The best new feature in Capcom’s new Onimusha is not entirely obvious

Onimusha: Way of the Sword’s lead developers discuss sword clashes, the reason for making an easier game, and a key tweak to collecting souls.

Onimusha: Way of the Sword. Image: Capcom

At a recent live demonstration of the upcoming samurai-vs-demons video game Onimusha: Way of the Sword, I marveled at how good the game’s clothing looked.

The garments worn by virtual samurai Miyamoto Musashi billowed and rumpled like real cloth.

For a long time, clothing in games was so stiff it may as well have all been made of metal.

But modern technology has given virtual fabric its flexibility. That was evident in the version of Way of the Sword that was demoed for a group of us at Summer Game Fest in Los Angeles earlier this month. A 15-minute playthrough displayed how far video game graphics have come since developer/publisher Capcom’s last major Onimusha game, the PlayStation 2’s Dawn of Dreams, in 2006.

Later, however, when I sat with two of Way of the Sword’s lead developers, one told me about a less obvious technological marvel that had been before my eyes: The way the game’s swords hit each other.

“When Musashi and another enemy attack each other, their swords clash,” the game’s director, Satoru Nihei, told me through a translator.

“With the latest technology that we're using right now, they are accurately clashing with each other, like sword to sword.

“Even if [the combatants are] on different levels of terrain or if they're in slightly closer quarters than usual, it's actually not a hand[-made] animation. They're all real-time calculated.”

It works when two combatants in the game attack each other. It works when protagonist Miyamoto Musashi is using his sword to block an enemy strike, too.

The game’s development team had worked hard on this, Nihei explained, to make sure it matches what you see on screen and to ensure it felt good. He lifted his hands up to help demonstrate what he was describing.