Gekido Kintaro's Revenge Proves Some Things Are Best Left Alone

I fondly recall, as an original Playstation gamer, my experience with "Gekido". It was a rocking 3D arcade style brawler that was unique for it's time. It dared to do something different. It had an amazing in-game soundtrack, a hidden song that could be played on a CD player, and gamplay that was overall fun. The art style was akin to something seen in comic books back when comic books were actually good. For whatever reason this tried and true formula was ditched for what best could be described as a blatant middle finger to fans of the first entry in the series. Gekido Kintaro's Revenge, in all of it's mediocre glory, puts players in control of two seemingly familiar characters (Tetsuo & Travis), and has them taking on the arduous task of finding out why the dead are rising in a nearby village. It feels, and plays out a lot like a plot inspired by the anime, "Ninja Scroll". While this could have been cool it falls short of being so through bad controls, poorly implemented combat, bad graphic design, and cheap sucker punches that happen way too often. It's almost as if the developer who made this game had a grudge against the gamers who bought what they were selling the first time around.

From the dull anime inspired cartoon cutscenes that look like they were emulated and transferred via port processing to the uninspired dialogue shown via standard text, and even into the repetitive gameplay itself, "Gekido Kintaro's Revenge" ultimately kills what little faith gamers might have had after having watched the reveal trailers. As with most side-scrolling brawlers of the "Streets of Rage" or "Double Dragon" sort this particular story, score, and objective driven martial arts adventure abides by the genre's staple formula, but very poorly so. It has gamers taking control of up to two selectable characters through local co-op as they use simple kick and punch auto combos to deal with swarming waves of enemies. It's nothing fancy, and the only real stand out gimmick to the combat is the timed power-up drops that have both beneficial, and adverse effects which either help or hinder your progress.

Aside from those combat features the characters you can play as also come with a small assortment of other attacks that aren't so combo oriented. Each given character has a jump kick, a throw, and a special attack. The latter of which can be used once you build up enough meter through enemy clearing. As far as the enemies go they come in a hierarchy of difficulty based variants as one would expect from such a brawler. They serve as the main threat along with the boss type bad guys who are led by an even greater evil themselves. Along with the minions, and their masters you'll also find traps and pitfalls of varying sorts scattered here, there, and yonder for added artificial difficulty. Some of which are unavoidable, and hit you from their out of view locations without ample warning. The goal for each short lived, and title inclusive chapter in this supposedly action packed experience is to move forward a little, battle enemy waves, find needed items such as keys and a lantern, interact with key characters that trigger cutscenes, and backtrack to the places which the items you've collected open up. Ultimately facing an end chapter boss when you finally make it to the final area.

Story mode in the game is, in all respects, a futile fight against an aggravating ensemble of recycled enemies and traps that seemingly appear out of nowhere at times while whittling away at your life bar as you helplessly take the sucker punches that are so frequently dealt. In each chapter, and against each new assortment of obstacles and enemies you'll be tasked with trekking through the labyrinth of rooms or outer locations as you hunt for progression items, and cutscene points that forward the mission objective at hand. Some enemies that you'll encounter have different attacks which you'll have to mind, but the cheap mob mentality that is wholly ingrained in the entirety of the experience remains the same throughout regardless of how careful your approach might be. It is the mob mentality itself that makes the game both challenging, and unfairly frustrating. There is no real way to avoid getting hit, and thus your only reprieve is to pick up dropped food items that randomly appear when you kill off enemies or break breakable objects. Along with the enemy clearing antics you'll also be tasked with finding keys and lanterns to access the different areas which will eventually get you into a final fight with a boss character or characters.

Aside from story mode you'll find a score based survival mode in which you alone, or you and a friend via local co-op can battle wave after wave of the evil undead to earn points. Sadly this is made difficult, and unfairly so by the inability to block or react swiftly. No matter how hard you fight against it you will eventually get sucker punched to the point you will lose your only life, and experience a game over. A routine life and death situation that echoes throughout all modes of play within this game. The only difference here being the amount of lives or continues you are afforded. A detail I forgot to mention about the previously described story mode is that you can set how many lives or continues you get by a predetermined amount. Here in the survival mode, however, you only get one try. Beyond all of that there seems to be no in-game leaderboard for bragging rights, and no global leaderboard at that. Something that should be available in a game that has modes which keep track of scores.

Lastly, in the way of modes, the game offers a unique take on the core gameplay through "Relic Hunter". In this mode you will basically be going from room to room hunting for relics as you face off against the usual assortment of familiar foes. As with the survival mode you only get one life, and once that life is lost it is "Game Over!". Found relics will be displayed at the "Relic Hunter" main menu listing.

For those of you looking for that something extra there is a small gallery of artwork available for clicking through in orderly fashion at the main menu listing. There are mostly black & white drawings with artist details included. In the way of in-game options you'll find you can adjust the screen size to fit modern HD televisions, or scale the screen size down to a widescreen or 4:1 ratio. This only serves to change how the game fits your TV screen, and doesn't really do much else to improve upon the lackluster graphical presentation. It should be noted that the original layout looks very much like what you'd see in an emulated port. It's graphically not what a modern day indie should look like, especially an indie that was built in this day and age.

The Verdict ...

I was extremely disappointed with this game. It felt like a metaphorical slap in the face. It felt like the developer didn't even care enough to carry over all that made the original "Gekido" fun. The many sucker punches I endured, and the overall experience in general left me frustrated. It didn't inspire me to finish the story nor did it inspire me to keep playing the tacked on survival and relic hunter mode. The fact that the presentation was so pitifully rendered outside of the combat phases, and the controls so awkwardly done left a lot to be desired. I cannot, and will not recommend this game. It seems very much like a game development project that was scrapped long ago for good reason, and revived as was. Skip this game even at discounted pricing.