Not to make you feel old but the original Dynasty Warriors was released over 25 years ago back in 1997. Since then the series has seen nine main ‘numbered’ entries and a handful of spin-offs. It’s been almost seven years since the last entry in the franchise, Dynasty Warriors 9, which I think most fans of the series would agree was quite average at best. At the time, our very own Chris Carter felt it was ‘clunky and unwieldy’.
I’ve always been a fan of ‘musou games’ like Dynasty Warriors. There’s something about mindlessly hack n’ slashing your way through hordes of enemies that almost feels tranquil in a way. But over the years, the many releases of Dynasty Warriors—and similar style games—admittedly started to weigh on me. As Omega Force and Koei Tecmo started to diversify the catalog of musou-style games with other themes and even IP’s with amazing releases like Warriors Orochi 4, Hyrule Warriors, One Piece: Pirate Warriors, Dragon Quest Heroes, Fire Emblem Warriors, Berserker and the Band of the Hawk and more. The standard Dynasty Warrior formula started to become stale for me.
Fast forward a few years, and I had the opportunity to play the first three chapters of Dynasty Warriors: Origins. While I typically prefer to play these styles of games on console, I previewed Origins on PC. I started with a controller, but out of curiosity switched to a keyboard and mouse just to see how it felt. In that regard, let me start by saying it actually felt way better than I expected. Button smashing just comes easier on a controller, but the keyboard controls felt just as smooth once I reworked some the key binds on things like the special attacks. Thankfully, the controls aren’t the only things I felt were greatly improved in Dynasty Warrior: Origins. In fact, it feels improved in most aspects.
A real Origins story
Without knowing too much about Dynasty Warriors: Origins beforehand, let me first share with you what I quickly discovered; the Origins moniker serves a double meaning: a return to the origin of the Dynasty Warrior franchise, as well as the game’s intent to tell the story of the Three Kingdoms period when the Cao Wei, Shu Han, and Eastern Wu dynasties reigned over China. For those not familiar, it’s known as one of the bloodiest periods in Chinese history, so quite fitting for a game where you are tasked with fighting massive armies.
Storytelling in previous entries in the franchise has been a bit lackluster, to put it mildly. It’s never been a strong point of the series, but to be fair, it never presented itself as such. With Dynasty Warrior: Origins, the storytelling is much more prominent, right from the start. There are cutscenes, fully voiced characters, and more that all work together to tell the story of the Three Kingdoms. As someone who’s very interested in the period, I’m excited to see how the story is told over the full game.
While Dynasty Warriors is known for letting you select from a ton of staple historical characters from the period, Origins puts the player in the role of their own character. As you play you’ll level up, getting various stat boosts, skills, and other abilities as you progress. As you get deeper into the game, you get access to those fabled heroes and can choose to take them with you and even control them in battle for a period of time. I know not everyone is going to like this change, but I’m actually enjoying being my own hero and forging my own legacy this time around.
After the first battle, Origins opens up a bit into a semi-open world setting. You’re able to traverse a ‘World Map’ of sorts and choose which regions to battle in. Each region has its own sets of battles and missions you can do to increase the peace level of that region, rewarding you with stat buffs and boosts along the way. Progressing will unlock more regions, allowing you to progress and essentially alter the story of the Three Kingdoms based on your decisions.
Battlefields as big as ever
The major “Wow Factor” of Dynasty Warriors has always been its massive scale. You versus entire massive armies on the battlefield. I’m happy to say the scale is bigger than ever in Origins, with more enemy and army counts on the battlefield than I’m pretty sure, well, ever. In fact, with a somewhat more direct approach to combat compared to other entries in the series, you can actually find yourself quickly overwhelmed by how many enemies are actually on the battlefield.
Well-timed special attacks and the use of powerful abilities can really turn the tide of battle in Origins, especially in the 1-on-1 encounters with more challenging enemies. You can eventually choose to surround yourself with your own micro-army of guards and can even issue orders to them such as to defend you, charge an area, or even focus attacks on an area. This too can really change the tide of battle.
Overall, battles themselves feel a bit more tactical, or maybe even technical, compared to previous entries. Button smashing isn’t quite the option as it used to be, as I said, you can find yourself quickly overrun by even basic infantry units on the battlefield. It’s not super tactical like a Soulslike game or anything like that, but you’ll have to make use of your special attacks and combos to effectively carve routes through the battlefield. It’s a change for the series for sure, but a good one I feel.
After playing through the first three chapters of Dynasty Warriors: Origins, I have to applaud Omega Force for the direction they’ve chosen to take the series in. It would have been easy to just release a prettied-up button-mashing Dynasty Warrior game with the same playable characters and endless grind potential. I know there are certainly some people out there who may prefer that.
But for me, the innovative changes to the series provide a unique—and honestly just outright more fun—experience to the formula. Omega Force and Koei Tecmo have taken a lot of the staples from the franchise like massive-scale battles and expanded them while also improving the overall game through better storytelling, more interesting combat, and a player character-driven focus. I think this will put the series in a great spot to be appealing to both newcomers and long-time fans, and opens up for the potential to really continue to innovate in the future. Dynasty Warriors is so back, and I’m here for it.
Dynasty Warriors: Origins is set to release on January 17, 2025 on PC via Steam, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S.
