Onimusha Tactics - The tactics of the samurai

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Hello everyone! Here I come with yet one more entry of my blog. After the game inspired in the tale of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms from the last entry, in this entry we are going to switch back once again to the Tactic RPG genre, and just like with Tingle´s Rosy Rupeeland and Valyrie Profile Covenant of the Plume, I’m going to talk about a game that belongs to a relatively well-known series in the industry (although it has been missing for quite a few years now) and that went relatively unnoticed at the moment of its released. However, I do believe the game had enough equality to be considered as one of the best titles in the genre at the moment. The game is called Onimusha Tactics. Let’s see what this Tactic RPG game based on Capcom’s popular samurai and demon franchise has to offer.

Developed by Capcom and published in 2003 exclusively for Nintendo’s Game Boy Advanced in Japan, North America and Europe, Onimusha Tactics is a spin-off of the Onimusha franchise born in the PlayStation 2 and an attempt from Capcom to bring the franchise to the Tactical RPG genre. Just like in the case of Sega and their fighting game Blade Arcus, of which I talked about a few entries back, maybe some could be surprised to see an RPG game from Capcom, but actually this is not the contact of Osaka’s video games giant with the genre, since years before they had already worked in the Breath of Fire series, a game that became one of the classics of the golden era of the JRPG genre, especially during the times of the Super Nintendo, although the series gradually faded away from Capcom’s plans till it was finally abandoned after its fifth installment in PlayStation 2 until it’s recent comeback as an MMORPG in 2016. Onimusha Tactics is a game that follows on the steps of other Japanese classics of the Tactic RPG genre such as Final Fantasy Tactics or Tactics Ogre. The story of Onimusha Tactics follows the same arc as that of its older brother in the PlayStation 2. The story puts us in the role of Onimaru, a young man that belongs to a famous clan in the feudal Japan. The dreadful Nobunaga Oda has come back from among the death with an army of demons know as the genma and plans to take over the whole world. Onimaru will soon discover that his clan’s only destiny and purpose has always been to stop with the demonic menace, and so Onimaru accepts his destiny and sets on a journey to finish off Nobunaga and his evil forces once and for all with the help of other brave warriors that will join him along the way. The story of Onimusha won’t be remembered as one of the best, but it does a good job in bringing the adventure forward.

Regarding the gameplay of the title, as I was saying before, Onimusha Tactics follows the guidelines established by other previous classics of the genre such as the already mentioned Final Fantasy Tactics. However, compared to Square Enix´s title, Onimusha Tactics is a much more simple game when it comes to gameplay mechanics. Just like in many other Japanese Tactic RPG games, in Onimusha Tactics we will progress on a linear manner through the world map, but this time around we won’t be visiting any towns, instead of that, we will travel directly from one battlefield to another. Once we are in the battlefield, the first thing we will have to do is selecting the heroes that will participate in the battle. Once we do this, the battle itself will start. The battles will take place in maps displayed in an isometric camera and will be divided in a grid, but opposite to what we see in many other Tactic RPG games in which the turns alternate as both sides take an action with one of their characters, in Onimusha Tactics turns will switch only when one of the sides has carried an action will all of their characters. Once is our turn, we will have to select our characters and their destinations in order to move them around the map. Once we finished moving around (or not moving if we prefer so), we will be able to select from the typical options of attack, skill and item in order to perform an action with our characters. Depending on the type of weapon of our character, we will be able to attack just to the enemies right next to our character or those that are several squares away, thus we have that, for example, those characters equipped with a katana will only be able to attack to the enemies standing right next to them, while those characters equipped with a weapon like a bow will be able to attack to the enemies that are located several squares away from them. As you can see, Onimusha Tactics follows one by one all the guidelines that most Tactic RPG games follow. However, opposite to what we see in the already mentioned Final Fantasy and Tactics Ogre, Onimusha Tactics lacks a series of gameplay features that keep its gameplay from being as deep and complex as the one we can see in other games, like for example the complete lack of a job system that allow us to customize and adapt the characters to our needs, or the impossibility of inflicting additional damage when attacking from the flank or the rearguard. Things like these will make the game much easier to assimilate for those with less experience in the genre. However, this could end up making the game a little bit too simple for the most veterans. Finally, Onimusha Tactics includes an item creation system that will allow us to create our own equipment for our characters. As I was saying before, in Onimusha Tactics there aren´t villages or shops, as the story will be narrated via conversations between the characters before and after each battle, so it will be up to us to create the equipment our character will need for the battles. Every time we defeat an enemy, we will obtain materials that we will be able to use to create items once we obtain first the necessary recipe to do so, which we will also be able to obtain by defeating certain enemies.

As for the graphics of the title, the game displays nice graphics, especially if we keep in mind that we are talking about a game from 2003 and for a platform such as the Game Boy Advanced. The sprites of the characters are really well done and display a fair amount of details for this type of game. However, the animations are rather limited, although it is true that is something that happens quite often in the genre. The stages in which the battles will take place are well done, although sometimes the design can be a little bit too simple.


Overall, Onimusha Tactics is a good Tactic RPG and a more than laudable attempt from Capcom to enter this popular subgenre of the RPG games, although the game never reaches the level of excellence achieved by the titans of the genre. As it always happens with this kind of game, this game was released just in English and Japanese, so certain command of either of those languages is required in order to be able to enjoy the title at its full, and on top of this, coming along a copy (in good condition) can be a bit expensive, but if you are looking for a new Tactic RPG game, perhaps you should give a chance to Onimusha Tactics, is not the most innovative example of the genre, but all it does it does it well, delivering a solid experience that will surely please the fans of the genre. Enjoy!


GAMEPLAY VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k13Ts8E_tvs