Version needed: 1.52
Players: 1-2
Wi-Fi Compatible: Ad Hoc
Like a lot of other genres on the PSP, the choice of fighting games pales in comparison to the amount of driving games available, with Darkstalkers Chronicle being the only other option in this case. While there are others coming to the handheld console in the next few months, importing a copy of Bleach: Heat The Soul is a good solution for those who cannot wait. Bleach is a Japanese fighting game based on the popular anime TV series of the same name, about Ichigo Kurosaki: a 15-year-old high school student, who is able to see ghosts with the help of the mysterious schoolgirl, Rukia Kuchiki. Rukia is a shinigami, a soul reaper, who transferred her powers to Ichigo to save them from an evil spirit, known as a hollow.
Some people may be worried about importing this game because of the language barrier, but in Bleach this affects about 60% of the gameplay. The majority of the menu screens are in English so there is no problem there, but all of story mode is in Japanese so following the storylines is very difficult. There are some things that you can understand without knowing exactly what’s going on; for example you can tell from the opening video that Ichigo and Renji Abarai are rivals or even enemies, but unless you understand Japanese you’ll never fully get the gist of what’s happening. This doesn’t matter though; Bleach is a fighting game and fighting is the part that makes Bleach enjoyable.
Every character has some sort of supernatural power to make them as equally strong as their opponents. Characters like Uryu and Rukia have magical attacks: Uryu can produce a huge magical bow to even the playing field against characters like Ichigo, who wields a sword that’s almost as big as he is. Rukia and Orihime (pronounced Ori-him-ay) both use fireballs but have different special combo attacks, and Yasutora has some sort of glove that reaches all the way up his right arm to his shoulder, which he uses to deliver devastating punches. They all have a sufficient, basic range of combos that are easy to pull of using either the directional buttons or the analogue stick: both work as well as each other. The analogue stick is very precise and you can pull off combos with it as easily as when using the directional controls.
It is very disappointing though, that the opening sequence shows a vast amount of characters, most of which appear in the story mode, but when it comes to playing the game you only have a choice of up to six characters. This makes story mode extremely short: if you skip all the cutscenes you could complete it for every character in about an hour or so. Raising the difficulty may help a little, but it doesn’t undermine the fact that there’s barely a handful of characters to choose from. It’s also strange that hollows appear in the beginning; yet never make another appearance in the game. The story just seems to be about the characters and fighting each other.
Still, the graphics in Bleach: Heat The Soul are gorgeous. The cel-shaded effects give the game more charm and more character that it makes it difficult not to fully enjoy it. Loading times don’t disrupt the game too much either. There are a couple of loading screens that appear in some of the menus which can be between 10-15 seconds, the same as the loading time before a fight, although occasionally it can be up to 30 seconds before you can start playing.
Completing modes, such as survival and versus mode, give you points that you can use to buy cards from the card shop in the appendix. These cards aren’t really important; they’re just something for you to collect and look at in the gallery. Completists may want to do this task to fully complete the game, but others may want to do this too, as it unlocks new things after collecting a certain amount of cards.
Bleach has a lot of potential with its astounding, cel-shaded graphics; the special attacks are amazing to watch and easy to pull off, and attacks flow easily into the next. Unfortunately the stunning animation doesn’t quite make up for the abysmal amount of characters available in this 3-D fighting game, which also lets down the main part of the game, leaving it incredibly short.
Bleach may have been a little rushed so that it was released on time, but nevertheless it’s still addictive and entertaining that, whether you have a couple of hours or a couple of minutes, you’ll find yourself coming back to it time and time again.
The animated series of Bleach will be available on UMD in Japan from December 7th 2005.
Overall: 75%
Posted on 10/10/06 by Steph
Linear Mode
