I can still remember playing the Guilty Gear series for the first time back on the original PlayStation and thinking that it was the coolest thing at the time. The fighting animations of the sprite based characters and even the series’ main protagonist are still one of the reasons that I can’t help but revisit the series with each release over the years. While other fighters have kept on doing the almost same old but prettier thing over the years, developer Arc System Works has taken the series in a new direction with the release of Guilty Gear 2 –Overture- for the PC.
Set five years after the events of the original Guilty Gear you assume the role of series protagonist and bounty hunter Sol Badguy once again. Only this time you won’t be engaging in 2D one on one fights like with previous entries in the series. Guilty Gear 2 –Overture- is the first title in the series to use 3D graphics changing the series mechanics into something more in the veins of Dynasty Warrior than its 2D fighter roots.
In disturbing events, the Gears that were once sealed away are now alarmingly vanishing and the Kingdom of Illyria is attacked by an unknown enemy force causing the now king of Illyria and rival of main character Sol, Ky Kiske, to seek him out. Players are rather quickly introduced to both the new gameplay style as well as the real-time strategy elements that Guilty Gear 2 –Overture- features as Sol comes face to face with the same enemy force that is attacking Illyria.
While I did miss Guilty Gear’s familiar gameplay, I couldn’t help but enjoy this new change of pace that GG2 –Overture- brings to the table. Combat now takes place in 3D locations where you go up against multiple enemies at once instead of the traditional one on one. As a fan of titles that pit one person against a thousand enemies, I fell right into Overture’s pacing pretty quickly. Much like a traditional Guilty Gear game you will get to engage in combat with more than just Sol as you gain access to six other characters over the course of the story and the other modes found within Overture.
This included the traveling companion and named Sin who crazily enough wields essentially an army banner pole complete with said banner into battle. Combat is still just as fast paced featuring many of the signature attacks that fans of Guilty Gear will know and love but now you can see them executed in an three dimensional space. While the combat animations are quite pretty to look at there are plenty of other things that require your attention this time around. One of most interesting features to Overture is the real time strategy elements that you can utilize on the battlefield. For starters players often have to take ownership of control points called Ghosts to progressively move forward in each mission until your main objective usually resulting in the defeat of a main boss or enemy base known as a Master Ghost.
The interesting element that is revealed to players is that these Ghost control points cannot be taken by your character alone. You have to utilize your own version of over 50 different types of troops to aid you in battle. These range from simple capture troops that can take control over a capture point allowing for the spawning of new troops closer to your objectives to more powerful allies called Servants that can deal damage to enemy base shields just to name a few. The trick is that you have to keep enemies away from a Ghost long enough for your own allies to take control. You also have to be mindful that for every enemy defeated it feeds the nearest enemy controlled Ghost causing more enemies to constantly spawn until you take it over.
The farther you get in the game you are gradually introduced to all the different types of troops as well as the troop management system that uses Mana or magic to be utilized via your own Master Ghost. Everything in Guilty Gear 2 –Overture- happens in real time with the exception being able to pause the game mid-fight via the Organ feature allowing you to manage troops as well as items in the heat of battle. This feature is particularly useful when things aren’t going quite as planned. Each defeat of your character caused you to be resurrected by your Master Ghost with the downside of your Master Ghost’s life bar being reduced each time this happens. If your base’s life bar is depleted either by repeated personal deaths or by enemy attacks it means mission over. Each mission has its own set of win/fail conditions to be sure to pay attention to what they are.
One of the thing that I recognized about Guilty Gear 2 –Overture- on PC right away is that it was definitely designed around a controller. While it is not impossible to play with a keyboard and mouse I would still recommend a gamepad like an Xbox controller to play this title. It made things significantly easier in the long run especially since it didn’t require looking online for the keyboard configuration layout to figure out what keys did what. This may also come in handy when taking things online to compete with up to 3 other people in either teams or solo combat unless you’re a keyboard ninja. I tried my hand at some online matches and let me tell you some of the fans on there are crazy good though I did manage to squeak by with some victories from time to time.
One of the things I’ve always liked about the Guilty Gear series is the combat animations and over course the soundtracks. Guilty Gear 2 –Overture- carries on the tradition in both areas remarkably well. Overture features a wicked rock and metal fueled score that can be heard throughout the whole experience and it drives the action just like it did with the 2D fighters before it. As I mentioned before I really liked the visual style and animations that the 2D fighters possessed and that too has carried over into the 3D realm which is awesome. I really liked that we get to see Sol and crew’s character designs from other angles as well as some new wickedly cool looking enemies. The downside is that the environments don’t always live up to the same level of polish the characters do. Some of the environments do look really good particularly in story driven moments but other not so much.
Guilty Gear 2 –Overture- is definitely a change of pace of sorts for the Guilty Gear franchise and for the most part I really liked it. There are some highs and lows with the graphics and while the RTS elements make for an interesting gameplay experience I sometime found that I didn’t have to rely on my allies nearly as much as I think was intended. There were times where I could clear the main objective with relative ease with sheer force with little aid outside of control points while other times, strategy seem more pertinent to the mission. Near the end of the game I did find myself going all out offensively pretty much singlehanded in almost true Dynasty Warrior style for much of the finale.
In the end Guilty Gear 2 –Overture- was a welcome experience that Arc System Works largely succeeded in creating something that took the series in a new direction but still retained much of the Guilty Gear essence that I’m used to. While I did get to see a cooler version of Sol this time around he and the others still very much have their signature skills and better still personalities intact. The relationship rivalry between Sol and Ky is still very much present here and that’s one of the many things I really like about Guilty Gear 2 –Overture-. If you’re a fan of the Guilty Gear series than you have to check out this new take on your beloved characters in Guilty Gear 2 –Overture- for PC today.
