If you have played a game called Guardian Heroes, then you have an idea of what type of game this is. In Code of Princess EX, Princess Solange and her motley crew of warriors, mages and thieves (if you want to call them that) have to stop the spread of evil monsters through the kingdom. This is an enhanced version of the 3DS game but with better graphics and rebalanced gameplay. The game is a sidescrolling brawler that allows you to shift up and down through (3) horizontal planes to dodge and defeat your enemies. Each character has unique melee and ranged attacks and the more levels you beat (they can be pretty short and to the point), the more characters you unlock to play and upgrade as. You also gain new upgrade perks that you can assign to either give you more HP, Magic points or help you do stronger attacks against bosses. You can purchase others and swap them out as you like between characters. As you progress, your characters will automatically upgrade as well. The physical edition does come with a full color instruction manual and a mini cd with songs from the game. One thing of note for anyone who played the original 3DS game, although the graphics are a bit better and the gameplay/combat rebalanced, there is one huge change: You can no longer assign individual skill points to characters in order to upgrade. Even though you can swap out perks and upgrade automatically, the first game allowed you to gain a number of skill points as well that you could assign permanently to your overall health, magic, attack power etc. You can longer do this. For example, you could grind a few battles and assign all of your skill points to your melee attack to give you a strong upper hand but this is not the case in this version. These skill are distributed automatically when you upgrade now. Which means that you will have to do a lot more grinding before you can advance through latter levels for certain characters. Also, the English dub is no longer available - it is Japanese with English Subtitles only! The comedy is still funny and quirky, but anyone looking for the Atlus release's dub might be disappointed. Overall a fun and challenging game with better graphics and quirky characters...but with a few omissions. The soundtrack is also solid. I do recommend it but know what you are getting into!

This is a re-release of a GREAT 3DS title from a few years back. The original had JAP/ENG audio options, but due to a change in US publishing rights we lost what the majority felt was a pretty great dub. The gameplay is largely the same. It's still a pretty game with smooth movements and a huge number of characters with various abilities. Local couch co-op is possible and can be pretty fun. I'd recommend it. The story is pretty interesting, so don't press through the dialogue too quickly.

Easy to get into. Goofy story. All around a fun game. Does have a difficulty spike a little ways in but not so hard as to make the game un playable.

Music and visuals are great, don't get me wrong, but gameplay is lacking. It's a side-scrolling beat-em-up sure, and that's been done and done well, the problem I have with the game though, at least in the first three hours, is that the controls are clunky, the main character moves super slow, and the attacks are stiff and slow.

Code of Princess is the spiritual successor to cult classic Guardian Heroes for the Sega Saturn (later ported to the Xbox 360 & currently backwards compatible on the Xbox One). Even if you never played Guardian Heroes, this is a great game. One of the biggest issues with the 3DS version was the framerate, but that's not an issue here. This game is a lot smoother, has a lot of content, likable characters, and a fun story. Good for both males & females!