Asura’s Wrath Hands-On

God of War’s Kratos has our unanimous vote for being the angriest dude in video games but he could soon get a bit of competition from Asura, the protagonist of Capcom’s latest IP (Intellectual Property), Asura’s Wrath. Like Kratos, Asura too is somewhat of a demigod who always had underlying anger issues. Things get intense when bad guys frame him for murder, kill his wife and kidnap his child. This obviously pushes him over the edge and he now spends his time roaming the Earth screaming at dudes and beating stuff up.

Last week we checked out a mission that’s maybe half way through the game. It’s a flashback of sorts where you see the tender side of Asura who’s trying to play with his infant daughter. All’s well till she starts crying leaving this big bad dude feeling awkward and very angry. We’re then fast forwarded to the future into a cave of sorts where a young girl’s prayers have awakened Asura who emerges from a state of hibernation, hundreds of years after his betrayal. Before he can comprehend what’s what, the girl’s attacked by a bunch of evil apes and the action kicks off.

Gyaaaaaaaaaa

Combat in Asura’s Wrath is similar to games like Devil May Cry or Bayonetta where you have light, heavy and ranged attacks that can be mixed up to inflict mad amounts of pain on enemies. Once your meter fills up you can pull off a rather devastating attack that’s capable of decimating multiple opponents at one shot. It’s not revolutionary but it’s pretty effective.

Once we dispatched off with the grunts, we were introduced to a boss that just so happened to be a gigantic evil elephant. Ok then. The boss fight that transpired played out like one of the many, many boss fights we’ve probably played a million times by now. Chip away slowly at his health bar, avoid his attacks and inflict mad damage once your rage meter is full. Towards the end of the boss fight, a massive QTE (Quick Time Event) gets triggered during which we launch the massive beast in air and continue to pummel it. Very cool.

Feel my rage

So far we like what we see in Asura’s Wrath but we did have a few issues with the game. For starters, it seemed to lack the polish we’re using to seeing in most games in this genre (God of War III really spoilt us). Character models didn’t look terribly detailed and environments looked rather bland. Combat looked like it could get repetitive and boring but then again, this was a preview build so we’re guessing the final version would have more options in the form of unlockable skill trees. From the videos and the preview level we experienced it’s safe to say this game will rely heavily on Quick Time Events and this could prove to be a hit and miss situation that works in some games but fails in the other (Ninja Blade anyone?).

You call that a punch?

Still we give Capcom props for dabbling with a new IP in this era of sequels. If developer CyberConnect2 can apply a significant amount of polish before the game ships this February, we may just have yet another solid action game on our hands. If you wish to try the game out for yourself, you could check out the demo that's now available on Xbox Live as well as the PlayStation Network