Two armies face each other across the rolling hills of southern France, armor and weapons gleaming in the noonday sun. A light breeze stirs the air, rustling the pennants and banners of the English and French forces. Suddenly, from out of the serried ranks of infantry comes one lone man, blade in hand, screaming a battle cry as he charges the enemy ranks. He tenses, a grim determination on his face, as in a split second.... he's smashed into the mud by a hundred horses, because this isn't Dynasty Warriors—it's Bladestorm.

Bladestorm is something of a departure for Koei, developers of the hit Dynasty Warriors and Romance of the Three Kingdoms games. Over the past few years, they've made an art out of iteration and slow evolution. One sequel after another slowly refined the core game play, until you knew exactly what to expect out of a Koei game before you had opened the box. The Romance series focused on controlling an empire at war, while Dynasty and Samurai Warriors focused on controlling a single hero in the midst of those wars. Bladestorm lands somewhere in the middle. You control a custom-made mercenary captain in the middle of the Hundred Years War. Instead of fighting alone, you take command of various squadrons on the battlefield, using them to fulfill the terms of your contracts with England and France.

At the beginning of the game, your unit selection is limited, but as you continue to play, you'll meet and defeat enemy commanders. Those commanders drop books which teach you how to command new units. Each unit is typed by weapon, and each main unit type further has several subtypes. For example, if you pick up a 'sword' book, you'll initially be able to command units of sword and shield infantry. Later, you'll find new pages for your sword book, teaching you how to command greatsword units. As the game progresses, the variety of units begins to trend towards the bizarre: samurai, Roman legionnaires, Viking berserkers, camel and elephant riders may be fun to fight with, but I'm pretty sure they weren't wandering around France in 1356. (Great Hannibal’s Ghost! – ed) Historical accuracy aside, the variety of units helps to keep the game fresh, as you learn how and when to switch from one unit to another, in order to make the most of their strengths and weaknesses.

As in the Warriors games Bladestorm has a main story that functions primarily to draw you from one battle to another. This story is revealed to you through major battles, which appear seemingly at random, when both England and France request your assistance to change the tide of the war. As a mercenary, you're free to choose who to fight for, and those decisions, as well as your performance on the battlefield, change how much of the story you see. Once you've completed the storyline, you can keep playing to further level up your character and obtain special items and complete side quests.

For a 360 title, Bladestorm's graphics aren't hugely impressive, but the game gets a bit of extra credit here for convincing recreations of medieval cities, and for producing so many graphically distinct unit types. If the game is somewhat lacking in eye candy, it more than makes up for it with brilliant audio. The game makes excellent use of surround sound to really make you feel like you're at the center of a battlefield, and the thundering hoof beats of cavalry and clash of steel really pull you into the fight. And after the battle, the laughable voice acting and hideously fake accents really make you feel like you're at a second rate Ren Faire.

As is usual for a new Koei franchise, Bladestorm still has some rough edges. The engine can chug a bit when a few hundred soldiers are on screen, and the random battles you fight in between doses of story eventually get a bit repetitive. If there's one thing Koei is known for, however, it's taking a core game concept and polishing it endlessly, so most of these issues should be solved by the time we see a Bladestorm sequel. Until then, the game remains a refreshing change from the well-worn gameplay Koei has become famous for, and the epic battles provide a satisfying fix for loyal fans of the genre.