I love beat-‘em-ups, and I’m a dribbling Bleach fan; my book shelf bends low under the burden of too many soul collecting manga graphics. So, naturally I was pretty damn psyched when Sega’s new digitisation of the classic Japanese comic hit the doormat, and I immediately put on my hakama and readied the largest of my perturbing sword collection for soul reaping pleasures.

Now, Bleach is all about style. On the surface, it smacks of a fairly typical manga outing – teenagers in world changing, heroic battle escapades, all getting angry at each other and bursting into furious tantrums of tears. But Bleach excels at not taking itself seriously; an aspect that’s all the more triumphant because of the seriousness of the characters involved. If they took their soul collecting jobs as lightly as the readers do, Bleach would be a distinctly tepid affair. As it is, the beloved manga and anime series is perfectly balanced to provide satire and surrealism in equal, enthralling quantities.

This vital part of the Bleach canon has been adequately captured by Sega in Ichigo’s one-on-one tournament fighter. The action rages across vital peaks and valleys of drama as the two combatants face off in affable cell-shaded style. An immediate and accurate parallel is noticeable with the highly popular Dragonball Z Budokai series – a wise move for the developer to make, not only due to the persistent Dragonball success, but because of the distinct similarity between the inspirational material of both games. Both are high-octane, mind-bendingly confusing works of extraordinary Japanese art, and their extension onto the gaming scene is a delicate matter.

There’s no point trying to educate the masses about the complex, bizarre legacy of Bleach. It’s simply better to let the characters battle it out for no good reason than trying to convey the befuddling manga storytelling. And I’m going to do likewise. This is a Bleach game, and if you don’t know what Bleach is… well, it doesn’t really matter. Just know that Shattered Blade is a tournament fighter that threatens to do your Wii-mote asunder in spirited pseudo-kung fu style!

There are few surprises in the fundamental gameplay of Bleach, which follows the standard fare of fighting game tactics closely. Button mashing and brute force are vital commodities. The inclusion of the Wii-mote is a particularly interesting deviation, however, and goes a long way toward including the player in the knuckle and sword based action on a very personal level. The usual button mashing is replaced by Mote-thrashing – hacking and slashing with the controller is mimicked quite accurately onscreen. Simply piling into the opponent with a flailing Wii-mote doesn’t get you very far, however, as an energy level quickly decreases with each slash, and recovers slowly. Once it’s empty, Bleach (or one of the other collectors) can no longer attack until suitably replenished.

Adding the A and B buttons to your aggressive controller battering adds power to the character’s moves, while slowing them down and extending their recovery time. The Nunchuk also comes into active play. Shaking it builds up the character’s special power (while making them momentarily vulnerable) until the gauge is full and power attacks (benkai) can be unleashed. Sprinting is achieved with the C button, while Z defends. The dash attacks are surprisingly well controlled, as the game engine hones in on the opponent without ever feeling forced, and moving in and out of the screen circles the enemy automatically – a useful, and intuitive way to expand this typically restrained game style into three dimensions.

Take my advice and get out of the chair when playing this game. The entire experience doubles in pleasure when jumping around, slashing frantically, shaking the Nunchuk violently then stopping in an involuntary kung fu pose that comes straight from a bad Hong Kong film. Enormously embarrassing, but undeniably entertaining.

This intensive cross and change of vibrant action and defensive, energy harvesting pauses give Shattered Blade an invigorating pace of action, although the forced cut scenes when unleashing a bankai attack are a little too long and rob the game of vital momentum – especially considering the amount of use these cool moves get.

A simple tutorial inaugurates the would be warrior extremely well which, coupled with the instinctive controls, means players begin with a high level of expertise. So much so that I actually made it all the way through the arcade mode on the first go. While definitely too easy, this doesn’t hamper the enjoyment of Shattered Blade a great deal. This is the kind of game that demands much repetition anyway, and a great many matches were very close calls. There’s also no denying that no game should be completed in its first attempt, so the minimal challenge posed is something of a concern.

While I’d gladly sacrifice my controller to the God of Insane Beat-‘Em-Ups, the rabid interaction a serious fighter gets caught up in is the closest this reviewer has yet come to inflicting himself with Nintendonitis, or a good, old fashioned, self-inflicted black eye. Exciting at the time, but bear in mind there’s a wire between the Wii-mote and Nunchuk. There’s also a serious irritation caused by the pause button being mapped to 1 on the controller – a button that repeated connects with the heel of the palm and grinds the action to a depressing halt. The menu it jumps to also makes it damn easy to quit the game when aggressively trying to jump back into the fray.

But difficulty levels and wayward button presses aside, this is the most involving fighting game for quite some time – mostly thanks to the brilliant use of the Wii-mote but similarly dependent on the excellent realisation of the inspirational manga characters.

A new Dragonball game is heading toward the Nintendo console in the near future, and Sega have stepped in at exactly the right moment to set a high benchmark for future Wii fighters to vault.