Defined as it is by technology’s inexorable march, the videogame industry is constantly in flux. Anything that can withstand its caprices for a quarter of a century, then, is doing something right. The western launch of Dynasty Warriors 9 Empires comes two weeks ahead of the 25-year anniversary of the original game’s Japanese release – a landmark that few who played that game at launch could have ever imagined.
Omega Force’s has been with the series since directing 2000’s , which abandoned its predecessor’s one-on-one fighting series that has adopted such a formula. Barring one or two exceptions, it has occupied its own niche, essentially having a genre all to itself. In fact, the genre is often referred to by its western fans as ‘musou’, a nod to ’ Japanese name. Suzuki nods towards Capcom’s as one potential rival, but says “we haven’t heard much from it lately”. It’s no exaggeration: the west hasn’t seen a new entry in that series for more than a decade, and only mobile spin-offs mean it still has any sort of presence in Japan.
