Miyamoto Musashis Swords

Description
No, Miyamoto Musashi isn't the guy who created [i]Super Mario Bros[/i]. That's [b]Shigeru Miyamoto[/b]. Miyamoto Musashi was a samurai from Japan's Harima Province, who lived through the late 1500s and early 1600s, famed for his notable style of duelling and for being the author of [i]The Book of Five Rings[/i] - a classic treatise on military history. Miyamoto Musashi's historical persona earned him a place in the lineup of KOEI's psuedo-historical battlefield action game, [i]Samurai Warriors[/i]; as well as it's sequel and expansion packs, and the [i]Samurai/Dynasty Warriors[/i] cross-over title: [i]Warriors Orochi[/i].

In the [i]Warriors Orochi[/i] game, the fictional persona of Miyamoto Musashi allies himself with the Kingdom of Shu, and wields two blades as usual. His weapons differ from the [i]Samurai Warriors 2[/i] incarnation, in that his dual traditional Japanese blades are replaced by what I can only assume is a large ceremonial training sword, and a smaller more lethal off-hand blade.

And that's what brings HOUOU back to us after all this time, with faithful replications of these weapons.

Now, to keep things simple, I'll just come out and say it. They're mostly spot on. HOUOU even got the kanji just right. The wooden training sword appears more blade-like than the original source material, which is good, and the smaller sword has had slight design changes, which I'm happy with - it looks a wee bit dodgy in WO. The textures are remarkably accurate, although a little sharper, deeper and more vivid, which isn't particularly a bad thing. The most important part is that they [i]feel[/i] right, and they're not horribly imbalanced against other weapons, either.

Sword fanatic, Japan fanatic, or [i]Samurai/Dynasty Warriors[/i] fanatic.... These swords will interest you if you fall in either of those groups.

~ Kouen