When I saw the trailer for Akane, I was intrigued because the game had a Kill Bill kind of vibe, and in a way, I was not disappointed. Akane brings a high octane hack and slash game that goes straight and to the point, wasting no time on a presentation or long cinematics. You are just instead shown a small dialogue box of Akane saying that she will die that night but that she is taking everyone with her…so badass.
One thing I recommend is that you do the well-done tutorial first because it not only explains the basics of combat, but it also serves as sort of a small intro about Akane’s past–but just a little. This is the one thing I don’t like about Akane. The lack of story let me down honestly because I’m all for killing all bad guys and all of that, but why did Akane choose to die fighting? What were the events that led up to this fateful night? If you are like me who loves a good story and has child-like curiosity, then these questions, unfortunately, won’t be answered.
Now, let’s talk about Akane’s saving grace, which is the gameplay itself. For the first part, the enemies are a lot, but they die either from one hit of your blade or a well placed shot in the head. This is good since you can take down several without much effort, but so does Akane. That one hit you are down approach makes for some heart-pounding moments as a player. As you might have guessed from my statement above, Akane is equipped with a Katana and a Gun. You can either do slashes with you Katana or shoot enemies down with your gun. However, you see fit with execution. It reminds me of a mechanic used in Hyper Light Drifter. In the aforementioned game, the gun’s bullets could be “reloaded” by defeating enemies with his sword. Here in Akane, the same concept is used. Once you use all your bullets in order to reload your gun, you need to kill enemies with the Sword. This sets up an interesting way of taking down enemies while maximizing damage and resources.
I like the objective-based gameplay Akane has. Before each run, you are presented with a series of objectives like kill one hundred enemies with your sword, or do a fifty kill combo (kills in succession), and so these objectives grant some rewards that you want to get your hands on. Completing these rewards on each run grant you equipment like different types of shoes (with some added bonus for some like increased walking speed or faster dash), more katanas to choose from (some unlock special skills), more guns (like the multiple bullet shotgun), gauntlets that offer different boons like more bullets per enemy killed, and bracelets and cigars (some offer boons some are purely aesthetic). So, it adds to the replayability of the game.
I also like the art style used and how clean and crisp the game looks. There is lot of neon and some of it adds to playing in the screens and the flashiness of Akane’s Dragon Slash and Dragon Slayer moves. The music could’ve been better, but the fun gameplay makes up for it.
Bottom Line: Akane shows that you don’t need to have multiple stages to duke it out to make a fun game. I was let down for the lack of story. I think that the game would’ve benefited from it and would help get the player get more engaged. If you are a fan of hack and slash games, definitely give Akane the chance.
A Review Code was provided for this review.