Genji: Dawn of the Samurai is the first project from Game Republic, a development company founded by former Capcom executive Yoshiki Okamoto. If you’ve played any of Capcom’s Onimusha games, the connection is immediately obvious as Genji looks and feels very similar to Onimusha. If you’re a fan of flashy action and Japanese mythology, you’ll be happy to hear that Genji hasn’t strayed from its path. Unfortunately, this path is short and ends just as things get really interesting.

The Tale of Genji has a mythological theme revolving around a rare magical stone called Tenhagane. These stones grant the wearer the power of Kamuy, allowing a single fighter to defeat dozens of opponents in an instant. The game is set in late 13th century Japan, when a powerful warrior family called the Taira clan ruled the country. Taira generals are given god-like powers thanks to the Tenko they wield, allowing them to slaughter resistance with ease. As you might imagine, the Taira clan are not always friendly and fair rulers. The Taira clan are searching for all Tenko to become even more powerful and achieve immortality and absolute domination. That’s simply not possible, so you must set out to liberate Japan from the clutches of power-hungry tyrants.

The protagonist of the game is Yoshitsune, a young warrior with his own Tenhagane. Your mission is to find all remaining Tenhagane and use them to end the rule of the Taira clan. In your quest, you’ll face battles with many faceless thugs and powerful bosses, but the more Tenhagane you collect, the stronger your power will become. Early in the game, you meet Benkei, a hulking, stocky monk determined to defeat the Taira clan with a very large, overwhelming weapon. Benkei will support you in battle, and you can switch between the two characters at certain points in the game. Which warrior you choose is mostly a matter of preference. However, you may need Benkei’s strength or Yoshitsune’s agility to reach certain areas or find hidden items. For example, there may be a sturdy door in the game that Yoshitsune cannot open, but Benkei can easily push it open.

Since this is a simple action game, you’ll spend most of your time killing drones, collecting treasure, and fighting a series of awesome bosses. Genji’s combat is extremely satisfying, and the fact that you can switch between two different characters makes it even better. Combat controls are simple but effective; pressing the Square button will land simple hits that can be chained together into combos, while the Triangle button will land powerful blows. There are also jump attacks, and holding down one of the punch buttons when using certain weapons will allow you to perform an attack that deals a lot of damage, but leaves you vulnerable during the attack.

Combat is fast, spectacular, and fun. You can slice enemies in half, knock them off bridges, or send them flying with a single swing of Benkei’s club. Benkei can actually rip an enemy’s torso from the legs, but the animation is the same as when Yoshitsune cuts an enemy in half. These effects are over the top and ridiculous, but they effectively reinforce the illusion that you’re a badass warrior who can take down dozens of bad guys without batting an eyelid.

The best part about Genji’s battles is the power of Kamui. As you kill enemies, your Tenkou charges up. Once your energy bar is full, you can activate Kamui Power by tapping L1. This essentially slows down time and sharpens your reflexes. When you do this, all enemies in the area will attack. When the right time to attack is right, a small square button icon will appear at the bottom of the screen. If you press the square button before the symbol disappears, you can avoid the enemy attack and launch a powerful counterattack of your own. This can be difficult, as some enemies are faster than others. Sometimes you only have a split second to press the button, so you have to pay more attention to the enemy’s attack animations instead of relying solely on the icon. Getting the timing right can be difficult at first, but once you get it, dodging and countering multiple attacks in succession can be an exciting and rewarding experience. Most enemies will die from one of these counters, but defeating a boss may require a sequence of six or more of these evasive hits.

As you fight you gain experience, improving your health, defense and attack stats. You can also earn and find Tenko Essences as you play; collecting three will increase the level of either attribute. Yoshitsune and Benkei earn experience points independently, so neglecting one of them will leave them weaker in comparison. Killing multiple enemies in succession creates combos. Combining multiple kills will give you an experience bonus for your efforts. In addition to gaining experience and strengthening your character, at each level you can find all kinds of items, weapons, and armor that will greatly improve your character. You can also bring some of these items to a blacksmith to have them crafted for you, provided you have all the necessary materials.

The only problem with Genji’s combat is that it happens so quickly that you always want to see more. The pace of the game is interrupted by frequent in-game cutscenes. The cutscenes are adequate, but they occur so frequently that they detract from the gameplay. It can sometimes feel like you have to watch three or four cutscenes during a 10-minute gameplay. This isn’t a glaring issue, but it’s frustrating when a fight ends as quickly as it began.

Cutscenes are great, as long as the story is interesting enough to justify them. Unfortunately, Genji’s story isn’t particularly compelling, and the game ends just as it begins to get interesting. The game can easily be completed in under seven hours, but considering that the game contains over an hour of cutscenes, Genji feels too short. Beating the game unlocks two new difficulty levels, as well as a New Game Plus mode that lets you start the game from the beginning while retaining all your stats and items, but these bonuses don’t do much to increase the game’s replay value, since you’ve already seen everything there is to see on your first playthrough.

You’ll love Genji’s graphics and art design, however, as it is excellent. The characters and environments have a distinctly Japanese feel, with elaborately dressed characters, ornate environments, and mysterious otherworldly realms. Most levels are completely non-interactive, but provide excellent backdrops against which to battle groups of enemies or one of the game’s many supernatural bosses. The world is filled with spectacular landscapes, including shimmering koi ponds, crumbling ruins, misty waterfalls, and forested paths teeming with colorful vegetation. The characters are also quite detailed. All of the armor you wear is beautifully rendered, with ornate designs and bright colors that look fantastic. The problem with such great imagery is that while you want to see it in person, you can’t because the game uses a fixed camera angle. You have no control over the camera, and the view often changes in a pretty jerky way as you move from one screen to the next. It can also be frustrating when you get stuck in shadow or far away during combat and the camera angle prevents you from seeing what’s going on. Another graphics issue comes in the form of frame rate drops in Genji. When there are 3 or 4 enemies on screen, or a huge boss, the game will often slow down for a few seconds. This doesn’t happen all the time, and it’s sometimes covered up by a slow-motion effect, but when it does happen, you’ll definitely notice it.

This game also sounds great. There’s a ton of dialogue in the game, and it’s all in Japanese and subtitled in English to ensure authenticity. The music in Genji is perfect for the theme. The fully orchestrated score has a powerful, dramatic sound that sounds like something you’d hear in a big-budget movie. The sound effects work well, but aren’t particularly memorable; you won’t be rocked by loud explosions, but sword slashes, footsteps, and ambient sounds all blend together perfectly.

This is a decent first for Game Republic, but it doesn’t stand out compared to other third-person action games. The story isn’t particularly compelling, and the characters aren’t developed enough to really care about. Genji looks and sounds great, and the game mechanics are solid enough, but the game is too short to be worth more than a rental.