Pros: Fighting against hundreds of enemies at a time; battles can involve some strategy
Cons: Repetitive combat; short campaign; slowdown when attacking a large group; can't move camera with the right analog stick
Dynasty Warriors is a series that has become infamous because of its rehashed gameplay across 5 sequels and several other offshoots (Samurai Warriors and Dynasty Warriors Strike Force to name two of them), but things weren't always that bleak for the series. While Dynasty Warriors was simply a fighting game for the PS1, Dynasty Warriors 2 offered something that was exceedingly rare in games: an open battlefield. Too often games were linear in nature and had you fighting enemies in a particular pattern throughout a level. However, with Dynasty Warriors 2, players were able to fight the battles as they saw fit against hundreds, sometimes thousands of disposable enemies. There was something inherently satisfying about killing off hundreds of enemies in every level, even if they were pretty mindless. Dynasty Warriors 3 upped the ante a bit by offering more customization options for the characters and allowing for two player co-op, something that was oddly missing from Dynasty Warriors 2. Dynasty Warriors 3 was actually fairly well received, garnering a metacritic score of 78 at the time. While Koei was developing Dynasty Warriors 4, they decided to offer an add-on pack to get a few more bucks out of gamers called Dynasty Warriors 3: Xtreme Legends, which allowed players to use some of the boss characters from the original Dynasty Warriors 3 in campaign mode and also allowed you to port these characters over to the original Dynasty Warriors 3. Sum total, there were only 7 new generals, which was nothing compared to the original's 42, but the game wasn't meant as a full-fledged sequel and came out for a budget price.
I came to own Dynasty Warriors 3: Xtreme Legends and no other Dynasty Warrior game because, quite simply, I was looking for a co-op game to play with my sister and it was by far the cheapest Dynasty Warriors game that Gamestop had at the time. I only played it with her for a short while because we seemed to keep failing missions, and when I took it to college, a friend of mine and I also seemed unable to push past the third or fourth level in the game. Since we couldn't finish it, the game got shelved and I didn't touch it until a few weeks ago, against the warnings of a friend who said that the game didn't age well. I was prepared for an archaic experience, but honestly found myself pleasantly surprised. Dynasty Warriors 3: Xtreme Legend is obviously meant to be an expansion and not a standalone game, but that doesn't hinder the core combat which is still surprisingly satisfying, if a bit repetitive.
Dynasty Warriors 3: XL continues to tell the story of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms. You'll play as historic Chinese generals, fighting for their respective causes throughout a military campaign. Combat in Dynasty Warriors 3: XL consists of mashing on the main attack button while occasionally breaking it up with a "Musou" attack, a move that can only be used when the Musou gauge is filled. You fill this by performing regular attacks, so the combat gets a certain rhythm to it where you attack, attack, do a super, and repeat. Technically, there is also a heavy attack button, but quite honestly I never found a reason to use it. For the most part, the enemies just stand around, waiting to be killed, so its pretty easy to mow through an entire crowd with the above strategy. However, you will also periodically find a general in with the rest of the troops, and they require a little bit of a different approach. They have the ability to block, which means you'll be using single "poking" attacks, waiting for them to drop their guard before you unleash a full combo. The number of hits in a combo is determined by the weapon that you have, and you'll find upgrades as you proceed through the campaign.
The combat may seem a bit repetitive, but what has always made Dynasty Warriors unique is the context you fight in. Every level takes place on a battlefield where you'll be tasked with not just attacking as many enemies as possible, but completing a certain objective. In most levels, this is kill a certain enemy general while protecting a certain allied general, but the game mixes it up every once in a while with a completely different objective like stopping a general from escaping. All told, there are only six levels to a campaign, so it really didn't bother me too much that there was a lack of variety in objectives, but some might find issue with it. While the campaign is short, you can always play through with a different character that will have somewhat different levels. Levels might repeat between characters every once in a while, but you'll probably have to play through at least three different characters before you've seen all the levels the game has to offer.
There is one other odd complaint I had with the gameplay, and it involved the camera. Namely, you can't move it with the right analog stick, which seems second nature to me for third person action games. Instead, you have to tap on L1 to bring the camera back behind the character, which is fairly awkward. I recognize that this innovation just might not have been established in games yet, but it feels off regardless. Also, there is some slowdown when you attack a particularly large group of enemies, although it really doesn't damage gameplay. To an extent, it looked more dramatic to me, but it is clearly due to the game's technical limitations and not an artistic choice.
Dynasty Warriors 3: Xtreme Legends isn't a classic game by any stretch of the imagination. The combat is repetitive, the campaign short, and the graphics fairly bland. However, that doesn't stop the game from being entertaining while it lasts, especially if you play through with a friend. It won't take you more than a couple hours to finish, but considering all of the Dynasty Warriors PS2 games are in the bargain bin now, you can always pick up a couple and still not break the $10 mark. If you have friends that don't play games much, this is a perfect game to waste some time, even if there are better overall games out there.
Overall Score: 7.1
Recommended Price: 2.99
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