The epitome of the Musou series.
There's a lot to be said for the hack n' slash formula; it used to be a side scrolling type game where enemies come at you anywhere on a flat 2D plane. With all the sophisticated graphics of today, full 3D worlds can be carved and made into game settings.
Samurai Warriors 2, the sixth game in the "Musou" series (not counting Dynasty Warriors 1, because it was a fighter not unlike Soulcalibur), tells the tale of Japanese Warlords in the feudal era attempting to gain control of the land. If you've played a Koei Musou (Warriors in English) game, you know exactly what this is.
There are subtle differences, however. The Dynasty Warriors series tend to tell the same tale over and over again, revisiting the same events that occurred with different scenarios. Samurai Warriors 2, conversely, actually takes place a bit after the first game. Let's recap: In the first game, there were three feudal lords, each with the goal of unifying the land under their own beliefs. These three were Uesugi Kenshin, Takeda Shingen, and Oda Nobunaga. Depending on the player you choose, the story pans out differently with multiple endings, not unlike fighting games. Samurai Warriors 2 contains a bit of that era of history, but puts more emphasis on what happens after it, through the reign of Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Tokugawa Ieyasu.
If you don't know who any of these people are in actual history, stop reading this and go look them up on Wikipedia. Yes, the real people. I promise you'll get a lot more out of the story as a result. The story is told through prologues before each battle, sometimes with cinematics. Each character has their own story, and like fighting games, have different outcomes and endings. It creates a "what if" scenario of history if a certain character had survived.
However, as similar as this premise is to a fighting game, it is not one. It is a hack n' slash. Take control of a warlord or general, and slaughter a bunch of people in the opposing force before finally unifying Japan under your or your leader's control. Each battle has missions within the battle. These missions vary depending on how the morale and soldiers on the battlefield have progress (all well labeled on your HUD). Paying attention to your map is the key to victory most of the time; blue are allies, red are enemies, and yellow are most likely also enemies but a third party in the cause. A bigger dot signifies a general, and it benefits your army to not let them be defeated, while defeating rival generals gains morale. There are some really harsh objectives though, like never letting a single enemy officer die, or a random ambush at your home base across on the other side of the large map. This is always achievable, but sometimes hurts the difficulty curve.
This all sounds strategic, but the way the battles progress is linear, and shows you a "go here, kill the generals, go there, kill generals" To be honest, the game never progresses past that; this is actually a compliment. Koei has spent a large amount of time making sure that this element of the game is well refined. You use X for fast attacks, and Y for charge attacks. You start out with only a 4-chain X combo. After each press of X, you can end your combo with Y, and it leads to a lot of interesting movesets. For example, my favorite character, Saika Magoichi, Can do X+Y, which then tosses the enemy in the air, ready for juggling... or he can do X+X+X+Y, which the last blow is a area affect attack. Different combinations result in different uses, and it is wise to learn when to end your combo.
There are 26 characters total. all with very unique movesets unlike Dynasty Warriors' recent usage of clones. 3 are cut from the first Dynasty Warriors, though one had no true historical identity, and plays a lot like one of the new additions, and another is available through DLC. The DLC, Xtreme Legends, adds 6 characters, all with their own story modes, for 2400MSP, the most expensive add-on to date. Each character can be leveled up to 50, or 70 with the expansion pack. There is also a Survival Mode, and a board game mode called Sugoroku. Both of these modes are nice additions, breaking up the rigid story structure at your own leisure.
The graphics in this game are clean, and I can't stress that enough. It runs at 60fps, full 720p, and can display 100s of characters on screen at once, where barely any enemies disappear. The draw distance that hinders previous warriors games is still here, but hidden much better; there seems to be a filter that blurs textures into distance without you noticing unless you're paying direct attention to it. To be honest, this is the best compromise in a Warriors game; The three Warriors Orochi games, 1, 2, and Z, all have MASSIVE framerate issues due to the extended view distance (which isn't even useful, as characters disappear more noticeably). Dynasty Warriors 6 and its expansions also drop frames. Samurai Warriors 2 is the only entry I've ever played that doesn't; it's not the most detailed in the series (DW6 is), but it is the most consistent.
The sound design in this game is amazingly. I find myself humming some of the tracks. The decision to change music during different events really sets the mood properly. The voice acting, on the other hand, is cheesy and a bit off. Still, you'll feel like you're utterly destroying enemies with how they did the sound design.
The Sengoku Musou (Samurai Warrors) series has a contender in the form of the Sengoku Basara series, known as Devil Kings in America. Many people argue about which is better, but I can honestly say that both are different enough to coexist. The Musou series is known for its larger environments, while the Basara series is more about smoother combat in a more linear fashion. The characters in Musou are more historically based and more "manly", while the characters in the Basara series are more like anime and much skinnier in comparison. If you're caught in a decision between the two (the Basara series isn't released in America, so you'd have to import it), use the differences I've mentioned and make your decision from that.
+ Story- Put some time into reading about the characters, and the story is a solid 4/5.
+ Game Structure- The game rewards you for diligence, and has a lot of replay value for all 26 characters. 5/5
+ Gameplay- Koei has definitely refined and perfect the gameplay in this installment. 5/5
+ Graphics- Clean, adequate, 60fps, though not extremely detailed. 4/5
+ Sound Design- Awesome music, bad voice acting, but amazing sound effects. 4/5
+Overall - 4.5/5. This is THE Musou game to get.