Like it or not, 2025 looks to be the year of the Warriors franchise. Already getting fed well with Dynasty Warriors: Origins last month, Warriors: Abyss, a roguelike spin on the long-running Musou genre, shadow dropped earlier this month. Featuring fast-paced combat battles against hundreds upon thousands of enemy soldiers, its new genre stint is thoroughly enjoyable, even if it’s a bit boilerplate.

Warriors: Abyss has you controlling a hero in the Dynasty Warriors universe, summoned by King of the Underworld Enma to help thwart the invasion of Gouma, a devil that’s infested hell with their minions. That’s all that’s told to you. You’re (depending on who you pick each run) one of the dozens upon dozens of Dynasty Warriors characters who must work through four floors of Hell, conquering a flood of undead soldiers and nasty gross bosses to put a stop to Gouma. Enma is an entirely new character for the franchise. You aren’t missing anything and this is the paper-thin excuse to go on some roguelike fun. There’s also no extra narrative depth the more clears you get, like Hades. That’s that! Moving on!

Players pick one Warriors hero for their given run, taking on the four floors of 7 stages and then a boss at the end of each floor. Fans needn’t worry about missing out on playing as their favourite character either. While the more recent mainline games sorely lack a high playable character count, Abyss features 100 characters to choose from, with just shy of 20 unlocked from the get-go. Though you can only play as one character at a time, it’s still a friend fest in Warriors: Abyss. More often than not in a stage, you’re rewarded with a spiritual tree that you can interact with and then choose a hero that will be able to be summoned for that run.

Each has their own summoning ability that sees them briefly spawn in the arena and do some AoE damage, idling about Vampire Survivors’ style. Upwards of six can be used for summons at any given time, but both your main party and reserves (you’ll be coming across more than six trees in a run) have passive and active buffs that all stack to make your runs more powerful.

What these buffs are are ’emblems’ that are of different elements; not just earth, wind, fire and electricity but speed, strength, summoning and so on. Once a certain amount of an emblem is gathered, milestone buffs and additions are added. There are a lot of moving plates of buffs to monitor in-game, and that especially becomes true the more you play and get familiar with the game. You can get a decent way through by not paying all that much attention to the minute buffs but instead focusing on the big number buff that is your total Battle Power. In fact, I almost managed to get my first clear and see credits within the first two hours with this approach, only choking at the final boss. I performed even better when I wrapped my head around the deeper mechanics, including the upgrade conditions of each character and their Unique Tactics.

Lastly, ‘Formations’ are the foundations holding all of your upgrade choices and paths together. These will come to players incrementally through runs but, like the playable characters that you unlock, the pool of choice on runs grows as you purchase more. These are similar passive buffs but also determine what you’ll want to be investing in. For example, it’s pretty easy to guess what element you’ll need to invest heavily in for the ‘Deer Antler’ formation, which adds more defence the more electric bolt emblems you have. Formations are also active as they also determine the nature of some of your attacks. The end of a combo on a fire-focused formation will, for example, leave lingering fire AoEs that foes can be melted away in.

These combos are incredibly true to the Dynasty Warriors name and pulling them off feels satisfying as you watch characters like Zhang He making quick slices through groups of hundreds of enemies with his claws to great effect. Having the game be an isometric perspective while this chaos and carnage occurs is only advantageous as it provides ample lay of the land. Many of the characters you know and love from not just the Dynasty Warriors games but the Samurai Warriors games are here to mess around with. As someone who is playing their first game with either cast (I’ve dabbled in some of the spin-off crossovers), I’ve had great fun learning what every little character is about, striving to clear runs with as many as I can. That feeling will only expand tenfold with longtime fans.

This power fantasy feeling grows when you’re using the two forms of ultimate ability at your disposal. Your Musou gauge once full lets you let out your character’s Musou ability, more often than not a variation of a flurry attack that stops enemies in their path and interrupts damn near anything. Once your assemble gauge is filled with a press of the right trigger on a controller you can have your summons laid out at once, helping you create devastation across the arena, lingering for around 30 seconds and, later in the upgrade path, essentially dropping a near arena-wide nuke. While it’s doing this your screen is erupting in technicolour and particles. Hundreds upon thousands of bodies are sent flying. It’s in these moments I’m reminded that gaming is bloody cool.

Of course, Warriors: Abyss is a game that will kick you down in the dirt if you’re not careful. Essentially all of the enemies’ attacks, boss or otherwise, are AoEs or projectiles that you must dodge or interrupt. These can entail long horizontal lines where foes have banded together to initiate a charge or large explosions of a projectile type. You’re always moving and, at least early on, that dash cooldown is cruel. It’s when the going gets tough that I find great joy in experimenting with the speedier glass cannon-type figures that can manoeuvre their way around a battlefield more quickly. Shout out to tiny characters like Xiaoqiao and her fans she throws out as she runs. An MVP for me.

Meanwhile, you’re engaging in the game’s compelling risk vs reward nature where on the fly you’re trying to work out what you’re prioritising in a given run. You could hunt for Ember Karma and Tears of Blood, the permanent currency that you can use to unlock characters and formations both in and out of runs. Or you could go for less of these currencies but bolster yourself up with emblems. These options are laid out dangling like tantalising fruit to the player as you clear every stage. The wrong choice could send it all crumbling down and stopping your run short in its tracks.

Thankfully Warriors: Abyss offers a lot of aid to the player. In the Hall of Heroes, the shop that is available to players in between runs, each unlock (be it Formations or Heroes) will also permanently boost base stats in defense, health and the like for all characters. Even if progress initially is slow, you’re chipping away at being more equipped for a run, both in skill or experience and in strength. This is immensely useful and a good way to keep the player invested in that “one more run” feeling. There are no difficulty options until you clear for the first time. You just have the game coaxing you along as you go, coaching you through it.