

Shop purchases affect your basic ship settings, so no matter what kind of extra bonuses you snag mid-level, if you purchase a double-shot, that becomes your base weapon for the remainder of the game. Enemy drops can be things like extra guns and armor, but they’re not all good, so it pays to be vigilant.

You can purchase them in the shop or collect them as an enemy drop. The upgrades are surprisingly thoughtful and balanced.

Beautifully responsive and easy to use, the various control schemes handled like a dream, while the many different upgrades and unlockable bonuses added a massive amount of variability and challenge to the experience. To make my point, I usually hate tilt controls with a burning passion, but the tilt controls in Warblade were an absolute pleasure. There are three different control types to accommodate any playing style: tilt, 1:1 touch, and digital buttons, and they’re all fantastic.

Although the overall experience isn’t especially original, three things really make the game shine: the controls, the upgrades, and the unlockables. Once you’re out, it’s game over, and, in the end, it’s all about the high score. Like most shooters, you have a limited number of lives. Like the classic space shooters of yore, Warblade is heavy on action, light on story, gorgeous to look at, and absurdly fun to play. Unlike the dozens of Space Invader and Galaga clones out there, Warblade doesn’t just set out to recreate the retro look of the originals, but instead emphasizes, in their words, “very good playability,” and that’s not just lip service. Although it would be easy to write this off as “just another classic shooter”, there’s nothing “just” about Warblade. And before that, it was dropped by The Devourer of Gods in the now-removed Prepare to Cry mode.With a title that lights a fire in your belly and grows hair on your chest, Warblade far surpassed my hopes for another Galaga-esque shooter on the iPhone. Before that, the Murasama was a Revengeance-exclusive weapon dropped by The Devourer of Gods. Prior to being located in Underworld Arsenal Labs, the Murasama was generated in now-removed Underworld Shrines.The weapon's tooltip, "There will be blood!", is a reference to the lyrics of "The Only Thing I Know For Real", which is Sam's boss theme, specifically the line "The only thing I know for real- There will be blood! Shed!".The fact the weapon is "ID locked" is also a reference to Sam, for the inability of using his weapon immediately after defeating him, unlike the other bosses in Metal Gear Rising.The fast, blurred cutting animation that the item uses is based on the blurring visuals shown when the player or Sam uses the sword.The Murasama is a reference to a weapon of the same name and similar appearance wielded by the character Jetstream Sam from Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance.The Murasama has a Draedon's Log entry dedicated to it, also found in the Underworld Bio-center Lab, where it is depicted alongside the Phaseslayer.When this is paired with a night owl potion or a night vision helmet, it generates even more light. If the player is playing with the retro or trippy light settings, then the Murasama behaves as an immense source of light.The Murasama only deals 40% damage to Ares and its weapons and 35% damage to Supreme Calamitas' Supreme Soul Seekers.The Murasama can be used at any point before defeating Yharon if the character's name is "Jetstream Sam" or "Samuel Rodrigues".Its swing range is also fixed, despite the slashes appearing at varying distances. The Murasama's attack speed is slower than what is visually indicated when using it, at 25 use time (2.4 swings per second).As such, it also has the most range of all true melee weapons.Despite not behaving like normal swords or spears, it is considered a true melee weapon.The exception to this rule is enemies that move through tiles. The Murasama cannot attack through walls.
