We play for more than an hour and a half to One Punch Man: A Hero Nobody Knows, the game based on the homonymous manganime, for PC, PS4 and Xbox One.
Saitama and the other heroes of the manganime One Punch Man will arrive this February 28, 2020 to our PCs and PS4 and Xbox One consoles by Spike Chunsoft. Thanks to Bandai Namco, we have been able to play One Punch Man: A Hero Nobody Knows for more than an hour and a half, an action and fight title that will bring together all the famous manga and anime characters of mangaka ONE in order to discover more than we saw in the closed beta. We remember that in this event we were also able to get under the command of Captain Tsubasa: Rise of New Champios, the new game of Oliver and Benji.
Creating our hero: personalization with touches of humor
The first thing we find at the beginning of the title at hand is a character editor with many options at our disposal. We can select different faces, complexions, sizes of main body parts and more in order to shape what we will take as the protagonist in Story Mode that invites us to play “A Hero Nobody Knows”.
The really remarkable thing comes at the time of dressing and putting on accessories, since we find a wide range of suits that will remind us of the looks of the recognized characters of the manganime. As for these accessories, we can place them in a crazy and incomprehensible way by our body in order to bring a touch of extra humor to the appearance of our hero or heroine. For example, we can carry a backpack on the head or glasses on the legs, since the accessories are not limited to their logical placement.
The beginning of Story Mode: a city to defend
Once we have our protagonist created, we can enjoy the first introductory scene of the game. A criminal is beating us up and, just at the moment he intends to end our life, Saitama's shining bald spot appears to stop the blow. Undeterred, the invincible hero ends our attacker and welcomes us to the city. A place where crime is at ease and many heroes are required to end all the evils that seek to sow chaos.
After this cinematic, we will arrive at the Association of Heroes and will give us the first indications to move around the city. What we must do is basically accept various missions in order to help local citizens, while learning the fundamentals of fighting. As we progress in the history of the game we can unlock new areas of the city in order to explore it, in addition to obtaining our own apartment, which we can decorate to our liking.
In addition to main missions they will also propose a series of secondary tasks that will provide us with various rewards upon completion. We were able to try a couple of them during the demo and the truth is that their level of simplicity disappointed us. These are the typical orders based on taking something from point A to point B or ending up with a certain villain. Of course, the complexity and interest of these side missions could improve as the history of the title progresses.
As for the battles, at least the ones we could play in the time we were testing the Story Mode, they are much simpler than those of the Versus Mode. The reason is because we will be "alone in the face of danger" and we will have to fight alone against various villains. Of course, at the start of the fight we will see a counter that marks several seconds and decreases until it approaches zero, provided that in doing so a hero arrives to help us.
If it's Saitama, you can hit our enemies and with a single touch they will die and the fight will end instantly. However, the protagonist of the manganime is usually busy, so the heroes who will come to our meeting are somewhat weaker and will join in support of our fights. Thus, we can press L1 (in the case of the PS4 version we tested) in order to alternate between the hero and our protagonist.
Versus mode: frantic 3 vs 3 fights
In order to delve deeper into the operation of battles, we must mention Versus Mode. We can access it at any time from the Association of Heroes in order to dispute battles embodying the characters we know of the manganime. Genos, Terrible Tornado, Infernal Blizzard, Silver Fang, Infernal Bat, Stinger, Spring Mostacho, Mumen Rider and many more. We will find many of them in the Story Mode and they will even come to our aid in the aforementioned fights in which a hero comes to our aid.
In Versus Mode we form a team of 3 fighters to face an enemy group with the same number of members. Once on the battlefield, we find a fairly simple combat system in which we must execute punches such as punches and kicks, in addition to defending ourselves and dodging the attacks that the enemies try to fit us. Each character has unique attacks and abilities, so the choice of fighter can go beyond our pre-established preference due to knowing them by the manganime.
As for Saitama, you can not choose to fight (since with a single touch the battles would end), but if we place it in the third position of our team we can activate the “arrival of the hero” system mentioned above. The time it takes to get Saitama can be reduced if we do combos and good shots. Once it appears on the battlefield, it will be won. Because of this point, our fighting strategy can be based on endurance and endurance until Saitama arrives and helps us win the match.
On the other hand, in most fights random events such as volcanic eruptions can take place that make us dodge fireballs that rain from the sky. This brings some complexity to the clashes, since in addition to worrying about enemy attacks, we must also be aware of the dangers that occur on stage.
Graphical and technical sections that can be improved
The graphic section of the game is not particularly noteworthy, but rarely does a title with these characteristics seek to be. The character models are well accomplished, but the facial and body animations leave a lot to be desired. As for the movements in combat, they are fluid enough not to hinder the control of the characters but are not up to other current fighting titles.
When playing the title we did not find any bug or serious error, so the technical section of the game endures the type better. Of course, the loading screens seemed quite long and excessive and we experienced slight pulls of frames to fight and appear many movement effects and lights on the screen.
Definitely…
One Punch Man: A Hero Nobody Knows is a game that fans of the manganime starring Saitama will like. The fragment of the game that we had the opportunity to try did not seem especially remarkable, but with an hour and a half at the controls we cannot say that as the Story Mode progresses, it takes on more weight and interest. At the moment, the missions we could play seemed too simple and the battles of the Story Mode became repetitive after playing.
As for combat, once the controls are calm, it is fun especially in Versus Mode, since we can create our team of fighters by choosing our favorite characters from the saga. The addition of the mechanics of "the arrival of the hero" and the unique abilities of each fighter are interesting in order to bring some freshness to a battle system quite similar to any other fighting game.
On February 28, 2020 we can leave doubts and discover if One Punch Man: A Hero Nobody Knows ends up standing out as a great game based on a manganime or if instead it joins a wide list of games that remain at doors of a podium that is increasingly difficult to access.
