Gungrave is exactly what it promises, a nice fun action romp with some really cool style. Gameplay's fairly simple, Grave aims on his own so all you have to do is fire (I recommend turning on the autofire option, unless carpal tunnel syndrome is your cup of tea) and watch enemies and the environment blow up. There's just enough strategy to Gungrave for it to not feel completely mindless, but still quite easy to breeze through: Grave is very sluggish normally but you have a few movement options like a dodge roll, and a mode, normally activated by clicking in a stick but that I recommend you remap via emulator to a free shoulder button, that lets him run a bit faster, plus a score system that grants you some consumable super attacks/heals throughout the stages and a rating at the end of them.

On the presentation front, yeah this game goes pretty hard, especially for a small scope PS2 game. Beyond the Grave is a really stylish protagonist (Incredibly smart of Nightow to design him from the back first, since that's what the player would be looking at most of the time), but honestly what I really liked were the stages- some are less interesting than others but on average the atmosphere is quite great. I especially loved how the last one looked but unfortunately that's the only one that seemed very unpolished and not fun at all as a result. Still this is a very low-commitment super neat game, highly recommend it.

This is probably the most 5 star 3.5 I’ve ever given, if that makes any sense.

After playing multiple long, content heavy RPG’s back to back, I felt burnt out. I love the genre, but I needed a break. My respite came from Beyond the Grave, in the form a gun slinging beat ‘em up that I cleared in less than 2 hours.

Let’s start off by addressing the story, or lack there of. Sure, there’s a story here but its main purpose to serve the gameplay. Things move fast, characters die, you keep shooting, and before you know it it’s over. The premise isn’t bad, it’s just not fully explored, but it doesn’t have to be. The game knows why you’re here, and it doesn’t waste your time. It gives you just what you need so you have an excuse to mow through crowds of enemies and face the bosses.

The gameplay might be polarizing. It’s extremely simple. You mash square, occasionally dodge, and then press triangle to clear out crowds when you’ve built enough meter. Sure, you have a melee attack but it’s rarely needed. I think I pressed square on my controller more times in those 2 hours than I have in the rest of the time I’ve had it. Is this repetitive? Of course, but that doesn’t mean it’s not fun. In most other shooters, the game encourages you to dodge or hide behind cover when fired upon by enemies, but that’s not the case here. The game wants you to stand your ground and style on your enemies and I love it. It feels really cool to watch Grave spin around basically dancing as he clears out an entire room of foes while standing his ground. Grave moves extremely slowly, but this just further encourages you to stay where you are, especially with the shield the game provides you and the iframes demolition shots offer. Speaking of which, the demolition shots are fun to use and also offer unique finishers against bosses if their health is low enough. After I realized that during the 3rd boss, I made sure to do it every time. These cinematics are pretty fun to watch as well and reward you for saving your demolition shots, which isn’t that difficult to do either.

I do have one complaint about gameplay though. The camera really sucks. The camera follows Grave, and you have a button to do a 180, but that doesn’t help much. Sometimes you’ll have to round corners to clear enemies shooting at you, but Grave turns so slowly it’s annoying. What makes it worse is that more enemies will be shooting at your back while you turn to shoot those around the corner. Overall, the game would really have benefitted from using the right analog to control the camera, but I get that it wasn’t common practice yet.

The last thing I wanna gush about is the art style. I really like it. It feels like a comic book or manga page sprung to life. The heavy use of shadows was really pleasant to look at as well. The closest thing I could compare it to would be a mishmash of guilty gear xrd and killer 7 or no more heroes. Between levels you’ll also get these really cool concept art/manga panels that look pretty sick too. The heavy stylization has really made the game age well visually.

All in all, I really appreciated the game for what it is. It was a palette cleanser that reminded me games can just be fun, and that’s good enough. Not every game has to be a GOTY, 10/10, masterpiece that’ll change your life. I really did miss playing these kinds of games. It feels like revisiting the child within me that first started playing video games. I just have to remind myself why I play them every so often, and this time I can thank Gungrave for that.

Holy based batman !
i came in barely expecting anything, but i found some pretty shiny gold, its short and sweet, its action packed, its a whole explosion of rule of cool, zero BS, zero gimmick, its short because its straight to the point, it won't deviate from gameplay and try to deliver what it promises right from the get go, it helps that its so fuckin cool.

also it should definelly be ported to steam, i forced 60 fps with 1080p and had a blast, this holds up surprisingly well.

for those wishing to try it on mouse and keyboard, here are my configs :
W,S : forth and back
A,D : turn left and right
Mouse 1 : shoot
mouse 2 : lock in (great to use when you gotta circle strafe a enemy)
E : grave sweep
Shift : run.

again i wish this was ported to steam, but emulating is still amazing in its own way

A fun short arcade style romp with a ton of replay value. It's very forgiving and plays almost like a cross between Max Payne and God Hand. The aesthetics are peak mid ps2 era vibes. I wouldn't be surprised if someone made a handful of breakcore songs based off the soundtrack either.
I was surprised at how well they pulled off stylish third person shooting without copying Max Payne. The only complaint I have is the one healing boss and the absolutely atrocious camera angles, but ps2 games are required by law to have terrible camera angles.

Gungrave introduces every level with the smash-header "Kick their asses." Gungrave is about one thing, kicking ass. Or more succinctly, shooting ass. You hardly aim, you don't reload, you hardly move. You mash a button and in response things either die or explode. Grave walks in a straight path, blazing everything in his way and taking every bullet wordlessly and painlessly as a combo builds in the corner of the screen. Get too close and he lifts a coffin from his back and swings it, insta-killing almost anything in its trajectory. The gunfire blows out the music and audio quality, and the gorgeous hard-black cel-shading lights up with muzzle flares as the screams gradient into the wailing jazz in the background. Gungrave is as primal as a video game can be without losing its status as pure, true art.

Don't let the score fool you, this game was better than alright, BUT I know this shit was $50 when it came out and I would be pissed if I bought this since I finished it in less than 90 minutes.

Took a few stages for the game to click for me. It's a fun arcade game with 6 stages, the boss fights being the highlight. Half my playtime was on the last 3 bosses alone, tough but fun.

Loved the music, which is probably done by the Trigun guy? The whole game feels like it mutated from a Trigun project with the people involved. Just wish it had more meat to it for the price.

Monoton, kurzweillig und erzählerisch kein Überflieger, aber dafür stylisch, actiongeladen und eine tolle Form von "Easy to learn, Hard to master".

Gungrave hat neben seinen super stumpfen und einfachen Gameplay dennoch eine gute Form der Herausforderung, dank einfachen und kompakten Levels, guten Gegnerplacement und einige Bosse, die gutes Timing verlangen und erfordern. Manche Leute würden sagen, es wäre das "perfekte 7/10 Videospiel", doch für mich ist Gungrave weitaus mehr, als eine 7/10. Es mag sein, dass der Nachfolger das Gameplay sehr entschlackte und einige coole neue Ideen einfügte, doch finde ich das Feedback und das Pacing im ersten Teil weiterhin als die bessere Erfahrung. HIer mehrere Playthroughs zu machen, ist dank der Spielzeit von gerade mal 2 Stunden, leichter auszuführen und viele Workarounds bei kniffeligen Stellen, werden schneller erlernt. Mir gibt Gungrave eher das Gefühl, eines Arcade Titels der 2000er, welche eine simple Idee nimmt und alles damit macht, was möglich ist.

Bottom Line: Ein klassisches Eric-Spiel, welches möglicherweise nicht jeden gefallen wird, aber für Freunde von kurzweiliger und spaßiger Action, genau der perfekte Fang ist.

Und es ist besser, als der peinliche Versuch, welcher 2022 mit Gungrave Gore versucht wurde.