It'll Be A Grind! Surprise?

I've heard a lot of good things about Dynasty Warriors 7, so I took the plunge and picked it up, despite nightmares of Orochi 2 grinding and the fact that I didn't really like DW6, despite the fact that I'm a big fan of the series.

DW7 is, thankfully, far better than the last installment. The gameplay feels more old-school, along the lines of DW4 or 5. I like that characters can use two different weapons, as this has allowed me to use alternatives for characters whose main weapons I don't like (like the fan). The new story mode structure is a welcome change, though Conquest mode has held almost all of my attention so far. It's cool to choose the order you do battles as you progress across a sprawling map of China.

The one thing that hasn't changed, however, is how time-consuming the achievements are. With the new uber-easy "Beginner" difficulty, 1k-ing this game looks to be utterly simplicity, if you're willing to invest the time. (Note: I'm not stooping to playing on Beginner until it's hyper grinding time)

What makes this game take so long? Well, you have to beat every character's legendary battles in conquest mode to unlock them as a playable character, and unlock one of their wallpapers. That's not so bad since you need to clear every stage for another achievement anyway. However, you must also make every character your sworn ally, which involves helping them across a few missions before they'll join you. With that done, you then have to max out their bond with you for an achievement and some of their voice data for another. That means using each officer again for multiple battles (I did find a level that can be consistently done in under 1 minute, which will speed along THAT grinding session).

The last voice data comes from unlocking all the skills for a character, and this has to be done with every character. This can only be done by playing as that character and killing officers. WHile there are skills that can speed this along, and it could be combined with leveling up someone's bond, I'm projecting this game in the 60-80 hour completion time range right now. I'm going to do what I can to minimize the grinding time,but we'll see. I love you Dynasty Warriors, but make your achievements more organic and less of a grind...