Samurai Shodown - Review

The Switch has been great for fighting games. While we don’t have a more modern Street Fighter, everyone else has stepped up with some high quality games. SNK has more than enough classic fighters on the eShop, and it’s finally the time of year for the port of the much more recent Samurai shodown. I’ve played many hours of Soul Caliber, but do I have what it takes to live by the blade as a digital Samurai?

Having not played a game from the Samurai shodown series, I had no real idea how it would be different from other fighters than it was one of the ones with swords. When it comes to weapon based fighters I have been a big fan of the Soul Calibur series, but even then I found shodown to be quite a different experience. For starters, everything from the menus and beyond is trimmed down to the essentials. You better be here for the fights and fights only, because that’s what this game does best.

Playing Samurai shodown for the first time I learned within minutes how deliberate every swing and move has to be. Button mashing won’t get you far for long. You can easily spend half of the match time blocking or countering each other’s attacks. It was always a good feeling to be able to counter an attack and turn the tide of battle. Which is another thing, I have not played another fighter game where there is so much of an opportunity to turn around a match. You can be on the last slither of health and the challenger has three quarters left, it always feels possible to claw back victory.

The rhythm of the fights also feel different from a Mortal Kombat or Street Fighter, those swords can do some real damage quickly! First time I got some really good heavy hits in and then “Holy crap, I just cut a guy in half!!”. Most rounds felt quicker than what I’ve been used to, in fact sometimes the load times felt longer than the round before it. If you can get your head around a few of the button combos, not only will you be able to grab a sword mid strike but you’ll also be able to disarm your opponent. It is possible to keep fighting when your weapon is knocked away, I even won once barehanded, but it’s not recommended.

In spirit with every other fighting game there is a meter. In shodown it’s a ‘Rage Gauge’. Throughout the fight your Rage Gauge builds up, and when it’s activated it gives you the opportunity to do some major damage. Thanks to the button combinations assigned to the shoulder buttons and triggers, it’s easy to do. You can even unleash a damaging once-off move that takes off a decent amount of the health bar, it’s a great ace to keep up your sleeve. It’s a risky maneuver, it’s possible to whiff or be blocked and then it’s wasted. Once you’ve used your attack it also takes away the Rage Gauge for the rest of that fight, even if it’s the first round. There’s at least one more high damage special move that I found harder to make happen. If you can do it it’s another once off, but if you do so much damage you won’t need it often.

While there’s less fighters than you’d usually experience at 16, they are all very distinct. Whether it’s the variations of swords/weapons they wield, their stature, or differing moves. I know you could say that about any fighting game, but here it feels purposefully and efficiently lean so every character matters.

Not only does it feel important that you know how your character fights, but also to know what your opponents capabilities are. Once again it feels like it should be obvious, given how devastating a well placed hit can be. There isn’t the same luxury here that I’ve found in other fighters to just overcome with brute force. Knowing how each fighter wields their weapons goes a long way.

The majority of the group are from previous games. Only three fighters are new and some you’ll find locked behind DLC. Darli Dagger is one of the new characters I tried playing at first, a shipwright who wields a hefty saw blade that I dabbled with as I jumped into the Story mode the first time. She has a devastating heavy attack that feels slower than other characters heavys, but definitely hits harder (up to a third of health if timed right). It helps that when she’s lost the blade she’s also a super strong puncher too. Truth be told I enjoyed trying out all the different fighters. Their fighting styles and weapons meant everyone felt different enough.

Story mode is of course where Samurai shodown’s story is tucked away. It feels like a big step back from other recent fighters such as Mortal Kombat 11 or Dragonball Fighterz. Where other games have focused more on big multi character stories, shodown goes back to basics. There’s a brief opening clip that sets the scene, explaining why your chosen character is going to fight through a portion of the games roster. There’s a few other short clips that set up the final boss fight without any real context. And that’s it. This story mode feels very outdated in this day and age. As a newcomer to the series it also made it hard to know how any of these characters tie together or within the context of the boss. I know that most older classic games only had this much if not less to tell a story, but they were built for arcade matches. There will be people that aren’t interested in a story mode because they’re just here for the online or ranked matches, but it still stings that the story is lacking. You have a whole roster of interesting characters, but the game gives them so little story or background that the ending videos feel out of place because what do I know about them?

The Dojo is where you can train and fight AI based on other players ‘ghosts’, similar to how you can train your Smash Brothers amiibos. The AI still has a long way to go before it can capture players fighting styles, the ones I went against mostly stood there and swung the blade hoping I’d walk into it. I don’t know if it takes time and regular playing to help build a better fighter, but for now it is only useful for getting in game unlockables.

The online mode holds up. It's as stripped back as the rest of the game offerings but it works. Everyone’s experience with this mode will differ depending on your skills. While I can hold my own against the CPU, people are another matter. Ranked is there for you to put yourself to the test, and I was definitely put to the test. I don’t know enough about netcode and I’m not about to pretend now, but everything works so I’m going to take that as a positive.

The game itself runs smoothly most of the time. The only time I noticed any hitches was during hard hitting combos, and it was hard to tell if this was an intentional part of the animation. Regardless it doesn’t impact on the fighting which holds up, especially where it would matter for fighting game fans. Given how quickly the fight can ramp up or end swiftly with some well time heavy hits, Shodown could handle it all and even got flashy with the over the top special attacks.

Samurai Shodown embraced the ink brush outlines that really add to the more traditional Japanese aesthetic, much like Okami. The stages the fights take place on also draw from various settings in that region, whether it’s a Kabuki show or outside of a temple. Being the Switch it definitely doesn’t look as nice as the other versions, the focus being more on maintaining the frame rate. Visuals lack detail in handheld, well it varies. Sometimes it looks really nice and then it can look like your fighter just climbed out of a vat of vaseline.

Apparently the loading times for the other versions could be up to thirty seconds. On the Switch the load times can reach that and longer. Once again, we all know the game is running with less power so loading times are hardly surprising, especially when the other versions suffered too. Just be prepared for waits that add up and feel like there’s more loading than fights.

The season pass is generally how fighters now extend on their rosters and keep their communities active, Samurai Shodown is no exception, with four additional fighters added. Unlike the other platforms there is no wait across the months as the content has already been released for the other consoles, which is great if you don’t want to wait for the four to be slowly rolled out. With the PS4 and Xbox One versions, the season pass was available for free before and for a few days after the games release. But there seems to be no such luck for Switch owners. Don’t get me wrong, the game is fully featured without them, you can even fight them as they appear in Story matches. It is still a shame given that Switch owners missed the same chance while also having to wait long enough the first season pass has been rolled out and the second one announced.

Samurai Shodown is a refreshingly different fighting game to play, with a rhythm that a button masher like myself isn’t used to. It could’ve been a risky move for SNK to reboot the series and get back to the bare essentials. As a result, the game feels accessible to newcomers like myself and there is plenty for veteran fans to dig into. With a smaller roster than most, it manages to make every fighter feel very different from one another. If there aren't enough fighters for you, there’s even more available through the season pass with more to come. The transition to the Switch has been relatively smooth, the frame rate holds up when the blades start clashing and even with a lower resolution the art style is still lovely. It’s a shame after the wait for Switch owners they don’t get the first season pass included given other consoles had it offered free for early adopters, but at least you can still fight against the DLC characters. The story mode feels like it’s from another era, which feels like a missed opportunity to flesh out characters and give solo players a bit more to do.

Shodown is great at being a fighting game with weapons while revitalising an old series. Those looking to fight against other people will likely find much more to do than solo players against the CPU, but it is still fun while it lasts.