Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams Critic Reviews

It's a welcome change and breathes new life into the Onimusha franchise.

It's fun, lengthy, beautiful, and really, really satisfying.

The franchise’s grandest adventure yet, hands down. A few minor quibbles are the only flaws in what is an absolutely masterful action-RPG/adventure epic.

The story itself is pretty good and is even more fantasy based than before (the first three Onimusha games actually had more historical basis to them), though it does suffer a little bit from lack of clarity every now and then.

A great samurai action-adventure. It is fast, stylish, entertaining and has a good story to boot. What more could you ask? The camera is far from perfect, though.

As a whole, Dawn of Dreams is a truly skillful entry in the series. It's a great fresh start with new characters, gameplay, and ideas.

With a lengthy quest (about 20 hours), a fun multiplayer mode, and scores of unlockable goodies (including some of the coolest alternate costumes ever), there is a lot to enjoy here. And don't let any talk about rejuvenating the franchise scare you away. This game more than lives up to the Onimusha name.

With plenty of action, great visuals, lots of replay value and overall refinement, this is a winner both for newcomers and fans of the series. And while the game wraps up pretty cleanly, there's plenty of material for another adventure.

Even with these few select caveats, Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams is a stellar addition to the series and a new beginning for Capcom's fourth largest franchise. One has to wonder with all the multiplayer RPG aspects, will there be an online Onimusha title on the horizon.

A triumphant return to top form for the series and a very successful reinvention, making it arguably the best Onimusha yet.

By stepping from an action packed exploration and puzzle game into a full blown action title, Dawn of Dreams has managed to breathe new life into this series. I heartily recommend it.

Better than the games that came before it, and I don't make that statement blindly. The move towards an action RPG with more characters, a more twisty storyline with more threads and action that helps refresh the stuff that was starting to feel just a little stale in the past games (though slicing demons never really gets old) all add up to an adventure that I'm grateful actually happened.

The combination of great visuals and a sweet combat system is hard to top and this combines the two oh-so well.

Quite possibly the best game in the series, Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams delivers an enjoyably deep and epic action-adventure game fans new and old will relish.

Great, fast gameplay, good story, nice cinematics, a wide variety of characters, and much more. The game is good at every level.

Action hounds, for instance, should go crazy over its combat, cool combos, and boss battles, while proper Onimusha fans should dig it because of improvements to the puzzle and camera systems.

Onimusha was one derivative sequel away from entering the "Tomb Raider" spiral of franchise death. Instead a timely revamp has sent the series in a promising direction and given it more momentum than it's had in years.

Boasting two discs worth of content, this is the longest offering yet from the Onimusha team, and there’s a lot to like about it. The only caveat would be that gamers tired of the series won’t find much to rekindle their interest here. It’s bigger and a bit more complex than before, but it’s still Onimusha.

Though the formula for destruction is basically the same, there's enough new material here to please fans of the series and newcomers alike. Who knew this old samurai could cut so deep?

Offers a lengthy new quest, five different playable characters, and a good amount of replay value, not to mention that distinct anime-meets-soap opera style.