Muramasa: The Demon Blade Kisuke Playthrough - Part 1

This is part 1 of my playthrough of Muramasa: The Demon Blade for the Wii using Kisuke. This was recorded directly from my Wii (not the Wii U). I'm playing on Shura (hard) difficulty.

I’ve always been a huge fan of Japanese culture (generally the more traditional aspects), so whenever Japanese-style games came out I would pay attention. Around 2009 I heard about an upcoming Wii game named Muramasa and was impressed by the old-fashioned Japanese woodblock art style, as well as the 2D gameplay.

By 2009 I was pretty much purchasing Wii games on their release date whenever I felt like it, which substantially reduced my number of video game Christmas gifts. However, despite my interest in Muramasa, I decided to hold off and simply ask for the game for Christmas that year since I was already busy with a bunch of other titles and it wasn’t something I felt I had to play immediately.

Muramasa was the only new Wii game I received for Christmas of 2009, but it ended up being pretty good and certainly kept me busing during the holidays. The art style and music are of course highly impressive, but the gameplay is oddly simplistic, yet unusual.

Muramasa is generally a one-button game. There isn’t even a jump button (you have to press up on the D-pad). You essentially have an attack button that is combined with certain D-pad presses to attack in certain directions and to string together combinations. There’s also a special attack button that can be used so long as you have enough soul power, but you’ll almost always be using standard attacks.

Despite its simplicity, Muramasa is not an easy game. The action moves incredibly fast and you cannot escape from enemies. Every time enemies appear you’re locked in combat until you defeat them or die, and then you’re left to simply explore and collect items. It’s an odd design, yet it works.

The game also features RPG elements, including a traditional leveling system, but the most addicting aspect is the sword forging system. As you level up and collect souls, you can forge newer and stronger swords with different special attacks. This gives you some motivation to keep leveling and to seek out random enemy encounters. The boss fights are also rather challenging and entertaining.

When I beat this game with both characters back in 2009/2010, I did it on the standard difficulty level (Muso), but this time I’ll be trying the harder difficulty (Shura). Similar to my GBA and DS Castlevania playthroughs, I’ll be splicing together footage at the save points in certain videos.

In this first part I continued my prior Momohime save file by starting the Kisuke story line and completing the Opening Act. In order to forge all of the swords and obtain the second and third story endings, you need to complete both characters’ story lines since their sword trees eventually start to merge. Also, since I had already shown the intro and tutorial in my Momohime playthrough, I skipped them for this video.

Kurozaru boss fight - 11:04

Recorded with the Hauppauge HD PVR and the Wii's component cables at 60 frames per second. I’m using a Classic Controller.