Bladestorm: Nightmare Reignites the 100 Years' War - Preview

 

“Remastered” and “Definitive” Editions have made a name for themselves over the course of the last year, taking games released in the tale-end of the last generation and bringing them to PS4, PC, and Xbox One with higher resolutions, more detailed character models, and other technical improvements - The Last of Us, Grand Theft Auto V, Tomb Raider, and soon DMC: Devil May Cry all fit this bill. Koei Tecmo also joined this club by bringing 2013’s Dynasty Warriors 8 to PS4 and Xbox One last year, but they are taking an interesting approach to their OTHER franchise based on real-life historical conflicts. 

 

Bladestorm: The Hundred Years’ War, based on the actual European conflicts of the same name, was a PS3 and Xbox 360 game originally released in 2007, which combined the hack-n-slash and heightened reality approach of Dynasty Warriors with the real-time strategy elements of Kessen, and now Koei Tecmo is bringing the game to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. It’s already inherently cool that Koei Tecmo is re-releasing an 8-year old niche title for the current generation of consoles, but even cooler is the addition of “Nightmare”, an all-new story campaign that follows up on the events of the original game, but with a fantasy spin. Not quite a sequel, not quite a remaster, and not quite an expansion either, Bladestorm: Nightmare looks like it could be an interesting foray for fans of Koei’s previous action games. 

I recently got to check out a preview build of Bladestorm: Nightmare, and was definitely intrigued. Despite the mini-history lesson I wrote above, I actually did not realize that Bladestorm: Nightmare was a remaster. Attempting to direct the flow of battle by juggling direct combat and micro-managing the rest of my troops seemed novel for a new game - so I was surprised when it was revealed to me that the base game was originally released in 2007. 

 

The core gameplay of Bladestorm remains intact. A first glance will initially make it look like a Dynasty Warriors clone, but the similarities end pretty quickly. You directly control your character across the large, historical battlefields, and like Dynasty Warriors you can tackle the hundreds of enemy troops head on. Where Bladestorm differentiates itself, however, is through its squad control. Approach an allied squadron, and you will join them and gain direct control of the whole squad. From here, gameplay mechanics will change depending on which squad you have chosen - join the cavalry and mount a horse alongside your fellow soldiers, join a group of archers to directly control where they fire their volleys, or fight alongside swordsmen for up-close combat. 

Bladestorm’s original campaign spans the major events of the Hundred Years’ War, where your custom-created mercenary can choose to fight alongside either the English or the French, encountering historical figures such as Joan of Arc, Edward the Black Prince, and Arthur de Richemont. The additional Nightmare campaign takes these versions of historical figures and puts them in a fantastical scenario that follows up the events of the original game. Joan of Arc has discovered a mysterious, magical force, corrupting her to evil and giving her control of an army of monsters, dragons, and demons. The French and the English must set aside their differences and band together to defeat her, though as in the original iteration players can play as both sides of the conflict, giving players access to Joan’s roster of monsters, such as fire-breathing dragons. 

 

On a technical level, Bladestorm: Nightmare looks to be providing a polish that is to be expected of remastered releases, increasing the resolution, texture and character model quality, draw distance, and the amount of characters that can appear on-screen. I still encountered some pop-in and framerate drops during my time with the game, but hopefully these issues can be improved upon before the game releases next month. 

Bladestorm was met with mixed reviews when it was originally released in 2007, but based on my time with this remaster it definitely seems like it’s doing some really interesting things, with its mixture of hack ‘n slash gameplay combined with RTS elements - I'm reminded of the vastly underrated Brutal Legend. Here’s hoping that with the stronger hardware on its side, as well as the new additional content, Bladestorm: Nightmare will be released to a more receptive audience when it launches March 17th for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PlayStation 3, as well as Steam this May.