March 23^rd, 2002 (12:00am) - Konami’s first exclusive GameCube title didn’t fare too well with the reviewers at Famitsu.

Here’s the review(s):

Grade: 7
The world depicted in the original anime has been reproduced here faithfully. There’s no doubt that fans of the franchise’s characters are gonna love this one. Although the playing field is a level/flat plane, the ability to pick up items, not to mention the 4-way simultaneous competition, evokes a sense of playing “Sumabura” (short for “Smash Brothers” in Japanese). This serves to give the title a 3D-fighting-game feel when playing it. Overall, I think it dishes up an interesting challenge.

Grade: 6
With the presence of moves that are just too powerful, this game left somewhat of a bad taste in my mouth. Still, with its smooth interface and one-of-a-kind, out-of-control exciting battles, the game can be enjoyable at times. The large variety of weapons and items gives variety to the battles. However, the use of a large number of buttons is a tricky point. Among the game’s various production values, the loneliness heard in the voices stood out for me in particular.

Grade: 7
The anime characters are reproduced beautifully here, with methods of attack differing according to the combination of weapons equipped and RAVEs selected. In this fashion, the game makes you want to experiment with the various options available to you, and this represents a siginificant part of its appeal. Although I had no problem with the super attacks being as excessive as they were, sometimes their range is too great, meaning there’re times when you get stuck and killed instantly. Other minor points that presented a problem to me were some of the stages in which your character’s movements are difficult to discern.

Grade: 6
“The (really!) super attacks are too strong. You have no choice but to run away, picking up items and charging your gauge as you go. You run far away and use your own (really!) super attack…”…the game has a nasty tendency to get stuck in this uninteresting pattern. If standard moves involving the various weapons that you can switch were a little more plentiful, and the differences between what you select to use were a little more defined, it would have been better…The stages, while looking different, all have practically the same layout…this was another minus in my book.

My thoughts: Even though the game received a mediocre score , I’m still looking forward to importing it...