- Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
- Video Codec: AVC/MPEG-4
- Resolution: 1080p/24
- Audio Codec: Japanese Dolby TrueHD 2.0, English Dolby TrueHD 5.1
- Subtitles: English
- Region: A
- Rating: TV-14
- Discs: 2
- Studio: Funimation
- Blu-ray Release Date: October 12, 2010
- List Price: $59.98
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BestBuy.com:
Purchase Sengoku Basara: Samurai Kings on Blu-ray at CD Universe
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Overall
[Rating:3.5/5]
The Series
[Rating:4/5]
Video Quality
[Rating:4/5]
Audio Quality
[Rating:3.5/5]
Supplemental Materials
[Rating:2/5]
Click thumbnails for high-resolution 1920X1080p screen captures
(Screen captures are lightly compressed with lossy JPEG thus are meant as a general representation of the content and do not fully reveal the capabilities of the Blu-ray format)
The Series
[Rating:4/5]
Sengoku Basara: Samurai Kings is an anime series based on the Capcom Playsation 2 videogame of the same name. It’s set in the Sengoku, or “Warring States”, period of feudal Japan during which time many generals fought for power. The series revolves around the two historical figures, the warlords Sanada Yukimura and Date Masamune.
The series combines feudal Japan with fantasy and science fiction for a nonstop burst of anime action. Each warlord has his own special attack, used to boost their power in battle, but what begins as a battle of titan against titan, turns into a colossal battle of all of the super-strengths when one ultimate evil, The Demon Lord, threatens all of the land and a group of enemies are forced to put together an army of armies and join forces to conquer him.
Sengoku Basara: Samurai Kings is a little light on the story as one might expect from a series based on a video game, but it hits you right in the gut with a nearly lethal dose of action, spectacular animation, and a classic good versus evil theme.
Video Quality
[Rating:4/5]
There are some very slight problems with aliasing and a little bit of softness in the 1080p AVC/MPEG-4 encoding of Sengoku Basara: Samurai Kings from Funimation, but apart from that, the image looks clean, meaning there isn’t too much video noise or color banding and compression artifacts aren’t an issue either.
Audio Quality
[Rating:3.5/5]
The English Dolby TrueHD 5.1 isn’t as aggressive as I’d expected it to be. The surround channels are active and very audible, but rather than being used heavily for discrete sound effects, they are filled more with ambience and atmospherics. The dialogue is clean and intelligible and dynamic range is pretty good as well.
The Japanese Dolby TrueHD 2.0 mix offers a good balance of sounds, a wide soundstage, aggressive stereo panning and good, clean dialogue as well.
Supplemental Materials
[Rating:2/5]
There isn’t much here outside of a small set of animated “mini episodes” featuring some of the Samurai Kings characters re-imagined.
The supplements provided with this release are:
- New Anime “Sengoku Basara Chosokabe Motochika-Kun and Mori-Kun” (1.78:1; 1080i/60)
- Textless Opening Song
- Textless Closing Song
- Trailers
The Definitive Word
Overall:
[Rating:3.5/5]
Sengoku Basara: Samurai Kings is Samurai drama with a twist — aggressive fun that rams the action into overdrive right from the beginning, what this series lacks in pensiveness it makes up for in adrenalin. Recommended.
Additional Screen Captures:
[amazon-product align=”right”]B003SPDSEE[/amazon-product]
BestBuy.com:
Purchase Sengoku Basara: Samurai Kings on Blu-ray at CD Universe
Shop for more Blu-ray titles at Amazon.com
