‘Gundam Breaker 4’, which was announced during the Nintendo Direct on February 21, is the latest in the ‘Gundam Breaker’ series of action games based on Gunpla. Bandai Namco Entertainment has been recruiting testers since the 23rd to announce the launch of Nintendo Switch, PS5, and Steam within the year of 2024, and some of them will be revealed through closed network testing in Japan on March 15th and 17th.
‘Gundam Breaker’ is a series that emphasizes the fun of controlling a Gunpla, fighting other Gunplas, and creating your own Gunpla of original specifications by combining various parts obtained from enemies. In this ‘Gundam Breaker 4’ test, only three Chapter 1 quests were revealed, including ‘Assemble’, which allows you to create a Gunpla of your desired specifications after clearing quest missions and securing parts, and ‘Paint’, which allows you to decorate it as you want. was able to experience the contents of
As only a small number of areas have been revealed, the types of Gunpla that appear as enemies and the types of parts that can be obtained are also limited. Nevertheless, from the beginning, I could feel the customization and action that were more advanced than the previous game. The previous Gundam Breaker could only be equipped with one melee weapon, but this time, it was possible to use a ‘dual sword style’ in which both left and right hands could be equipped with a melee weapon.
‘Dual sword style’ is operated by using the square button to use the weapon equipped in the left hand and the triangle button to use the weapon equipped in the right hand. Special movements are activated depending on the combination of the equipped weapon and button combination, just like the branch action of the Musou style. . For example, if you attack with the arm equipped with a beam saber and then press the button assigned to the arm equipped with the beam axe, the enemy will be hit hard and levitated in the air. If you attack with the beam ax after delivering 4 hits with the beam saber, you will hit the enemy down and forcefully strike them. It is downloaded with .
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Although only two types of beam saber and beam ax have been released yet, it is expected that more diverse aspects of close combat will be presented as other weapons are added in the future. In particular, a total of 8 combat skill settings can be equipped, including 4 types of EX skills activated by combining the L1 key and button, and option skills activated by combining the R1 key and button, so a wider variety of EX and option skills are available in the official version. It seems that you can enjoy a wider range of actions by combining them.
In Gundam Breaker 4, you can customize a total of 11 types of parts, including the head, chest, arms, legs, backpack, left and right shooting weapons, melee weapons, and shields, by fitting them with the parts you want. In particular, this time, it is now possible to mount different parts on both arms, just as the left and right melee weapons can be worn differently.
After installing the parts, he also put a lot of effort into the ‘paint’ work, which involves painting the Gunpla with the colors and patterns you want. A variety of options were supported to create your own Gunpla, from the degree of metal material expression and roughness on the surface to adjusting the intensity of the normal map of the surface paint pattern and color combination. As the ‘blueprint’ function, a so-called preset function that saves the settings after creating your own Gunpla, has been carried over from the previous work, it was fun to create various Gunpla and save the settings you liked and use them at any time.
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In this way, the ‘battle’ to match the gunpla continues the tradition of the series, but as mentioned earlier, several improvements were added to make it even more enjoyable. Isn’t the fun of ‘Gundam Breaker’ to fire suppressing shots from a distance, then quickly approach with boosters and steps, and destroy the opponent’s Gunpla while swinging a beam saber or various weapons? Here, the combination of the aforementioned melee weapons and more expanded combat skills have been added, adding to the fun of cooking enemies with more diverse combos.
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In Stage 2, where the giant Unicorn Gundam appears, we were able to see some of the boss battle structure. The Unicorn Gundam, which appears as the Stage 2 boss, has weak points in its arms, legs, and chest, and is incapacitated when these three parts are destroyed. The Unicorn Gundam operates normally until all three parts are destroyed, but parts that have already been destroyed do not take damage even when attacked. In other words, if you attack and destroy the legs first, you can only inflict damage by using a booster to levitate in the air and attack the arms and chest.
After destroying all of its weak points, the Unicorn Gundam took out its Armed Armor and entered Phase 2, leaping into the air and quickly slashing at the Armed Armor, or rushing and swinging widely, continuing to make more powerful attacks. The high-speed action sequence of avoiding this onslaught with boosters and steps, attacking distant enemies with missiles of optional skills and long-distance weapons, digging into gaps, and then destroying their weak points with close-range attacks was felt even in the testing stage.
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Of course, as it is still in the testing stage, both the IP game configuration and the action game configuration were only a taste of some of the conveniences. This test included Blue Destiny Unit 1, land battle Gundam, Dom, Goof, Gundam, Aggai, Unicorn Gundam, Jegan, Doben Wolf, V Gundam, Jim, Gundam F91, Zaku 2, Full Armor Unicorn Gundam, Zaku 2 Char’s private plane, and Haigog. A total of 20 types of aircraft appeared, and only HG class parts for the aircraft were dropped. However, even in a situation where only a part of it is shown, the basic framework for eliminating enemies while decorating one’s own Gunpla is well established, so attention is being paid to how this will be expanded and developed in the officially released version.
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