JUMP FORCE, a fighting game developed by Spike Chunsoft and published by Bandai Namco, is now available via Xbox Game Pass (on console only). I’m interested in anime games, so I figured I’d take a shot at it. My childhood was fueled by these shonen comics, and I’m glad that they made a fighting game where they can go head to head against one another to see who comes out on top (I’m rooting for Naruto).
The “Tweet Review”
JUMP FORCE is a fun game on its own, and better when fighting with friends. A lot like Dragon Ball Xenoverse, the animation and fights are well done. Non-story missions lack a bit in content, but free fights are fun. I also fought as Josuke. Fun times.
7/10
The “Normal” Review
Okay, if you’re still reading this, you want some more details. I’ll be happy to oblige.
Beginning of the Journey
The story begins with your character being saved from the brink of death by Trunks and being transformed into a hero. That’s really what happens, by the workings of a magic cube. Bare with me here.
After this, you fight off the invading forces of soldiers called Venoms led by Frieza and various other shonen villains, and then are transported to the home base of the Jump Force, or J-Force as they’re called in the game.
You are tasked to join a squad- Alpha, Beta, or Gamma- and team up with them to go on missions. Alpha fights off the invaders (Dragon Ball captain, Goku), Beta retakes control of lost territory and finds new fighters to join the J-Force (One Piece captain, Luffy), and Gamma is in control of espionage (Naruto captain, Naruto clearly).
Missions/Items
There are three different mission types: Free, Extra, and Key. The team you join determines what kind of story (Key) missions you will go on. However, because your character is an important asset to the J-Force, you will regularly be given Extra Missions where you will join members of the other teams to complete them. Example: You do a mission to rescue Vegeta, who then joins Beta team, and then you do a mission with him later on regardless of if you’re on Beta team or not.
Free missions work a lot like the system in Dragon Ball Xenoverse where you can go fight teams of enemy combatants to earn money and items to make your characters stronger. They range from easy to very hard difficulty, and the higher difficulties give better rewards. You’ll have to do these missions multiple times to get all the items, or you can buy most of them from the shop at each team base at a premium price.
The Extra and Free missions are one and done fights as far as I’ve experienced, but I’m still relatively low level, around 15. Once you complete a mission, another higher leveled one may come up after it. I hope that they will have more steps or waves of enemies to each mission, like the mission system in Xenoverse, with the higher difficulties.
Combat/Animation
Skills
With skills available from multiple shonen universes, you can create a character specific to how you want to play. My current character has a move each from One Piece, Naruto, Dragon Ball, and one more that I can’t remember off the top of my head. He plays really well for being a beginner character, good mix of close and ranged attacks. He’s also wearing a Josuke costume, because he can.
Some skills have you dash towards your opponent to make impact, others fire projectiles, and some are ranged attacks. Still others have an initial button press to create an effect or attack, then if you hit the button again, the attack goes off, like Hellzone Grenade. The large number of skills you can unlock allows for a ton of customization, so don’t be afraid to try out new skills.
Ultimate skills aren’t something that can be used all the time. You need to fill your Awakening gauge to at least 50% to use one. You do this by preforming combos, and taking damage. Awakening causes different effects for each character who uses it; for example: Goku goes Super Saiyan and Gon gets that impossibly long hair and ages like eight years for a massive power buff.
Actual Fighting
Combat is done in teams of three, and you’re able to call in the others for support attacks and to switch to them when you wish. There is a cooldown on this so be careful. There is no guard limit (so far that I’ve encountered), so guard whenever possible because it can even block ultimate attacks. The CPU likes to spam guard though, so break through it with a Smash attack (that’s actually what it’s called). Use your skills, keep the combo going, and you’ll get the win in no time.
You can also fight against other players online and in local offline battles, but I haven’t tried this out yet. I’m waiting on my friend to wrestle it away from his brother so we can play together. If it’s anything like Xenoverse, these battles are the highlight of the game because it makes you think on your feet, not follow the motions of the CPU.
Animation
The animation throughout the game is well done, and it shows in the details they put into the combat. Breaking ground, particle effects from attacks like Spirit Bomb, and the smoothness of movement make it just plain fun to play, and that’s what I like about this game.
Final Thoughts
Despite the missions being run-of-the-mill fights for rewards, the fights themselves are what make this game great. The combinations of skills and teammates, paired with how well combat flows (when the CPU isn’t spamming guard) make it fun to play. Will I play this game all the time? No, because I would get bored really quickly. But, I will play this game whenever I’m in the mood to fight Dio as Josuke, or just kick Frieza around as Kenshin or whoever else I want to play as at that time.
7/10
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