LET IT RIP! Yes we all know what that means (at least those of us into anime) it is another Beyblade videogame! This is the latest installment on the Beyblade franchise, we speak of Beyblade: Metal Masters for the Nintendo DS.
This anime is no stranger to the videogame world and has been present on almost every console, Gameboy Color, Gameboy Advance, Playstation and many more.
Story
Beyblade: Metal Masters is the second in the Metal series of the anime, Ginak and his team of Beybladers are invited to join a tournament but something seems odd, it is held on a cemetery and many contestants are losing their energy and can’t use Beyblade anymore.
What is the mystery behind this fishy tourney? Find out by defeating rival enemies and making it to the finals!
How a villain plans to conquer the world by using Beyblades beats me, but hey everything goes in anime!
Gameplay
If you played previous Beyblade instalments you know the jazz, if not well the game mechanics are quite simple to be honest, imagine a sort of advanced spin (called Beyblade), and the goal is to destroy your opponent’s Beyblade or take it out of the ring, simple enough?
Beyblades can be highly customizable with different rings to get more power, speed or balance, it all depends on your gameplay style really. Also Beyblades has different special attacks depending the character you chose to play as, some are weaker than others but does not mean they are bad, as i said before it is up to you, your skills, gameplay style and the Beyblade you build in the end what really matters.
The game has a few game modes for you to play with, Arcade (the storyline), here you can fight against teams from the anime while you unlock additional characters to use in your team and new Beyblade parts.
Missions; which are more a sort of tutorial and battles to win in which you will unlock special attacks and new Beyblades for your collection for a total of 100 missions.
Multiplayer; you can play and battle against other players via local multiplayer which is a cool feature, it is always fun to play with friends.
There are a total of 24 achievements you will unlock by playing the game, a gallery to see your parts collection and some other little things but nothing impressive to comment.
Graphics 7.5/10
As usual the main issue with the graphics is the DS screen isn’t the best around, other than that the Beyblades looks great in 3D and the 2D style anime graphics are eye candy, this of course if you like this show.
Sound 6.5/10
Can say they could have been better, sounds are pretty basic and there is not much variety on the soundtrack.
Downsides
Arcade feels extremely short, this was a major letdown as i expected more hours of gameplay and of the storyline, developers should put a bit more of care. Even as a DS game aimed for a younger audience giving players a videogame that won’t end in the bookshelf after a week would be mroe than welcome.
There are no cutscenes, not even a cool opening video, something that could be good to have, as an anime fan i was expecting to see that as i turned on the DS, alas there was none.
Overall
Have to admit i enjoyed Beyblade: Metal Masters, i am a fan of the anime and like the franchise, the gameplay is good but extremely short. Although i liked the game this may not be a title everyone will enjoy, mainly fans.
If you like the show and love Beyblade then this game is definitely worth to have in your collection (specially the Special Edition with Beyblade included), otherwise you may want to stay away of it as you may feel dissapointed… LET IT RIP!
We give the game a 6.5 out of 10
**A review copy was provided by the publisher for this review
~Mario
