Code of Princess

Code of Princess is a side-scrolling hack-n-slash RPG from the director of Guardian Heroes. As Tetsuhiko Kikuchi's influence is heavy here, the game is, in some ways, like a spiritual successor to the aforementioned Saturn title.

Code of Princess follows a typically "anime" plot about a princess whose kingdom is being overrun by monsters, and a motley crew of characters that meet and join together to overthrow the evil monsters and the reason the monsters are there. Primary focus is on the character Solange as she wields a massive sword known as the deLuxcalibur, which is a sacred artifact of sorts for her kingdom. She is joined by several other characters, most of whom are playable in the story mode of the game.

Each stage is a fairly straight-forward side-scrolling affair more focused on intense combat than any amount of exploration. Each character uses the same basic controls, but all are played very differently. Many combat moves are performed in a style similar to a fighting game, such as pressing down, towards, and the A or B button. Players may typically move between 2-4 planes of action on the stage moving forward or back in the 3D space, and doing so is often part of the strategy of moving through levels. Typically, a note at the top of the screen will give the current objective for the level or individual wave during the level, such as "defeat all enemies," "defeat the boss" (which makes the other enemies more of a distraction), "save a villager," or even simply to survive for a set period of time.

Since levels and missions tend not be be very long they are very numerous and players will find themselves leveling up frequently. Each level allows the player to assign skill points (generally 5 points) to any of six attributes: Vitality (life), Piety (maximum magic), Attack, Defense, Mind (magic strength), and Speed. Various status effects may affect the player throughout the game as well including burning, shock, stone, dark (draining magic), or poison.

Each main story character not only plays differently, but they level up independently of one another, so that players may choose customize each character differently. For instance, Solange is naturally a bit slow, but fairly powerful, so a player may build on these strengths adding new speed and ramping up her strength even more. The character Ali is already pretty fast, so players may want to customize based on that, while other characters are more magic-based, or various combinations of strength, magic, speed, etc.

Besides the regular story missions, there is a Free Play mode that allows players to replay any story mission without lengthy cut scenes or dialog, and there are Bonus missions which unlock parallel to the Story. Often, they operate as elements to deepen the overall story experience through the gameplay, or simply to add new twists that aren't part of the main story, such as fighting a boss a second time after the boss has, essentially received a "second wind" and called in some support. Bonus Missions also tend to be more challenging, with many of them greatly exceeding the difficulty of the regular story missions, leaving these to be "pro" challenges or challenges for those players willing to replay missions enough to level up several times more.

During combat, players may lock-on to a single enemy, which allows the player to deal heavier damage to said enemy. On top of this, activating a Burst gradually drains the magic meter, but also increases all attacks on every enemy. Combining this with a lock-on allows a player to deal massive damage with every attack. There is also a shop where players may buy better weapons, armor, and the like--though it is fairly small compared to a traditional RPG.

Finally, the game also uses the Nintendo Network for local and online co-op and versus play, complete with leaderboards. This mode also allows players to use more than just the main eight main protagonist characters--practically every single enemy character in the game can be unlocked to be used in this mode, from the simplest soldier characters to massive dragons and even boss characters.