, there are a bunch of weapon types, allowing you to explore different combat styles, so a single protagonist doesn’t feel too restrictive.
The world isn’t just a 2D map, either. A Final Fantasy-style overworld is present, with a giant player character wandering between chibi representations of cities and towns. This does a nice job of illustrating where the combat is taking place, and seeing a mountain temple in the background is a good way to make me excited to play on and see what’s next. Between battles you can chat with other warriors and take on dozens of optional battles. Some of these are a one-on-one duel against an enemy officer, while others are simple base-taking challenges. They’re always short, but ultimately don’t feel rewarding enough to spend your time on.
Being able to chat with other warriors does a lot to characterize all of the people you’re fighting. While many enemy officers are called things like “Brave Yellow Turban Officer”, some of them are unique, and may even challenge you to a duel. Duels ignore health, and instead rank you on how many attacks you deal and dodge within a time limit. Winning duels and defeating tactics have a huge impact on the morale of your army, and decreasing the morale of the enemy reduces the size of officer health bars, making the battle easier.
Everything slots together nicely, and no matter what I’m doing, I always feel like I’m working towards making my character stronger, so I can take on bigger and more threatening battles. The mercenary viewpoint is nice, and characters are given much more time to express themselves in cutscenes and conversations, even if it’s mostly Confucian philosophy that goes right over my head.
Ultimately, diving into big battles over and over again still gets tiring, but Dynasty Warriors: Origins executes those battles so well that I don’t mind. Seeing hundreds of enemy soldiers fly back from my swings is still wonderfully satisfying, and Origins does it better than almost any other game in the series. The seven years spent developing a bunch of successful spin-offs has allowed Omega Force to experiment, and now Dynasty Warriors: Origins feels like a fantastic reboot and second wind for the mainline series. Dynasty Warriors is back.
Score: 8/10
Platform tested: PS5
