I've been playing for five hours and fifty-eight minutes, and I've stopped the Vambee attack.

Granted, this isn't the first time I've played through Square Soft's (now Square Enix) PS1 title, Brave Fencer Musashi, so I vaguely remembered stopping the half zombie, half vampire menace before. Not that's it's any less fun the second time, though I did get tired of ambling around in the dark trying to avoid bats, Vambees, and globs of slime only to fall in a spike pit due to the lack of vision...

Brave Fencer Musashi is, as mentioned before, a game for the good ol' Playstation. You play as Musashi, a pint-sized kid samurai that bears no other resemblance to the Musashi of Japanese legend save for his name, and the fact that he's a samurai. Musashi is "hero summoned" out of his own cozy world, and into the land of Allucaneet (All-you-can-eat) Kingdom during an attack on Allucaneet's palace.


Caution: Not as tall as he appears.

Long story short, Allucaneet's Princess Fillet, Steward Ribson, and the rest of the small palace posse tell Musashi that he has to find the super awesome sword Lumina, collect the five elemental scrolls, and stop the Thirstquencher Empire before they turn Allucaneet Kingdom into the One Plate Buffet Kingdom. Of course, Musashi just wants to go home, and makes that fact quite clear. Unfortunately for him, it's either save the kingdom and go home, or not save the kingdom and ultimately die after his "Bincho energy" dissipates.

Yeah, he goes and gets the sword.

Sometimes referred to as Square's "Zelda Killer" Brave Fencer Musashi requires the player to explore various parts of the kingdom in attempts to complete whatever task assigned at the time, including heading into the dangerous Twinpeak Mountain to find a dog, and exploring the dungeon that just so happens to be beneath the restaurant in order to stop the Vambees. Battle is pretty simple. Musashi, aside from Lumina, is given a katana named Fusion with a special ability. By filling up a gauge in the lower left-hand corner of the screen and pressing the square button, Musashi can chuck Fusion at an enemy and can, after repeatedly mashing the square button, assimilate the enemies' ability. Other than that, battle is mainly just swinging Lumina or Fusion around to take out your enemy. It's more fun than I make it sound.

Brave Fencer Musashi's soundtrack adds quite a lot to an already wonderful game. The main theme, titled "The Musashi Legend", makes one want to take on the entire empire at that very moment. Each track, whether upbeat, slow, or a reprise of the main theme, gives the different areas in the game that epic Musashi feeling, and are very enjoyable to listen to.

The game's characters (most of which have food-related names) add humor to a game that already tends not to take itself seriously (I mean really, Vambees?). Princess Fillet (played by Sandy Fox), for example, thinks she's pretty spiff for summoning a hero, and, after being kidnapped, thinks Musashi should "like, hurry up and save her." Musashi himself is excellently portrayed by Mona Marshall, and his equally hot-headed nature led him and the princess to start arguing very shortly after his arrival.

Many other features add to the charm that Musashi already has, but talking about them here would cause far too long a blog post. The best thing I can recommend is picking up a copy if you happen upon it at a reasonable price somewhere, and playing it for yourself. If that idea doesn't appeal to you, then that's cool too... I guess. Though you're missing out on a great game...

Thanks for taking the time to read this, pal! Happy Gaming!

Next time on I've Been Playing for 40 Hours: The Klonoa series