izigame.me

Finally, a proper Bleach game after so long! The last time I played a good Bleach title was back on the PlayStation 2 and PSP, so it's been a while. I've only played a bit so far. Time hasn't been on my side—and the game was crashing at first due to an unauthorized memory access issue, but I eventually found a workaround pretty easily.
Anyway, I’ll keep this brief: the game is simply amazing. The visual quality, combat mechanics, and music are all top-notch. Character designs look great, and you can shop for booster items similar to what you'd find in Dragon Ball games, like dealing extra damage, more defense, or recovering HP while standing still, etc. The game plays like an arena-style fighter, where you’re locked inside a large circular space. You can move freely within it, and the boundaries are big enough that they’re hardly noticeable—at least they weren’t for me, as I was still learning the ropes.
Each character has some form of release state, like Bankai for Soul Reapers or Vollständig for Quincies (Quincy actually—don’t expect a huge roster here). The character selection is honestly pretty disappointing. I was expecting way more characters, especially side characters, Arrancar, Espada, and Quincies and so on. There are no Bounts in it. Hopefully, future titles will expand on this. After all, this is the first modern 3D Bleach game in a long time. Even the character outfits are limited—only four options—and I didn’t notice much difference between them. During character selection, you only see the upper body, so when I got two pink outfits for instance, I couldn’t even tell them apart.
Voice acting is mostly stellar, with a few exceptions. For example, Yasutora Sado (Chad) didn’t sound quite right to me. Maybe it’s the original voice actor, but something felt off. Everyone else sounded like their usual selves, unless I missed something?
Now for combat, it's fantastic. Animations, effects, and voice lines during special moves gave me actual goosebumps. It's so cool. Yoruichi, in particular, is incredibly satisfying to use! She’s an absolute beast in this game and I am sure everyone got a favorite. If your favorite is an Arrancar, there is a high chance it might not be in the game (yet). My second favorite is not. :(
Now here’s what I don’t like: movement and some of the controls. Sprinting requires you to hold a button down (A), and even then it still feels slow. I was expecting movement similar to Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2, where you can dash or flash step around freely as long as you have stamina. Blocking and countering are mapped to separate buttons, which feels a bit awkward. Counters also vary by character. Some trigger instantly, others have a delay with a flashy animation (so that might be why). For instance, Yoruichi dashes toward enemies, while others do different things like spinning or slashing, or leaning. By default, every character walks slowly—painfully slow. Dashing doesn't seem to consume any resources, so it feels unnecessary to walk. Flash Step (basically teleporting behind opponents like in Xenoverse) does require a gauge and has a short cooldown, but it’s limited to just one or two uses before needing to recharge. It’s possible this gets better with progression or gear upgrades in other modes. I’m still early in the game, so I didn't pay much attention yet. Anyway, Flash Steps seems more like an Escape/Evasive skill rather than an all-time move. Like in Xenoverse 2 for instance when using a guard shield that consume your stamina. So the game wants you to use the pink counter attack input instead which is just like Flash Step if you do it in time.
Now, the story... it's bad. I ended up skipping most cutscenes. They're long, filled with slow dialogue about past events or character motivations. I wouldn’t mind that if something happened during the scenes, but it's just static shots of a character standing there, mouth moving, eyes blinking, for like five minutes. It’s lazy. I know some people might say I’m being harsh, but seriously, add camera angles, show other characters reacting, give the speaker something to do. Right now, it gives off major Jump Force flashbacks... and not in a good way. That game sucked. Thankfully, the in-battle animations are absolutely incredible—cinematic, fluid, and way more engaging than the actual story scenes. That contrast is wild, but at least the gameplay delivers.
That’s all for now! I hope this review was helpful. I may update it in the future once I’ve had more time to dig deeper into the game. And honestly, I am looking forward for some improvements or maybe an open-world version similar to Dragon Ball Xenoverse or KAKAROT in the future! That would be awesome.