Samurai Champloo: Sidetracked is the latest anime-based game from Bandai and it's quite enjoyable. Developed by Grasshopper Manufacture Inc, the game is a frantic button mashing extravaganza wrapped within wonderful cut scenes and a gripping story that will no doubt please fans of the television series, but if you're a n00b like myself, there's still plenty to love about its hack-an-slash gameplay and hip hop style.

The story, which is actually an entirely new episode in the franchise, chronicles the exploits of three travelers, the samurai Mugen and Jin and their companion Fuu, a young and pretty girl who's in search of the samurai that smells of sunflowers. They travel across Japan fighting, eating, and then fighting some more, even though Mugen and Jin are constantly at odds with one another. But for the most part, they've got one another's back and that's definitely a good thing. They certainly run into their share of allies, but enemies are lurking around every corner and they usually attack en masse, so the trio bands together and cuts the poor fools in half, leaving behind much carnage in their wake.

The cool thing, one of many cool things, about this game is you don't need to follow the series in order to understand what's going on. Grasshopper's done a marvelous job of telling the story through in game and gorgeous CG cut scenes that wonderfully describe the group's travels towards Nagasaki, and the voice acting is pretty good and at times hysterical, though that seems to have been the intent, to make some of the characters sound absolutely ridiculous.

Having seen the show several times, I was at first a little uncomfortable watching the CG, because instead of hiring artists to hand draw the 2D animation, Bandai and Grasshopper elected to go with fully 3D characters and environments ala Square Enix's Final Fantasy series. It's a bit weird seeing Fuu, Jin, and Mugen modeled this way, but I quickly adjusted to it, mostly because the animation is so well done. The production values are at a very high level, and never once have I thought that either Bandai of Grasshopper were doing anything half assed.

The story begins with the trio coming upon a boat that's advertising free lodging and food. Starved, Mugen, who is the more reckless of the bunch due to his break dancing inspired fighting style, immediately rushes towards the ship and attaches himself to it, much to the chagrin of a man who tries to get him off by poking him with a stick. As the other two look on, Fuu, who never turns down food, let alone free food, convinces Jin, who is the more reserved person in the group, to follow Mugen. Unfortunately, their voyage leads them into a barren snow covered waste land, and after being deserted, the three are left to defend themselves from what appear to be a small band of ninjas.

When I first encountered the fighting system several months ago I was incredibly confused and for good reason. The combat screen has a record and a little dude in the bottom left corner, there's a weird looking combo tree at the top, and there's like, all these records spinning around. It's quite bizarre, but once I made it through the game's tutorial, which I discovered while exploring the first town, everything became crystal clear.

Samurai Champloo is a straight up button masher, but like in most games, with some practice, memorization, and patience, you'll achieve incredibly sweet results. The combo tree, for example, basically lays out all of the cool and devastating moves you can pull off, so you may start out pressing square, then need to tap Triangle, Triangle, Square. The combo tree moves from left to right, and it will also branch depending on how well you're doing.

Another important thing to note is the Rhythm. Samurai Champloo is a cool anime because it combines ancient Japan with hip hop music. It's all a bit fantastical but it definitely works, and Grasshopper has done a nice job incorporating the music into its game. Basically, the game is full of LPs (records), and each one contains its own combo tree. You purchase LPs in town, and then you can decide which ones you'd like to bring into battle. While fighting, you can change your LP/the music on the fly by tilting the right analog stick, and doing so will result in a new batch of combos.

You can also counter attack. Just when an opponent is about to strike, you press an attack button and the screen freezes. In another second or two, and as both you and your enemy are locked in this epic confrontation, face buttons will appear on the screen, and if you press them in order and at the right time your character will explode with a counter attack that'll do serious damage.