Megaton Musashi W: Wired Review - Megaton Punching Above Its Weight

Summary

Classic anime narrative pairs well with detailed mech combat in Megaton Musashi W: Wired.
There's an impressive level of customisation options available for players to personalise their mechs.
Pacing issues and repetitive standard combat missions are drawbacks in an otherwise enjoyable game experience.

If playing in the 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Megaton Musashi W: Wired World Cup taught me anything, it’s that I didn’t completely suck at the game. My team managed to win at least one round, but then again, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:I didn’t excel at it either as my team✃ lost its very next match. I needed to know once and for all whether I was good, so playing theꦅ whole game seemed like the best choice. You know, other than inviting all the competitors back for a rematch in Tokyo.

Wired feaಞtures a classic anime-style opening cutscene complete with a cheesy but lovable theme song that sets the tone for the game. It features all the usual tropes and humour you’d expect from anime and manga, from school punch-ups and romantic confessions to a spoof of two aliens in a maid cafe. There’s also a later scene where a character gets a bit intimate with an android he’s powered down… but having a scene that makes you question what the hell is happ🍌ening is still very much in line with those anime stereotypes we all know, love, and sometimes raise an eyebrow at.

Level 5 CEO Akihiro Hino talking about Megaton Musashi- Wired

Level-5 CEO On How Megaton Musashi W: Wired Is “Unapologetically Introducing Japa🐷n”

I spoke with Level-5 CEO Akihiro Hino about the launch of Megato🃏n Musashi W: Wired and how i𒀰t marks the series' first launch in the West.

Posts 168澳洲幸运5开奖网: ♎

Megaton Musashi has its own anime series and at the time of Wired’s launch, the game🍒 has progressed further into the storyline than the TV series.

You’re Launched Straight Into The Action

Things quickly go from 0-100. Protagonist Ichidaiji Yamato and every other character you meet aren’t in a real city any more. Alie♛ns, known as Draktors, invade the planet and decimate most of it, l🌃eaving only a few survivors who take residence in a Shelter called Ixia. Most are completely oblivious to the real fate of mankind and have had their memories wiped so they can live in ignorance going about their daily routines of school, work, and hanging out in the local arcade.

Most narratives would hint at plot twists like this little by little, allowing you to uncover them as you progress, but in Wired, it hits you like a Megaton Punch to the face in the first hour. The pacing from there was a little odd as you build up to this climatic battle sequence and꧂ tꦿhe game feels mostly wrapped up by Chapter 11, even unlocking New Game Plus at this point. But no. The game has 25 chapters total, so after Chapter 11, it leads up to the next big battle, then the next. This emphasises the mirroring of an anime, where you have this ebb and flow of action and characters facing the next threat and the next.

Any time you aren’t actively battling feels like an interactive anime, with one cutscene pre-warning you it was 30 minutes long. For the most part, this gameplay-anime hybrid worked, but some parts felt a little stilted or poorly paced. I thought one character was a student until wham, bam, thank you ma’am it turns out he has a baby with someone. This whole thing just happened without much fanfare and felt more like a plot device than part of th♏e story itself. The father in question, apparently not a child (I💖 hope?), seemed unattached emotionally about this news, and the few brief scenes that touch on this don’t help you fathom this disconnect. When he later decides to care and become father of the year, it all feels a bit disjointed.

Overall, some parts felt dragged out while many others felt rushed. Perhaps this is the price to pay for trying to catch up to, condense, and surpass the anime all in one go. There were parts I𝓀 wanted to see detailed further, while others felt like filler episodes. Nobody likes filler episodes. And that all makes reviewing the game a little difficult, because really I’m reviewing the TV series the game is hidden inside of.

When Megaton Musashi originally launched in Japan in 2021, the game concluded in Chapter 11. The subsequent chapters were added for Wired, which might be why that♈ first faux ending with New Game Plus unlock felt out of place.

Slice Of Life Mixed With Mech Combat

Gameplay feels like an even split down the middle. Half the time you’re exploring the 2.5D world, chatting🌞 to other characters and chasing down leads or watching cutscenes, while the other half of the time you’re in your mech completing combat missions in a fully 3D world. Both offer optional content, so if you like one aspect of the game more, you can choose to dig deeper.

If you want more narrative, you can take on optional side quests, and find collectables relating to the other characters to unlock Side Stories that give you more insight into their lives. If battling it out in mechs is your favourite part of the game, there are a plethora of optional missions to undertake, including different types, such as Treasure Missions that yiღeld better rewards or Challenge Missions that are more difficult to comꦚplete. You can even repeat missions on varying difficulties to truly test your mettle, or pit yourself against other players in PvP.

The mechs are the shining stars of 🐈Wired. The level of customisation is incredible, allowing you to finetune your battlesuits by choosing different body parts and types, weapon types, and abilities with varying playstyles favouring specific setups. On top of all that, you can customise it cosmetically also, making your mech hot pink and slapping on different decals if you wish. There are numerous shops and features that allow you to recycle, craft, and purchase even more upgrades, parts, and abilities, as well as battle missions yielding lots of parts, too. There is so much you can do, it’s overwhelming.

But that’s no bad thing. Most players will absolutely love it. If, like me, you’re not the most adept at choosing every little detail, you can simply go with what the game recommends at the press of a button. You still need to sort your own abilities, which unlock as you progr෴ess through the game. You might⛦ need to grind a few missions to up your level to overcome some particularly challenging story missions, but other than that, completing Wired while sticking to the basics is easily achievable.

I dabbled between being a basic mech b*tch and trying to become a tech whizz by trying out some of the other elements, though I probably still fell short in the latter area. I also realised the hard way that you can’t just favour the one mech you really like, as there are times you arꦯe forced to play as the other characters’ mechs. Don’t be like me, make sure you’re upgrading them all.

I don’t consider myself a big mech fan, but the combat is undeniably appealing. You can make your mech however you want it to be, so I made mine fast and proficient in close combat because I like to but꧅ton-mash the heck out of my enemies rather than opt for a slow and steady, long-range approach. As you progress, you unlock bigger and better abilities that can carve a chunk out of your enemies’ HP in one hit and battles gain more depth when you gain flight abilities.

Combat is fun, but it becomes repetitive. The real winners were the boss battles, as you’re facing down different mechanics and dealing with giant titans for that exciting sense of an impressive, epic fight on a battleground where you’re smashing through decaying skyscrapers. But most missions involve progressing through a linear path, defeating X number of enemies to progไress to the next part and rinse and repeat until you deal with the boss at the end. Customising your mech to keep things feeling fresh does help to mitigate this somewhat, but if you’re mainly sticking to your old reliables because you’re not con🐭fident in your abilities to switch up your mech, you’ll get tired of this fast.

I didn’t know how much I would gel with Megaton Musashi W: Wired as I don’t consider myself much of a mech fan, but I was surprised by how invested in the narrative and gameplay I became. Though the story’s pacing could have been polished better and combat can get a bit r🐈epetitive, it’s an enjoyable experience that I fear many will miss out on this year as it has snuck in under the radar. If you love anime, mechs, or even just like beating down aliens (and other players online) in your own customised exoskeleton, give Wired a shot.