Demon Slayer is now the most influential anime/manga. Its popularity has grown on a global scale, as seen by the huge success of the animated series and the film. The Hinokami Chronicles is not an original story set in the Demon Slayer universe; rather, it is a retelling of the anime that allows fans to relive their favorite gaming moments.
If you’ve played the Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm series, The Hinokami Chronicles will feel at home. CyberConnect2, which also worked on Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm, developed this game. They have grasped the fundamental premise of an arena-based brawler. You have all of the necessary tools at your disposal, including special moves and powers starring the iconic characters. For fans, there is a meaty single-player campaign to sink their teeth into while a versus mode is also available, which is the main highlight of the game.
On the surface, it appears to be a perfect game that may be enjoyable to play, and this is how it seemed in the pre-release advertising. Once we spend some time with it, the problems become evident. Good luck figuring out what’s going on if you’ve never heard of Demon Slayer. This is not a game for people who have never heard of or seen anything about the series. It essentially serves as a proxy for the existing plot, with the idea that you are familiar with the majority of it.
The campaign mode follows the events of the various anime episodes up to the Mugen Train arc, which was turned into a popular movie that generated a lot of money at the global box office. In that sense, you’ve covered practically every important news beat here. The downside is that it is largely a rehash of the big events, which are not even recounted effectively. Sure, it’s lovely to watch the animated scenes with the amazing in-engine visuals, but they’re just there to serve as a visual showcase. The fluff that makes up the majority of the campaign is mediocre at best and uninteresting at worst.
The campaign is broken down into chapters. Each chapter has several playable events. Some of these are just fights, while others are locations to explore, but many others are simply preludes to important events. You may go back and restart any portion of a chapter without trouble, which aids in the discovery of collectibles such as memory fragments or Kimetsu points to spend and unlock rewards.
The majority of the campaign’s objectives are simplistic and repetitive, and they don’t contribute anything to the experience other than functioning as a tick for you to complete. Some of these missions will have you battling the same grunt over and over, which might get tiresome. These may be easily slain if you master the technique of parrying strikes, which is a little challenging at first. Boss fights, on the other hand, are fairly decent. This is hardly surprising given CyberConnect2’s incredible dramatic battles in the Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm series.
Normally, in combat, you would do damage to your enemies and then finish them off with a QTE prompt, but boss battles are a bit different. After doing a specific amount of damage, you will be able to participate in a QTE-fest that will lead to various cool-looking moves and executions. If you don’t get them, you can still win the fight, but you won’t be able to unlock any more memory fragments. Basically, this approach is a carbon replica of the Naruto Ultimate series, and it has always worked well, so why alter anything?
This is an arena brawler in which you may travel in any direction at any time throughout the fight. You have a variety of moves and combos to complete to outmaneuver your opponents, and there is certainly a decent balance of offensive and defensive skills. The game genuinely requires knowledge of both, so don’t rush in expecting to win by merely pounding buttons. I found some of the boss fights to be rather difficult because you had to evade their strong moves promptly. Fortunately, they are simple to spot ahead of time, allowing you to prepare for their attacks.
The campaign mode can take a little under 10 hours to finish, but it is vital since it is the quickest method to acquire the whole character roster, which is not available at the start. Once you’ve unlocked all of the characters, you may work on unlocking their many color/costume variations, but the heart of the game is its versus mode. I had a lot more pleasure fighting against a human opponent than I did against the computer. Offline and internet multiplayer are both supported. When it comes to online multiplayer, everything is covered, from ranked to casual matches.
One of the disappointments I experienced with the game was that it did not support 60 frames per second on PS5. While the load times are quite fast, which is fantastic because you don’t have to wait long between matches or in campaign mode, there isn’t much else to consider a current-generation upgrade here. I’ve heard that the 60 FPS update would be available after the game’s release, so I’m hoping it will be soon.
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Hinokami Chronicles Game Information
- Price: $59.99
- Publisher: Sega
- Developer: CyberConnect2
- Platform: PS5 (Reviewed)
- Disclaimer: A review code was given by the publisher
