Dynasty Warriors: Origins – same old story (Koei Tecmo)
With its 25th anniversary approaching, the veteran PlayStation 2 franchise attempts to reinvent itself as a more modern action strategy game.
If we were going to make bets on which franchise from the early days of the PlayStation 2 was going to survive all the way to 2025, we would not have put any money on Dynasty Warriors. When it first appeared it was essentially a tech demo, with the novelty of having hundreds of enemies on screen at once outweighing the fact that the game was extremely shallow and repetitive.
Rather than being quietly forgotten, like other technically advanced but gameplay inhibited titles like Battle Arena Toshinden or Jumping Flash!, Dynasty Warrior has somehow managed to endure. Never very popular in the West, for some time it was one of the biggest franchises in Japan, although that’s not really been the case for a while now.
Despite dozens of entries, including numerous spin-offs, none of the games have been very good, because none of them have ever tried to evolve the formula in any meaningful fashion. There’ve been a few crossovers, such as with Zelda and Persona, that weren’t too terrible but overall it’s a franchise that has been underperforming for decades and continues to have seemingly little interest in bettering itself.
As the name suggests, this is intended as a reboot for the franchise, after plans for Dynasty Warriors 10 were cancelled in the wake of Dynasty Warrior 9’s poor reception (it managed to make things even more boring than usual by switching to an open world environment). Origins returns to the more traditional style of level design while also making new changes, the most obvious being that you’re now only playing as one character throughout the whole game, rather than the dozens of previous titles.
As usual, the game is set in ancient China, but while previous games were merely influenced by the 14th century novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms this one attempts to adapt it, or rather the first half of it, a little more accurately than usual. That results in a somewhat more serious tone than normal and yet still you’re taking on whole armies single-handedly to the sound of soft rock.
You play as an unknown warrior with amnesia, but that helps make it clearer who everyone else is, as you’re introduced to them through the story, rather than suddenly just taking control of them on the battlefield. It’s a good idea in theory, but in practice it leads to far more cut scenes than normal and lots of circular conversations and predictable plot points (in regards to your amnesia) that is not only tedious to get through but constantly interrupts the action.
If the dialogue and voice-acting was any better we’d be tempted to say this was actually a good thing, as the action remains as brain dead and endlessly repetitive as always.
However, one unequivocal improvement in Origins is the graphics, which now feature even more enemies on screen at once. Individuals are reasonably well detailed, but they still shuffle about impotently, presenting absolutely no danger to you unless you just put the controller down and don’t do anything – and even then you have to do so for a good few minutes to be in trouble.
The majority of missions follow the same old formula, as you try to take over enemy forts in order to stop them spawning new opponents and instead fill the map with your own (equally lackadaisical) troops. At the same time, enemy soldiers will be trying to do the same with your bases, which has always seemed like a great way of mixing action with strategy.
Unfortunately, it never amounts to anything more than trying to get to each fort as quickly as possible. Apart from working out the optimum route to do so, which is usually blindingly obvious, there’s no real strategising to be done and your control over your own troops remains very limited.
Dynasty Warriors: Origins – a very consistent 25 years (Koei Tecmo)
At certain times, particularly when you’re invading a base, you’ll come across a mini-boss of some sort, which unlike the usual cannon fodder enemies will actually put up a fight. This is the one time you have to pay attention to what you’re doing, with the game having a wider array of parry, dodge, and special move options than normal.
It’s not exactly Sekiro, in terms of complexity or stylishness, but it is a welcome attempt to modernise the combat and definitely more interesting than lawnmowing your way through more no-name soldiers.
Also, while you’re always playing the same character there are nine different weapon types for you to utilise, each handy in different situations, whether it’s clearing out large groups or enabling charged attacks that are more useful against named opponents.
The problem is that none of this usually matters, because as well as being incredibly repetitive Origins is, like most of the series, very easy. The only time it really threatens to become interesting is the occasional mission that does not follow the standard Dynasty Warriors formula. For example, there’s one where you’re trying to disperse a magic fog and a genuinely good one where you’re trying to climb a seemingly endless set of stairs.
These are very much the exceptions to the rule though and the fundamental problem with Origins going back to basics, after the unsuccessful experiment of Dynasty Warriors 9, is that the basics of the series simply aren’t very good. Not only that but this entry is missing some of the few things that made the originals fun, in the lack of other playable characters or any kind of multiplayer or co-op.
One of the priorities with Origins has been to ensure it’s accessible to new players but beyond slightly better graphics and one-on-one combat the attempts at modernisation fall flat. Ending a mission with a kill count in the hundreds of thousands is amusing the first time, perhaps even the second, but 25 years later the novelty has worn so thin it seems like madness to keep making the same game again and again and expecting anyone but the most diehard fans to care.
If there are more crossovers in the future, that use Dynasty Warriors: Origins as their foundation, then maybe they could make better use of its advancements – but we’re not so sure. Dynasty Warriors has always had the potential to be more than just a mindless hack ‘n’ slash, but Origins does so little to advance the formula it’s hard to imagine it will ever improve.
Dynasty Warriors: Origins review summary
In Short: Some very minor improvements to the Dynasty Warriors formula but this is just as vapid and repetitive as it was back in the PlayStation 2 era, only now with relatively modern graphics.
Pros: One-on-one combat is the best the series has seen, and the visuals and scale are more impressive than they have been. A few interesting one-off missions.
Cons: The same mindless and repetitive action as it’s been for the last 25 years, with very little in the way of strategy. No co-op or other playable characters. Poor storytelling.
Score: 5/10
Formats: PlayStation 5 (reviewed), Xbox Series X/S, and PC
Price: £64.99
Publisher: Koei Tecmo
Developer: Omega Force
Release Date: 17th January 2025
Age Rating: 16
Dynasty Warriors: Origins – only fun in theory (Koei Tecmo)
