JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure:All Star Battle Review
Game adaptations of Anime and Manga series are definitely nothing new, console libraries are filled with games based on popular series from Japan. Many of them are decent, some of them are downright awful, and then there are a select few that are much better than just another licensed game. JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle falls in the latter category, thankfully. It’s a fast-paced fighter which feels like Street Fighter meets Soul Calibur, and it definitely shouldn’t be missed by fighting and anime fans.
If you’re unfamiliar with JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, it is a story that spans time, with the Joestar bloodline cursed to be haunted by the Stone Masks – which can grant enormous powers – but turn the users into Vampiric Zombies – one of those vicious beasts being Dio Brando, an emotionless and evil being who wished nothing more than to end the Joestar lineage and eventually rule the world. If that sounds somewhat confusing, that’s okay. It’s not something you can really sum up in a single paragraph…
The story of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure is addictive and fantastic, but unfortunately, it doesn’t get told well. The story mode of All Star Battle is told with short paragraphs and pieces of dialogue in between the main battles of the series. Although this gives a basic idea of why the player is fighting and who the bad guys are, it doesn’t tell the story in the best possible way. If you’re interested, then the anime and manga is basically essential.
But luckily, All Star Battle isn’t a story-driven game, the meat of this game is all in the gameplay and intense fights. Story mode serves its purpose to give players a basic idea of the identities of the characters, and Secret Missions during fights encourage players to use a variety of moves and really learn how to play the game with a variety of characters. Honestly, it’s one of the more engaging and instructive Story modes I’ve seen from a fighting game.
Other game modes include Campaign, where an online connection is a necessity to fight Avatars that represent online players and Bosses, where each fight slowly whittles away at a large HP bar to unlock new Taunts, Costumes, Colour schemes and more. Versus mode gives you the expected Offline and Online fights, either against CPU players, your friends via local or strangers online. Arcade mode is worth mentioning, although it seems like an expected inclusion to any fighting game, Arcade mode was entirely absent from the Japanese release of the game. Arcade mode sees you go up against 8 opponents of increasing difficulty, which you get graded for at the end.
Gameplay in a fighter is key. CyberConnect2 is mainly known for the development of the Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm games, with a very flashy, visually appealing style which is lovely to look at but isn’t so nice in practice as a competitive fighter. With JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle they seem to have the formula perfected. Moves are executed with basic combos, pressing directional cues followed by attacks, as you would expect in most fighters, with some moves having follow-up attacks ready to be executed shortly afterwards. A Heart Heat gauge which has a maximum level of 3 limits the amount of special attacks you can use, with a Heart Heat Attack activated with a level of 1, and a Grand Heart Heat Attack activated with a level of 2. Easy Beat is a welcome addition to make the game more friendly to new players, where a Light Attack combo will lead into a Heart Heat Attack.
The gameplay is shockingly tight, with expertly executed moves rewarding the player with hefty amounts of damage dealt. Heart Heat Attacks and Grand Heart Heat Attacks come with unique animations mid-battle, almost like cutscenes. I found these added personality to the characters, and they all look visually stunning, especially in 60FPS. Ultimately, the best strategy for JJBA:ASB is to time your HHAs and GHHAs to your advantage, to escape combos, down your opponent, or finish them completely. Completing certain requirements mid-battle and winning the round with a HHA or GHHA may trigger a Dramatic Finish, another visually lovely feature, although it doesn’t change gameplay.
Usually when I play a game based on manga or anime, I ultimately find out that it’s a game made for fans of the series… Although this is still true for JJBA:ASB, fighting game fans can enjoy it aswell. It’s genuinely fun to play with friends, online, by yourself or even competitively.
Fan service is everywhere in the game. The impressively large character roster should be fan service enough, but each character’s moves reference a point in the manga, all the stages too. Stage Hazards can be triggered during battle, which can damage you or your opponent, and they too are references. Familiar characters pop up whilst flicking through menus to “help” guide you and shout familiar phrases, although these tend to get more annoying than helpful. A huge Gallery is full of 3D Model, 2D Art, Background Music and Concept Art, even has information on all the characters in the game and more that do not appear. Honestly, the game has enough content to keep most fighting game fans happy anyway, but all these are added purely to appease fans of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure.
Audio is spectacular in this title too. Songs from the anime appear, including a selection of newer tracks. Every appearing character that has featured in the anime thus far has a familiar voice, and characters not yet voiced have been given voices that sound authentic and really seem to give a good impression of the character’s personalities and traits.