(As usual, I don't own any of the pictures)
Well it's that time again. Time to take one of the greatest historical novels of all time and turn it into a video game or an anime. When you think about it the Three Kingdoms Era is perhaps one of the most used wartime periods for media next to WWII and the Sengoku era. Dynasty Warriors is one of those well known ones.
The famous hack and slash army style series was not always like this style to be honest, originally it was a 3D fighter that evolved itself into the mook killing style that it is today. Many fans love it, but there are also many fans who hate it just as much. Many praise the creative use of the characters and the elements from the original Romance of the Three Kingdoms book while others criticize the same storyline aspect and repetitive gameplay. To be fair, the game was originally intended to be centered around Asian audiences because of their love for the bloodiest times in their nations history much like us in the west do for wars that we won, but western audiences grew in love with the game overtime so Koei's decided to focus on both sides. There have been ups and downs with the series overtime, but I can safely say that this Dynasty Warriors game is much better then it's last one which was, in my opinion and a lot of other peoples, the worst one ever. But I won't just be talking about the seventh game only, I'll also be talking about the series in general a bit as well.
1. Graphics
If there is one thing that both the critics and the lovers of the series have to admit is that with each new game the graphics get better and better. If you take a look at Dynasty Warriors 4 you'll see the old famous PS2 style that many games were using back then and then take a look at either 6 or 7 and you'll go "Holy crap this is like entering a whole new fricken world!". In 7 the graphics are much better, details to each character are unique, and the environments are given a much more attention in this one. Seriously, just look at the water they made. Any person in the industry will tell you that making water is HARD! Yet another thing I have to address also are the games effects. The fires, the power blasts, even the explosions make you want to act like a 2 year old and just dazzle at them like they were in your face. I've got to give credit to that. So in a nutshell, graphics are pretty f'ing sweet.2. Controls
The controls for this game have always been pretty much the same in every series so that's no much to go on. If your new to the series and you just started playing you'll get use to the controls after your first battle. For all of you veterans out there it's like playing the controls before 6's stupid Renbu system that made the game too easy. You've gone one button you keep pressing to use normal attack and your power button which you use in the middle of the combo to use a high powered special attack that does more damage. Add in jump, guard, and your Musou attack and your mostly good. Archery is still not back, but your character can equip a second weapon that can be a bow or crossbow but more on that later. Other then this, it's the same as it's always been.
3. Gameplay
Here is where both the good and the bad come into play with Dynasty Warrior games and it's counter parts. The first thing you'll notice is that pretty much every mook and common solider you fight against will die in less then 3 seconds upon meeting you and his wife will be told of his death and she'll cry into tears (Don't you feel guilty?). Nearly every enemy you fight will be to easy to kill and the game tries to even this out by making them swarm like Zergs. The only threat these lemmings are to you are killing your own allied officers who are as weak as slugs. I mean if you have an officer who prides himself on being the "God of War" he's certainly not the type of guy to just fall dead from a weak peasant's spear attack. There are only three real threats to this game and those are enemy officers, the main characters on the enemies team (With half of them cheating like hell), and Lu Bu who is Nightmare Fueled hate and anger rolled up in a black armored man with a spear that will chop your balls off. (Don't believe me? Play the Hu Lao Gate level on any of the games on hard more and try to beat him. Not easy). There is also the threat of failing mission that will cause your army to lose and that's most likely the most difficult thing in this game. Be sure to keep an ear open for important events so you don't get left behind.
But besides fighting endless waves of enemies and being called a "Hero of the Three Kingdoms" over and over again, there are some other aspects to the gameplay. The first is that the return of missions in the battles from Dynasty Warriors 6 have returned and they play a much more important role in the game. I kind of like this, it gives you the sense that there is a strategy in the works and you need to do it right for the sake of the battle or else all hope is lost. Sure there were these in the previous Dynasty Warrior games, but with most of those levels I could just get on my Red Hare pony, smack a few dozens in my way, find the leader of the enemy army, kick his ass, and win the day to get drunk on Chinese wine and dumplings. In this game it gives the player a duty to follow the wisdom of their armies strategist in order to make sure they win which gives a better army like feeling. 
But perhaps the most changed thing about the game is the fact that it allows you to play with two weapons. This is taken from the battle style from Dynasty Warriors Strikeforce where characters could equip whatever weapons they want. The same applies her and I like it. You could have Guan Yu using his famous Blue Dragon Spear and then using a pair of nun-chucks fighting all Bruce Lee style or you could have Xu Chu wielding a staff like Pang Tong to him using a sickle and chain making him jump around like a ninja. It's very entertaining and although most of the movesets are the same, each character still has their own unique weapon and special attacks as well as their own original Musou attack. Not like 6 which gave only a certain amount of characters those. Plus some of the weapons are really fun to use like a guncannon, a paint brush and even a iron mechanical drill (insert Gurren Lagann joke here). 
Now to talk about the game modes. The first one is Story mode, but I'll get to that later when I'm talking about the story. After that you have Conquest mode which is a board like world where you pick any character and perform a range of missions that go from actual historical parts that were not include in the game, to time attacks, defeating certain amount of enemies, and even "What if" stories.
BUT THERE IS NO FREE PLAY MODE!!!
That's right, you will not be able to choose your own stage and character to battle on whatever difficulty you want. The closest thing to doing that is unlocking a mission in Conquest mode and playing there while being forced to do the missions instead of "free" roaming. And even in story mode you can still pick the battles, but you can't pick the side or the character you want to play as. Free mode was one of my favorite modes in the entire series and I still can't believe they got rid of it. I know your trying to make the game more "Historically Accurate" Koei, but come on!
4. Story
Now the story of what Dynasty Warriors is about is that it's based on the romantic historical novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms (A good book I recommend) which is based on the Three Kingdoms Era and the events leading up to it. The game first focuses on the end of the Han Era by starting at the Yellow Turban Rebellion before moving on to the Tyranny of Dong Zhuo and after that the respective sides of each army. The three main armies are the virtuous Shu, the ambitious Wei, and the honorable Wu. You can occasionally play as other forces such as the Yellow Turbans, Dong Zhuo's army, Lu Bu's army, and Yuan Shao's army, but no storyline for these characters has existed since the fifth game.All three sides mainly fight each other in order to hold dominance over the land of China, each having their own reasons. Shu wants to restore the Han Dynasty, Wei wants to create a new Dynasty or political way, and Wu....well they just want to be left alone, but get dragged in anyway.
Seven's story is more accurate to what actually happened in the historical novel with a new fraction known as Jin coming into play. For anybody who knows their Chinese history well enough it's known that Sima family took over Wei and dominated China making way for the Jin Dynasty. Kind of ironic that the real winner was none other then Sima Yi's family after all the hard work Liu Bei, Cao Cao, and Sun Quan went into only for it to come to nothing huh? So yeah, the first three fractions show what their part in history was while Jin finishes it all up by showing how they won. This style is much similar to Dynasty Warriors 4, which many claim to be the best, where instead of focusing on a character's storyline and impact in the war it focuses on the entire fraction. However, in Dynasty Warriors 4 you could choose your characters for the story, in this game you can't. You can only play the given character in the storyline which I kind find disappointing because I would want to play as the other characters during the level. Again this goes back to my rant about Free Mode being gone.Still the story is very accurate in the game and it has it's own unique twists once and while so I still give it a good thumbs up.
5. Characters
The one thing that I love most about Dynasty Warriors is the way they portray the characters. Each one is unique and has their own personality that makes each character rememborable. You've got your honorable warrior ones who just plan kick ass like Guan Yu, Zhao Yun, Xu Huang, and Lu Meng. You've got your monsterous warriors like Lu Bu, Dian Wei, and Zhang Fei. Hot sexy girls like Diao Chan, Xing Cai, and Sun Shang Xiang. Even the strange ones likes Pang Tong, Wei Yan or Zhang He (Zhang He being the most obvious strange one).
And of course you got Zhuge Liang or as my friend Alex would call him: Super Chinese Jesus.
Making their way back to the Dynasty Warriors series are old characters such as Xing Cai, Jiang Wei, Meng Huo, and the Xiao sisters along with new characters such as Bao Shanniang, Jia Xu, Ding Feng, and an entire new fraction named Jin having characters such as Sima Shi, Xiahou Ba, and Zhong Hui. Each character plays well and has a unique Musou that fits well with their personality.
This is the largest date of characters that Koei has given us in a Dynasty Warriors game, it only seems a shame that we don't get free mode to play them all in.
6. Sound
Like the graphics, music and sound effects have gotten better and better. The awesome combination of Chinese music and rock makes you feel your adrenaline pumping and a need to kick ass Wu Xhu style. However on the negative side, the dubbing voices are not really good and some of their voices will be annoying. That isn't to say that some of them aren't good for instance I love Xiahou Dun's voice actor the most, but some like Sun Quan and Ma Chao could use a little work. Too bad they took away the ability to play the game in Japanese like in 5 or else then I wouldn't complain more.
OVERALL: 3.75/5
With Dynasty Warriors chances are you'll only like it if your a old fan like me or if you like hack and slashing repeatedly with cool effects or you like Chinese literature. Dynasty Warriors 7 does a much better job then Dynasty Warriors 6, but not up to the level that 4 and 5 were at. The inability to play free mode or choose what characters to play during the story mode weakens an overall improved gameplay and character settings list that made this game really great.
So if your already a Dynasty Warriors fan, I recommend you get the game. Everyone else? Rent it and see what goes from there.
We are gamers and we are legion.
Later
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