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Every once in a while, Capcom enters what I would like to call its experimental phase. It’ll pop out a genre bending game out of nowhere and hit it right out of the park. Viewtiful Joe, Phoenix Wright, Mega Man Legends…OKAMI! All these games weren’t exactly big hits, but they showed off what innovation can do for established genres. Now its time for Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess.
Drawing heavily on Japanese culture and Shinto beliefs for inspiration (kind of like Okami in that regards), the game is a mindboggling blend of different genres.
It’s definitely an experimental endeavor.
Does it work?
What is Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess?
Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess is labeled by Capcom as a single player Kagura action strategy game. It’s developed by Capcom, and also published by Capcom. It is available right now on the Playstation, Xbox and PC.
Our copy was generously provided by Capcom! Thank you so much guys and gals!
OK so you might be scratching your head at what exactly the game is. What’s a single player Kagura action strategy game? For us regular gamers, it’s basically a beat’em up action game infused with tower defence gameplay mechanics and light base building elements.
Think of it as a combination Devil May Cry and Sanctum (or Sanctum 2).
Instead of the Son of Sparda, the hero in Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess is Soh.
He’s the protector of Yoshiro, a Maiden of the mountain (Mount Kafuku) the game’s set on. The mountain’s been corrupted by demonic forces called the Seethe and it’s up to Yoshiro to rid the corruption of the Torii gates, which also serve as the Seethe’s gateway to our world.
Honestly, the story’s pretty light, which is one of the game’s weaknesses.
As you play, Soh can be strengthened by the tsubas and talismans you can find. The tsubas give you special attack options, while the talismans have a whole range of benefits so you can mix and match to fit your style.
Gameplay takes place in two distinct phases; Day and Night.
During the day, you run around the stage gathering resources, freeing trapped villagers and basically getting ready for the assault to come. Resources you gather are used to transform the villagers you rescue into special units and also to pave the way through the corruption, so that Yoshiro has a clear path to the Torii gates in the stages. Yoshiro will dance once you’ve laid down a path and the day will slowly progress in real time (or you can speed it up).
Where Yoshiro stops is where you’ll want to hunker down and set your units up for her defense as the Seethe will come for her once the game progresses to night.
Once the sun sets, the corrupted Torii gate will start to pump out the Seethe. Some are big, some are small, some can fly, some can buff. There’s a ton of Seethe variety (which is pretty cool). It’s Soh’s job now to massacre everything that comes out of the Torii gate till the sun rises again.
What that means a lot of slashing, hacking and whatever special moves you have equipped to Soh’s katana. Soh can block and dodge and jump. He can also execute combos of the X,Y, or X,X,Y variety. All in all, Soh’s a great character to fight as and the combat’s fast, fluid and very satisfying.
Unfortunately, somebody on the dev team made the boneheaded move to assign dodging to the L3 button. It’s up to you to go into the Options menu and change that ASAP. I move it to RT (with the L3 button now activating special moves) and you’ll be much more effective. Trust me on this.
Fights are fun and you’re quickly forced to adapt your strategies in the later stages. You can’t really depend on a single unit type to carry you through the fights. It’s really great that Capcom actually made the effort to make the helpers useful. Soh is good but he isn’t invincible or perfect.
More importantly, Soh can’t be in two places at once.
Even if you’re a killing machine and camp at the Torii gates where they emerge, the Seethe come in relentless hordes. They will get past you and go for Yoshiro. You can’t play the hero and just ignore using the villager units to complement your offense.
You need to think bigger.
That’s where directing and placing your villagers comes into play.
Like Mega Man, each time you beat a boss you get a new power.
In this case, mask.
Each new mask unlocks a new unit type. They can also be upgraded via a linear upgrade tree, which buffs them and gives them more powerful special moves. It’s nothing major but it’s a good way to give players incentives to specialize.
From Sumo, to archers to axe wielding warriors. Each unit type is good for something, but weak at others. Mixing and matching their numbers, and their positioning is required to succeed.
It’s pretty easy to tell them where to go…BUT the game really, really, REALLY needs an update that can making it clearer which unit you’re giving orders to.
It’s super hard to tell and I’m given orders to the wrong unit many times. It REALLY sucks to draw a wrong unit out of position because you just can’t easily tell at a glance who you’re giving orders to!
Since you can’t move your camera (you can only rotate it) during unit order/selection mode, units not in your line of sight are near impossible to direct. Sure, you’re selecting an archer…but which one?!
The game also needs a button to call all the villagers to your location. During Boss Stages, you can tell them to go all out attack or defence but there’s still no way to order them to move en masse to you.
Most of the stages in the game have a gimmick or two that sets them apart. One stage for example, is set in a cave. In it, Soh needs to direct villagers to light up lanterns so they can target incoming Seethe.
Another has Soh being nothing but a spirit and unable to attack or take any action. In this stage, it’s all down to the villagers to save the day.
The gimmicks are fun, and they do give a pleasant challenge. On top of that, each stage also has 3 different goals, which rewards you materials for completing them.
Once you complete a stage (not including the Boss Stages), Soh can then establish a base there.
With the villagers you acquired, you can repair various buildings in the base. Repaired buildings give you different rewards so it’s always a good thing to repair them whenever you get back from a mission. It’s a refreshing break from the action but I do wish Soh moved faster during these parts. Some of the villagers can be sizeable and Soh’s default movement speed is pretty slow.
One thing that I really like about Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess is its super vibrant colour palette.
The game is incredibly bright, despite its dour setting. Yoshiro’s dancing sets off a kaleidoscope of colors as she cleanses and Soh’s mesmerizing sword moves have a beautiful orange glow to them as they slice and dice.
The bright colours can sometimes get in the way (like when you’re in the command mode trying to find the villager you’re looking for), but in the grand scheme of things, it’s all good.
I’d have loved for Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess to have been like Okami (and Street Fighter IV to a certain extent) and used the Ukiyo-e style though. Having played a ton of Okami over the years, I’ve grown to love the style and this game seems perfect for it!
Speaking of the visuals, I was able to play on 4K with DLSS off on maxed settings and still get a stable 60fps framerate. I didn’t notice any slowdown at all, even when there’s a ton happening on-screen. I also played on a laptop with a NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 and it too had no issues on any of the stages I played, no matter how intensive the scene was.
No random crashes, no deteriorating performance, no weird stuttering or hitches. Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess ran well and smoothly the whole time, whether its on the desktop or laptop.
The Bottom Line.
Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess is a brilliant new I.P. from Capcom. There’s huge potential here for the series (hell, I do hope it crosses over officially with Okami in-game instead of just cosmetic items) and I really want to see where Capcom takes it from here.
Is it perfect? No.
There are a ton of teething problems.
That’s fine.
It’s a brand new series and the first game in it. There’s bound to be some issues. Resident Evil had them and Devil May Cry had them and look where both are today. There’s no reason to believe that Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess can’t be another feather in Capcom’s cap.
All the series need is a polished sequel…
TLDR:
Fun to play, but minor issues detract a bit from the experience.
The Good:
- Smooth fighting.
- Lots of enemy variety.
- Lots of equipment to unlock.
- Stages are mostly unique.
- Vibrant colors.
The Bad:
- Villager selection and management is not intuitive.
- Needs more villager control options.
- Light on plot.
Salehuddin Husin, EIC
Sal's been in the industry since the early 2000s. He's written for a ton of gaming and tech publications including Playworks, Hardwarezone, HWM and GameAxis. Recently, Sal served as a juror for the Indie Game Awards at Taipei Game Show 2020. A geek and hardcore gamer, Sal will play everything, on any platform.
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