During the holiday season, we're republishing some of the best articles from Nintendo Life writers and contributors as part of our Best in 2024 series. Enjoy!
Soapbox features allow our individual writers and contributors to voice their opinions on hot topics and random things they've been chewing on. Today, Alana talks about Vanillaware's old game — Muramasa: The Demon Blade, a Wii title celebrating its 15th anniversary. And after the success of 13 Sentinels and Unicorn Overlord, it's time to give Vanillaware's older title some love.
Vanillaware was almost everywhere. He visited magical, mystical worlds from storybooks Odin's Sphere. He repeatedly returned to the medieval, warlike world History of the great knights and Unicorn Overlord. It was 1980s Japan in 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rome. We were even able to go to witch school thanks to GrimGrimoire. But despite the wide selection of delicately painted and beautiful worlds, I always look back most fondly to Edo Japan.
It was love at first sight with Muramasa: The Demon Blade, the developer's second title on a Nintendo system after the Japanese exclusive where are you on DS. It's not the most unique game in Vanillaware's library, nor is it the most complicated. But it's a damn good time that, with the recent success of 13 Sentinels and Unicorn Overlord, deserves its moment in the (rising) sun.
Muramasa: The Demon Blade has a lot in common with Metroidvanias (advancement behind skills/weapons, an interconnected map, some light platforming), but the gameplay is more focused on combat than deep exploration or secrets. The two main characters — Kisuke, an amnesiac ninja whose only memory is that he must steal a certain katana; and Momohime, a princess possessed by the spirit of a criminal rōnin—play identically and explore essentially the same map. But the intertwining stories and gritty and challenging combat kept me coming back for more.
Aside from Vanillaware's stunning art style — which shines best when running through reed-covered fields drenched in a beautiful blood-red sunset or climbing through the honey-colored clouds of Takamagahara — Muramasa's standout feature is, as mentioned, its combativeness. This is an action RPG that you control by using one button for single attacks and combos and holding it down to dash around the screen. It's incredibly simple yet stylish, especially when combined with Vanillaware's watercolor sheen.
Bora comes in the form of a weapon. you have a huge a weapon tree where, from the three starting blades, you can forge various 'Demon Blades' to use during gameplay. You can equip three different swords at once and switch between them during combat. There are two types of swords — blades, which are short and fast, and long blades, larger, heavier and more powerful weapons. Each sword has its own stats, but you can't stick to just one. Your swords also have Soul Power, which is spent either by blocking attacks, dealing damage, or using the Secret Weapon Art — an extremely powerful attack that, again, varies from weapon to weapon. If the sword's soul power is completely depleted, the weapon is temporarily corrupted.
This is where weapon swapping comes in handy. Sheathing the blade and drawing other weapons will allow other swords to restore their soul power. Additionally, drawing another with a full soul power meter will trigger an attack that hits every enemy on screen. Don't tell me you've never seen a samurai movie where a warrior pulls out a blade and instantly decimates an entire room and never wanted to pull it off. It's as cool here as any show or movie I've ever seen.
For me 'collecting' is swords the draw. I want to see every secret art and find that combination of three weapons that works for me. Hell Spinner, for example, is an extremely fast horizontal spin that destroys enemies on the ground, while Wind is an aerial vertical spin. Faerie Bolt allows you to have two electric orbs surround your character for a limited time, protecting you and dealing damage on contact. Earth Runner is a relentless onslaught of sword stabs. Weaving a mix of light and heavy swords with defensive skills and fast offensive skills is my favorite way.
Even if the combat is simple on the surface, I still love running into each horde of enemies as I explore Honshu and the 16 provinces. A group of seven ninjas might halt my progress as I run through the Owari rain forests, but gosh, it's fun to juggle them in the air and jump across the screen, taking them down one by one — or sometimes all in one fell swoop.
The combat really shines during Muramasa's incredible boss battles. Many of them are visual spectacles that require a mixture of patience and aggression; learning the pattern of enemy attacks and animations and punishing them at the right moment feels incredibly useful. Ippondatara is one of the biggest in the game — a giant monster that towers above the clouds, you have to chop it in the legs before climbing up and grabbing onto its fists, all while deflecting projectiles with perfectly timed sword slashes. Then you have to fight him in boar form, where he is helpless and does no damage. Turns out he was just trying to keep the hot spring to himself.
While the fights with giant demons, giant spiders, or even the storm god himself, Raijin, are incredibly memorable, the best (as with many action games) are the fights with another person. In Kisuke's story, he must fight the woman he loves most in the world, Torahime. Commanding an army of undead soldiers and riding atop his skeleton, ghostly horse, Torahime rushes to the other side of the bamboo thicket, commanding his soldiers to fight Kisuke. Then you have to hunt her down, avoiding her arrows by deflecting them or hiding behind bamboo. It's not a particularly difficult fight — especially compared to some of the later battles — but the sheer spectacle, the narrative revelations that come afterward, and the fact you're fighting a badass warrior princess on a dead horse make it pretty damn awesome.
Some of those tougher fights—like the final bosses, or even the Wanyuudo flame wheel on Momohime's side—reveal the beauty and balance of Muramasa's combat. If you're smart with your weapon choices and know when to block, you can get incredibly satisfying combos and wins out of these encounters. But there are also Caves of Evil scattered across the map. These unlockable challenges throw enemies and boss encounters at you in a short gauntlet, and get harder the later you get into the game. These “caves” can be found on dead tree trunks you'll discover as you explore, and they're locked behind different colored barriers — meaning you need to acquire certain swords, usually from story bosses, to even tackle them.
Trials like the Light Blue one that forces you to tackle seven samurai (ha!) enemies at once test your patience and your ability to break through enemy guards. The earlier one, locked behind a green barrier, pits you against poison-inducing enemies. There's also a challenge where you have to re-challenge a boss from earlier in Kisuke's playthrough — except this time, there are four of them. The variety here once again tests your knowledge, and while it keeps you coming back (I mean, it has some Metroidvania DNA), who can complain about running through these beautiful locations every time? Not me.
With Vanillaware getting more attention than ever these days, I really wish Muramasa: The Demon Blade was an easier approach. You can only officially play this game on Wii right now or the PlayStation Vita — which is admittedly a far better version with better localization and four DLC episodes with new characters and playstyles (one of which has you playing as a cat). Company president George Kamitani said he wanted to port the game to modern platforms — and by God Muramasa would look good on the Switch OLED — but said “there are issues.”
Having played multiple Vanillaware titles, it's fun to see the common DNA in every single game despite how many genre differences there are in the developer's library. Brawler-style action fighting Dragon's Crown is in Muramasa, and almost every game has multiple stories that intertwine with each other.
Muramasa: The Demon Blade might be Vanillaware's simplest title and doesn't defy many genre conventions like its other games do, but do I fondly miss the days of running through snowy mountains, hacking your way through the depths of Hell and forging a legendary sword? Of course I want to.
Have you ever played Muramasa: The Demon Blade? Want to see the game on Switch (or modern platforms)? Let us know below!
