Outside of being immersed in a wide variety of top-notch indie titles over the last generation, it has been a pleasure to also broaden my gaming horizons, and sometimes that has come in the form of AAA games as well. While the Dynasty Warriors franchise, and its pretty distinctively-ridiculous musou style of fighting masses of enemies, has been around for quite some time, until the last generation I’d never had the opportunity to check it out myself. While the few I’ve now played were at least entertaining though, much like traditional beat ‘em ups I also tended to have my attention wane after a little while as general repetition began to set in. What’s wild about Origins is that it feels like the team behind it are now determined to break out of those limitations, in part by taking advantage of more powerful systems to continue to expand the scope of the battlefield.

Before getting to the power-flexing aspect of the game though, I wanted to share some thoughts on how they’ve changed up how you go through the game itself. This time around, by having you take the role of an unknown wandering warrior (whose amnesia is a classically-convenient device), playing the part of a new supporting player in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms story, there’s more of a slow progression with world building, rather than it being more detached and simply dialing up different battles with a variety of historical figures. Taking the time to have conversations with these people provides the opportunity to flesh everything out a little better, and though some may want to skip these lulls in the action, I think they added to the richness of the overall game.

Of course, if you’re simply itching for those classic ridiculous battles against hordes of enemies, sweeping through them with your powerful attacks, the game absolutely has you covered there. Not only that, but with a wide variety of weapons to choose from, and loads of skill trees and options that will allow you to do some tuning, it’s easy to keep trying new things to keep it all more fresh. Where the game really flexes its muscles though, and takes the series to the next level, are the larger-scale battlefields you’ll be engaging with. At first these can be a bit overwhelming, as you won’t simply be able to lock in on kicking everyone’s asses as you go, you’ll need to use your powers of perception to see the bigger picture, and sometimes that will keep you on the move, making the flow of battle play out very differently. Whether it’s needing to identify the source of mists that the enemy will use to try to mystically take control of the battle, or simply needing to support another hero who is being overwhelmed, there’s a lot going on and it can be quite exciting, as well as challenging in spots. 

What I love about the game, is that it has pretty well retained everything that helped its predecessors feel distinct and exciting, but has then been reinvigorated by some new ideas and polish that shine nicely on the Switch 2. Rather than it being all about gorgeous graphics, which still look great, for me it’s the sheer scale of the battlefields that sucked me in. The more involved storytelling, various weapons and perks that allow you to tune combat to your liking, and later-game decisions that can lead in very different directions are each building blocks that give the experience a great foundation. All that said, the thrill of being on horseback and riding toward a massive enemy army can really get the blood pumping, and it helps to make this entry feel special as well.