A real contender for the arena?
I was quite impressed with Calamity Trigger, so my hopes for Continuum Shift were quite high…but were they too high?
Well maybe, but Continuum Shift is a decent sequel that improves upon its predecessor with a great story mode, dozens of fighters and combos and all the bells and whistles you’ve come to expect from beat-em-ups like arcade modes and online play. There are some other modes like Legion which is the compelling single-player mode from Calamity Trigger Portable. In it you recruit fighters to your army and take territory from your opponent in an enhanced version that features new, more complex maps.
There are 7 new fighters and 15 new stages to fight on, which is pretty impressive in itself. Although the real beauty with BlazBlue has been how seamless the characters look, even for a 2D game…it looks damn good. It might have been nice for them to upgrade the engine a bit from the last game, but it still looks decent.
Each character fights differently as you would expect, but it’s all balanced very well. The story mode is decent, although there’s perhaps too much dialogue in it for my liking…it just seems to drag on and on when you just want to fight. I did come across a little bit of lag while playing online, but it’s not nearly as bad as some of the online fighters I’ve played this year.
The Verdict
So, overall there is a wealth of new content and more to be added through DLC, but it does feel a bit too familiar and that’s why the score is a little on the low side. I would have marked it higher if the game changed the genre, but it does feel samey…despite still being an excellent fighter. I’d still highly recommend it though, especially to those who are looking for their next fighting fix…
