Toukiden: Kiwami
Developer: Omega Force
Price: $60 (PS4) / $40 (Vita)
Platform: PS4 and PS Vita
MonsterVine was supplied with a PS4 code for review
Omega Force, creators of the Dynasty Warriors series, released Toukiden: Age of Demons on the Vita and a year later Kiwami comes out as an expansion to that game. You’re going to see me mention Monster Hunter a lot in this review because Toukiden is as close as you can get to that series without having Capcom’s lawyers bang on your door.
Now I’m not saying that as an insult, in fact I like how close Toukiden is to MH because while there are lots of really cool hunting type games like Soul Sacrifice or Freedom Wars, those sort of do their own thing. Sometimes I just want to play Monster Hunter without actually having to play it, if that makes some sense. The entire “hunt monsters to make stronger weapons to hunt bigger monsters” thing is still the entire goal of Toukiden, but it shakes things up enough to make it worth checking out.
In Toukiden you play a hunter of oni who’s joined a village to help out and you’ll accept quests at the quest lady’s office, go hunt oni on various maps, use the materials you scavenge from their bodies to craft weapons and armor, and get into long arguments with your friends about why their main weapon is for losers and yours is the best. At the end of the day it’s basically Monster Hunter, or at least as close as you can get to the real thing and I’m totally okay with that.
The main difference between Monster Hunter and Toukiden is that you won’t be spending huge chunks of time resupplying your stock of traps or items to tackle the next mission because there aren’t any of those here. Toukiden instead replaces all that with mitama which are the souls of dead heroes that offer four skills you can activate while on a mission. You’ll get things like attack boost or leeching, but also more active skills like causing devastating explosions on the last area of a monster you hit. You simply equip what you want and head out on a mission.
It definitely takes out that fun feeling of gathering up your party and figuring out what traps/items you need to bring for the next hunt, but it does this in favor of streamlining the process so that you can easily hop into a quest without needing to spend time preparing for it. Anyone who wasn’t a huge fan of Monster Hunter’s slow approach will likely appreciate this change. The combat itself also plays a bit faster as well which is evident due to Omega Force’s Dynasty Warriors history and unfortunately this causes the weapons to lack any sort of weight in their impacts. The game is full of these super interesting weapons like the ball and chain and metal gauntlets, but most of them feel incredibly similar when you’re swinging them around. All of these changes are clearly done to make the game more accessible to people put off by the genre, but that doesn’t stop it from being an entertaining ride.
What’s perhaps Toukiden’s most interesting mechanic is the ability to dismember limbs from bosses. Each boss has various limbs that, if damaged enough, can be cut off which can cause it to deal less damage or straight up stops it from doing certain attacks. Of course things aren’t that easy since you need to purify a dismembered limb which leaves you totally defenseless. This adds an interesting strategy where you have to decide whether it’s worth opening yourself up to permanently weaken a monster. Doing so could cause you to get killed by a devastating attack, but it could also help out tremendously with the rest of the fight. Another neat thing this game does is the ability to gain experience points on equipment you use in battles. In most hunting games you’d use materials to upgrade a weapon or piece of armor, but simply using them in battles will eventually fill up a meter that will allow you to freely bump it up a level. It’s another aspect that speeds things up in a genre known for its relatively slow grind.
Now Kiwami is an expansion to last year’s release and as such includes a host of new things to play with. Anyone new to the game won’t notice any differences obviously, but returning players will be able to transfer their progress over and jump straight into the new story missions if they finished the previous game’s seven chapters. There are new demons to fight, two new mitama types, new companions to meet, you Tenko can now equip and level mitama, you can send companions out on secondary missions, there are new story chapters, and even the AI of the oni and AI companions have noticeably improved. There’s a lot of new stuff in Kiwami and it’s great that they put this much effort in improving the game.
Besides all the new demons to fight there are also new weapons and armor sets to craft out of their remains. Kiwami also introduces the rifle, spiked club, and naginata weapons to the game. While the club and naginata are neat, it’s the rifle that’s the most interesting weapon in the game. When using the rifle you’re able to view an oni’s weak spots and hit them for additional damage. There are a variety of bullets to use as well such as piercing, sniper, explosive, or the vacuum bullet that helpfully slows monsters down. The rifle also allows you to toss a grenade out that when shot with a certain bullet type will explode causing a variety of effects. You can also load bullets in specific order to better plan out your attacks and shift the positions of bullets when you want to quickly access a certain one. It’s a really neat weapon that support players will no doubt have fun with.
For anyone unsure as to whether they should continue the game on their Vita or make the jump to PS4 just know that you’re able to transfer your Vita progress of last year’s game to Kiwami whether you get it on the Vita or PS4. I expected Vita-to-Vita transfer but it’s a pleasant surprise to see that PS4 is included as well. Kiwami also features cross-platform multiplayer as well which is great for friends who purchase the game on separate platforms. This is a game meant to be played with others so the inclusion of cross-platform play is much appreciated.
If I had one major complaint about the game it’d be the inability to visit the blacksmith while playing online. This is a mind boggling exclusion and makes me wonder why they didn’t bother to implement it in Kiwami. The whole point of playing with others online is to hunt monsters together, craft some new gear if possible, and then move on to the next monster. Having to quit the lobby you’re in just to even go check the blacksmith is ridiculous and basically forces you to have to either leave the lobby you’re in or continue in it with possibly low level gear.
The Final Word
Fans of the hunting genre or anyone looking to dip their toes in it will find a fantastic game in Toukiden: Kiwami with dozens of hours to sink into.
– MonsterVine Rating: 4 out of 5 – Good
