Shaman King: Power of Spirit for PlayStation 2 Reviews by Gamers

Marrying two genres with the intention of forming one game is often a serious mistake. In these situations, a developer has to worry about creating and polishing two full products and making them function harmoniously. In the case of Shaman King, Konami opted to merge the fighter / beat 'em up with the turn-based strategy. Unfortunately, Shaman King not only fails to make for a happy coupling, it also fails to really develop either genre into any sort of worthwhile experience. This lack of any credible gameplay in both departments then makes for a product that won't appeal to any gamer, but may still attract devout fans of the Shaman King fiction.

For the unfamiliar, the passing of 500 years signifies the approach of the Destiny Star as well as the straggling Star of Destruction. Of course, every 500 years a great fighter rises to become the Shaman King. This enchanted warrior guides the world to a positive destiny and staves off the astronomical annihilation the trailing Star of Destruction presents for about another 500 years. As an added bonus, the Shaman King's every wish and desire is fulfilled by the great Shaman Spirit. If he's a good savior, so shall be the world. If he's evil... Well, it's probably chaos for all.

It's been 500 years and the stars are approaching. Yoh, a passive youth entangled in an abusive relationship with an overpowering girl named Anna, steps up to become the next Shaman King. His mission is to linearly defeat ever more challenging opponents in a sort of mystical tournament. Victory delivers unto him the Shaman crown. Despite this goal of attaining ultimate power and living the easiest of easy lives, Yoh isn't actually a very exciting protagonist for a videogame.

The story is a tidal wave that blots out the sun and never recedes. Prior to each and every mission, Yoh and his ever growing list of companions, sidekicks, ne'er-do-wells, and oblivious moochers, mope around, slack off, and generally converse about nothing in particular. The personalities of each main and sub character are distinct, but the often pointless banter between them does little to further the game's story, which also neglects to really introduce anyone properly.

If Yoh were even the least bit interesting, the prospect of this grueling narrative over involving gameplay might be forgivable -- he's just not interesting. Yoh is the kind of kid better suited to lead a life of nonchalant head nodding than to become the world's champion. For a protagonist on a mission to save the planet, he really doesn't seem to care all that much about anything, but then this specific characteristic is one born from the fiction, so fans of that will at least appreciate the faithfulness. Still, even they will be hard-pressed to defend some of the nonsensical overreactions nearly every character greets every situation with.

Not only are none of the dramatic spiels particularly interesting to make worth enduring, they're also rather unattractive. The cutscenes play out like a Sunday comic. Lifeless collages of static imagery pop in and out of the screen and vibrate when surprise and anger are called for. It's all the worst parts of animation without any of the parts that actually animate.

And after Yoh's prepubescent sidekick with an incomprehensibly old voice shakes violently atop a cascading background of furious green coloring, we're shoveled into another predictable fight. Think of it as another weathered cobblestone along the road to Shaman stardom Yoh happens to not even care about. And even if the battles weren't as predictable as the coming of more rocks in the road, the action itself would still be less interesting than the storyline. It's the problem with inter-genre marriage. First comes the turn-based strategy. I define strategy as a thought process that can be considered...strategic. Strategic thinking involves the application of genuine tactics and the consideration of many factors to achieve a certain end attainable only with the aid of legitimate brainwork, rather than unending legwork. Strategy is not blindly moving into the range of an enemy knowing full well that the indefensible square button assault will carry our hero through any engagement.

This is the most apparent flaw with Shaman King's proposed strategic layer: it's not actually strategic. What this façade does offer is a typically Japanese themed turn-based map where a variety of characters move about an invisible grid in turns. They can attack, devour items, and even initiate special actions. All of that is certainly possible, anyway. But, if you're capable of understanding the basic concept behind the supremely helpful pickle flavored health power-up and are also cool with pressing a single button until the game says it's alright to stop, you won't need to worry about any of that awful thinking and planning stuff the big kids keep talking about.

This special, witless kind of strategy is only possible thanks to Shaman King's grossly lacking fighting component. Button mashers are well and good, assuming there's some challenge, depth, flair, strategy, or personality behind them. Even just one of those traits might suffice, but Shaman King lacks all of them. If it weren't so ridiculously easy to win each and every match, maybe we'd have to think for longer than a microsecond during strategic layer gameplay.

The actual combat, be it one-on-one or against a handful of enemies, is so unfulfilling and easy to cheat it didn't matter whether or not I knew how to do any of the things I didn't ever bother doing. I quickly discovered that the simplistic jump plus square attack maneuver was capable of toppling any enemy in the game if I performed it while constantly inching forward to ensure I could strike again as soon as my foe recovered from the last blast. After this, I dumbed it down a bit and just decided to hold forward on the directional pad and hit the square button in rhythmic succession. Unsurprisingly, I managed to beat entire stages by only getting hit once or twice.

Believe it or not, the real kick comes later on when Yoh levels up enough to become really powerful. At this point his enemies might as well concede and let us trudge on through to the next winded storyline segment. Their attempt to put up any sort of a fight is laughable anyway, so why not just quit and get with the shaking sidekick guy?

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