Nearly 30 years after the series first aired, Brave Soldiers recalls the most important fighters throughout the first three original manga arcs: the battle at Sanctuary, the scuffle against Poseidon and the holy war against Hades. The protagonist Bronze Saints, their fellow Gold Saints, Poseidon’s Generals and Hades’ most loyal servants alongside some reincarnated Gold Saints faking allegiance to the Underworld Ruler, totaling 59 fighters for an awesome roster.

Graphics: 9

In the midst of battle, the key factor in the game, graphics couldn’t be any better. The characters seem almost real, very loyal to their anime counterparts, something that not always happens in games inspired from an anime. Outside of battle it’s a different thing, mainly in Saint Chronicles, the game’s story mode. The cut-scenes before every fight show a little dialog, but the character’s figurines are out of place, being honest. Plus, they sometimes add a picture of the anime of the scene the dialog is focusing on, and in the very last episode, it clearly shows four characters that were left out of the roster, much to the fan’s dismay.

Sound: 10

By far the best aspect of the game relies on the audio. There’s only the original Japanese audio, with no option to any dub. Some people may disagree, but in reality, the Japanese audio is the most epic by far. The original attack names, the effort the voice actors put in… Magnificent. There’s also the point that some voice actors are the same as the very first anime, considering it aired in the mid 80s. True, Dragon Ball still has lots of the original voice actors, but this anime isn’t as popular as Dragon Ball, and seeing that many voice actors stay loyal to the series after so many years is delightful. Last, but not least, comes the music. In my opinion, the music isn’t needed while in the midst of battle, it deprives you of the awesome voices. As for the menu or cut-scenes, I prefer to shut it down, but nonetheless the music is very good, adding some more epicness to the battle for the Earth’s sake.

Addictiveness: 8

The game has a lot to offer: a story mode, a tournament mode with a lot of variants and rules, a survival mode… And there’s also the customization, available through orbs that can be equipped to your warrior to raise his/her power. Even if you don’t have anyone to play with, you can set your own personal challenges thanks to the huge character roster: enter a tournament with only characters from the Poseidon arc, enter with a warrior of a lower rank or even choose an armorless fighter and wreck anyone in your path!! If you do have someone to play with, then said challenges raise up to a new level. The only bad thing would be how fast and easy you can unlock all the fighters, but it’s a minor issue considering what lies ahead.

Story: 10

The story follows the original manga. You start in the first arc, which is the battle in Sanctuary against the Gold Saints. The Pope, second in command just below Athena herself, has betrayed his goddess, and vows to kill her to have her power for himself and conquer the world. You will take control of the Bronze Saints to defeat the Gold Saints under the Pope’s command one after another (even though not all of them are enemies). After the Pope has his evil within purified and comes to his senses, he commits suicide in atonement for his sins.

Right after this, Poseidon, who was awakened from his slumber, starts to flood the entire planet as he did in ancient times. Athena offers herself as a human sacrifice to spare the Earth momentarily, and her loyal Bronze Saints enter the fray once again (the Gold Saints being unable to act by the newly elected Pope’s orders), this time against the seven Marina Generals that guard the pillars which maintain the Underwater Sanctuary. One by one, the Generals are defeated, and in a miraculous bet, Athena is freed and manages to reseal Poseidon.

Then, the final battle ensues, as Hades deploys the resurrected Gold Saints in Sanctuary to kill Athena. All Gold Saints who perished in the first arc make a comeback, but two of them are taken out at the first battle against the Aries Gold Saint. The remaining three manage to evade the first house, but are seemingly killed in the fourth, although they disguised themselves as Specters that Hades had sent to supervise the Saints and continued on to the sixth house. There, the powerful Virgo Saint stalled them enough so the remaining Gold Saints could gather at the sixth house. Athena, however, was alerted by the Virgo Saint and learnt about the true intentions of the resurrected Saints, so she too committed suicide. Then, the previous Pope, who was the predecessor of the Aries Saint, claimed that they wanted to kill Athena to let her enter Hell and kill Hades personally, as his body is hidden there. Also, by using her blood, the former Pope resurrected Athena’s own cloth for her to wear in the battle, so the Bronze Saints are tasked with the mission of bringing Athena her cloth.

In the Underworld, many battles ensue: against Hades’ multiple Specters, two minor deities under Hades’ command like Thanatos (god of death) and Hypnos (god of sleep) and finally Hades himself. In the process, our Bronze Saints, thanks to the former Pope repairing their cloths with Athena’s blood, attain a power that rivals that of Gods, and Athena can fight and defeat Hades for good.

This is the story of the manga (the anime differs in the Hades arc), and this same story is reflected in Saint Chronicles. Obviously, not all characters in the manga are present here, but the main characters do, so you follow 90% of the original story without having even 90% of the characters. Very complete, isn’t it?

Depth: 7

The story is fairly large, although there aren’t that many battles as you would expect, just enough to be loyal to the series. There are also dozens of tournaments you can partake on, a challenging survival mode, and… Oh, nothing else, my bad. Well, the tournaments have different rules, and getting adapted to all of them isn’t easy. Sometimes you end a battle in 10 seconds and sometimes the 60 second limit isn’t enough to deplete half of the loser’s health bar, and all thanks to these rules. It gives a little variety to the game, and a bit of challenge.

Difficulty: 4

The game by itself isn’t difficult, but the lame part is that the tournaments are far more difficult than the story mode. I know, the special rules of some tournaments and all that… But the story mode is the most important, it can’t be easier than anything else, even if there are no special rules to make the battle more difficult, the opponent could at least have a harder difficulty setting, just because you are battling a god doesn’t mean it’s going to be difficult. Probably the weakest point of the whole game.

Overall: 8.5

I’m very pleased with the game overall. I last played a Saint Seiya game like 10 years ago in my cousin’s PS2, and only contained the first arc, so seeing this game take on its legacy and expanding the concept it’s amazing. There’s a sequel announced, and I can’t wait to get it, since it will have characters from the newest anime spin-off.

Positive:

-A huge character roster, Japanese voices and the main storyline adapted to the game’s story mode. The fan’s dreams just came true with all this.

Negative:

-The character roster isn’t perfect, half a dozen characters could have been included and 4-5 who were included could be taken out for not having an important role in the story.

-The attack selection isn’t the best, most prominently (but not exclusively) in the finisher Big Bang Attacks.

-The story mode could have an added difficulty other than normal battles against [insert fighter here].

-Stages could be wide open like in Dragon Ball instead of delimited quadrilaterals.