Guilty Gears: Dust Strikers Review

Guilty Gear, the hardcore rock meets anime fighting franchise begins each match with “To Heaven or Hell, LETS ROCK!” instead of the normal, “Ready…Fight!”. Because it’s just hardcore like that. The Guilty Gear franchise is slowly trying to build it’s way into the mainstream and out of the cult game status. With complicated controls, a dark mood, and zany characters, Guilty Gear never caught on with most non-tournament gamers the way other 2D fighters like Street Fighter or Marvel vs. Capcom. On the Nintendo DS, developer Majesco has taken a new turn to the series. Instead of normal 1-on-1 action, this time around we have up to four player brawls a la Super Smash Bros. Is it the fighting fix the DS craves?

The first thing that anyone notices about Guilty Gear is the “heavy metal anime” atmosphere. Everything has a gothic undertone to it, which may shy some gamers away. If you cracked a smile everytime the “Heaven or Hell” phrase shows up, like me you may not be feeling the rocker vibe. As odd as the characters get, you can still appreciate their designs. Dust Strikers has three main modes: Story, Arcade, and Challenge. It also has minigames and Robo-Ky customization. Sadly though, these sound a lot better on paper then on the DS.

The controls come down to a weak attack, strong attack, “dust strike” attack, and a sort of orb attack. The appeal of the Guilty Gears franchise comes in the skill it requires to execute long combos. You must attack, break up combos, and excute new ones at the same time. This feature is in Guilty Gears: Dust Strikers, but it’s pretty much useless. You’ll be seconds away from punting your DS if you try and play it like it was another Guilty Gear. Instead, the only strategy that seems to work is to push buttons. Battles, especially with four players, are hectic button-fests. Half the time I have no idea what it is actually going on but I’ll come out winning the match. Like Super Smash Bros., arenas have multiple platforms and power-ups will randomly appear throught the match. Power-ups are more of an annoyance then an addition. The healing power-up comes up to often, and it’s already hard enough to damage opponents. One power-up switches around every character’s position on the battlefield, and this causes more confusion then it’s worth.

Combos are too hard to pull off to be worth even trying. At first when playing I thought it was my fault that the game was not responding. After trying many different combos with many different characters, I realized that in fact the game was just not responding to my buttons. They worked sometimes, but I found them so unreliable that it was easier winning matches by just tapping X.

Challenge mode is quick multiplayer. Wi-Fi Multiplayer is lag-free, and would be so much more fun if the game wasn’t such a hectic button mashing party. Minigames give a nice break from the action. There’s one where you must balance stacked items as the fall from the top of the screen. Another is a chopping game where you must chop bushels of hay in as few swipes as possible. There’s also a game where you must polish a yo-yo, a game where you must guide dolphins through rings of fire, and a pool minigame. High scores in these unlock more moves for Robo-Ky, an extra character that you can assign all the combos to. These minigames are nice little five minute breaks, but they are not enough to make up for the rest of the game’s problems. Arcade mode plays as expected, random matches with 1 to 3 opponents. Story mode is a vague mess. No one with the slightest comprehension of the English language can tell you what purpose they have. Story mode is just arcade with non-sensical dialogue. The characters’ faces will appear on the top screen, while the dialogue is on the bottom during the “cutscene”. But the dialogue will leave you scratching your head. These little conversations don’t go very far from something like this:

YOUR CHARACTER: So, where is everyone?
RANDOM CHARACTER: What is a guy like you doing here?
OTHER RANDOM CHARACTER: Has anyone seen my yo-yo?
YOUR CHARACTER: Oh, I get to fight two hotties?
RANDOM CHARACTER: I don’t care who you are, you not passing this point!

And it never gets any better.

Graphics on the other hand very good for a 2D fighter. Sprites and animations are impressive. Backgrounds are diverse (You’ll be going to real countries all over the world) and painstakingly detailed. Audio is great too. In-game voicework is well put together, and it’s cool hearing some of the rock inspired special attacks like one based on Lenney Kravitz’s “Are You Gonna Go My Way?”. As far as cosmetics go, this game sets the bar for future 2D fighters on the DS.

I can see where Majesco was trying to go with this title. Guilty Gears Dust Strikers certainly had a lot of potential. Good gaming franchise, 4 player brawls, and a nice look. The game just suffers from to many problems for me to ever want to go to back. Coming from a first time GG player, I came into this review knowing nothing about the characters or the GG universe. After playing Dust Strikers, I still know nothing. From unresponsive controls, to hectic no-means gameplay, and the oddest story mode I’ve ever played outside of Katamary Damacy. Here’s hoping that a sequel goes back to the drawing boards.

+ Great sound
+ Great visuals
+ Minigames are nice departures
- Combos are unresponsive
- Repetitive button masher
- Useless Story mode