Once you begin to mesh and identify with the strange sort of world that Afro Samurai inhabits, you begin to appreciate the way the music goes with the visuals, among other things.

The controls aren't so bad, once you get to a high enough experience level you begin to get some wild combos and begin to understand the methods of making them work in the midst of a seemingly endless stream of bad dudes... And learning when to use over-focus to hack and slash mobs to pieces in a dashing whirlwind of madness.

There are interesting diversions along the way... The most important being to find the hidden clusters of crows in order to unlock the "Father's Legacy" moves and combos, which I never found useful, the most fun being "body part poker", in which you get a card for each head or limb that you chop off, the suit of which is determined by the enemy type for a maximum of three cards (I was quite happy with my Ninja Straight Flush, which unlocked the "No Limit Ninjas" achievement which is funny, think about it), and the most irritating being getting lost in the tower inhabited by the Empty Seven, which some of you more masochistic individuals might enjoy.

Perhaps what I like most is the environment, it really lends an element of beauty to what would otherwise be a sort of nasty bloodbath interspersed with evil three dimensional platform mazes (at first rather simple, but probably not as complicated as some other games of the same kind, I really don't have a lot of experience with these kinds of games) that involve paying attention and slightly maddening tests of reflexes and timing.

The environments, game-play, story and soundtrack come together nicely enough to outshine the awkwardness I felt playing it at first, which means I think it's worth renting at least (It was too short to advocate buying, though some of you might find some replay value in there somewhere). My one REAL bitch is that I think they should have attached a two-player death-match mode attached to the game, but perhaps they could be convinced to consider it.

Comments are not available for this entry.