Dual Blades (Game Boy Advance)

GameSpot editors' review

• CNET editors' rating: 3.5 stars Very good
  Detailed editors' rating
  Overall score: 7.0 (3.5 stars)

• Reviewed by:
  Frank Provo
• Reviewed on: 10/21/2002
• Released on: 10/07/2002
• Originally published on GameSpot: Dual Blades (Game Boy Advance) Review

Dual Blades is a fighting game that seems to borrow a little of everything from an assortment of popular one-on-one combat games. General gameplay is reminiscent of SNK's Samurai Shodown series, complete with bladed weapons and gruesome finishing moves. Special attacks are laden with projectiles and somersaults, just like those found in Capcom's Street Fighter games. Last but not least, super attacks are outlandish and fill the screen similar to those in Sammy's Guilty Gear X. Since it borrows traits from so many other games, it's no surprise that Dual Blades is generally decent. Nevertheless, the game desperately needs its own identity and doesn't quite achieve the same consistency as the more established fighting game franchises.

At a cursory glance, the game certainly has a lot going for it. There are nine included characters, each of which has its own unique set of attacks and special moves, as well as its own specific background location. They all look completely different from one another, so you don't necessarily notice that the roster is smaller than that of other GBA fighting games. The included gameplay options are also more than adequate and include single-player arcade, linked versus, time trial, survival, and practice modes.

Still, when you actually put a few matches under your belt, you can't help but notice that Dual Blades blends together an amalgam of basic styles without actually incorporating the kind of deep gameplay so necessary in a one-on-one fighting game. Each character has an assortment of slashes and special moves, but very few of them can be chained together into complex combinations. Likewise, counterattacks are extremely basic and usually only result in an opportunity to take one punitive stab at the enemy. This isn't to say that there aren't large combinations or various ways to combo into finishing moves--there just aren't that many of them.

The game is remarkably easy to just dive into and play, however, which makes it perfect for the large subset of players who haven't yet begun to refer to fighting games in terms of tiers, turtles, ratios, or any other blasé vocabulary. You only have to push buttons to slash and hold back to defend, while special moves use the same quarter-circle, double-tap, and charge motions found in any number of previous 2D fighting games. As such, it won't take long to attain proficiency with the entire roster of characters. The game also earns high marks for its gruesome death scenes, in which you can actually decapitate or dismember an opponent with a final killing blow.

In addition to the basic "hold back to block" defense that's typical of the genre, Dual Blades also includes a block-parry system similar to the one found in Capcom's Street Fighter 3 and Capcom vs. SNK 2 games. If you tap forward into your opponents just as they attack, you can block their strikes with your weapon and counter with a quick strike of your own. A successful parry also regains a touch of lost stamina. For as clever as the concept is, you can't parry successive attacks, which limits the move's practical use to isolated defenses against strong slashes and single-hit special moves.

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