The story of the game follows the events of the Manga/ Anime series from the first arc all the way to the end of the Mugen Train. Minor Spoilers for the series!
Somewhere in the Snowy mountains of Japan lives our main character Tanjiro Kamado with his family. Tanjiro often walks to the city in order to sell Charcoal and provide goods for his family as his father is no longer around. One day he returns home to find his entire family slaughtered by a demons. Every single member of his family was gone
except for his sister Nezuko who was turned into a demon. A demon slayer with a cold demeanor appeared in front of them with the goal of slaying the demon. Tanjiro tried to defend his demonic sister as he claimed she would never hurt anyone, despite his best, Tanjiro fails to defeat Giyu however his efforts left an impression on the slayer.
Nezuko despite being a demon, againts all odds defends her brother and refuses her demonic urges capturing Giyu off guard. Giyu decides to spare them and tells Tanjiro that if he truly wants to approach demons in hopes of ansewrs he should seek a man named Urokodaki.
Tanjiro and Nezuko reach the place of Urokodaki Without going into details, Urokodaki is impressed by the fact that Nezuko is yet to seek blood and offers to train Tanjiro in order to partake in the demon slayer exam. Only by becomming a demon slayer will Tanjiro have a chance of fighting off demons in hopes of finding a cure for his sister.
Tanjiro understands whats needs to be done and decides to do his best to make it to this years exams. Again without spoiling much, Tanjiro successfully becomes a demon slayer and is sent on various missions in order to get to Muzan, the demon king and the killer of his family. On his quests, fate had it and he meets two friends, Inosuke
and Zenitsu who re also demon slayers. The trio adventure together and fight with plenty of demons. However, the trio are travelling with a demon(friendly or not) which is considered a sin among the slayers and the Hashira(the best of the best) become aware of Tanjiro's companion and will have a say in it. At the same time, fate also had it that
Tanjiro runned into Muzan, making the demon king aware of Tanjiro's goal. In fact Tanjiro's earings seemed to bothered Muzan alot, as he often sends powerfull demons to deal with the young slayer.
What lies ahead of Tanjiro?
How will the Hashira deal with Nezuko?
Will Tanjiro's quest be successfull?
The story of the game is literally an abridged recreation of season one and the movie of the popular series, thus saying its good would be stating the obvious. What i will say, is that the effort put by CyberConnect2 is commendable. They put much effort into recreating locations expressions and actions that are one on one recreations of the series.
Despite keeping alot of things out of the game the key elements and structure of the story is clear. Additionally there are collectables called Memore Fragements. These fragements are small cutscenes that use still images from the animated series with characters narrating the events that the fragement covers. Furthermore, there are characters fragments
whose goal is to form a better image for certain characters. The game is fully voice acted and it does a great job narrating the events of 26 episodes and a 2hrs movie in more or less 7 hours.
Demon Slayer The Hirokami Chronicles is a 3D Anime fighter that blends action adventures elements in the main story. In story mode, the player controls mostly Tanjiro. In each chapter, the game usually begins with long cutscenes before dropping the player into a small sandbox where they can freely move around in pre determined paths. During these sections theres little spoken dialog unless its mandatory.
For example, in a couple of cases, the player sinply holds the forward button whilst Tanjiro and his group interact with each other. The gameplay there feels more like a last minute add on than a well thought gameplay. In fact "these" walking sections have been critisized for simply dragging and adding hours on the clock to justify the pricetag of the game. In other cases, the world has multiple paths that
have blue exclanation marks(!) that act as side quest. All of these, are usually interactions with NPCs or with items. Completing them will unlock items in the archives. A Minimap is positioned on the top right that shows everything available. Some objectives cant be completed on one go as they might appear after the main objective is cleared. Whilst moving, low rank demons with original designs will ambush
the player for a small conflict. And finally, in some cases, the player can use Tanjiro's special sense of smell in order to track down the objective. Red smoke signals will appear forming a path.
The Boss encounters are by far one of the best parts of the game. These encounters are all unique with unique gimmicks. During these, the game uses the 3D arena format, however the damage dealth to the Boss is not the same as the ones found in the PVP. The bosses usually power up for an attack. Whilst charging a red AoE will flash indicating the area which the demon will strike allowing you to dodge or
block. Some have unique gimmicks like Kyogai, the drum demon can flip the room multiple times. Yahaba is demon that sends arrows to many directions with some of them picking the player and moving them around, where as Nemu is a demon that will make you fall asleep. In most of these, the player will have to press buttons to avoid the hits. After the player delivers a certain ammount of hits the demons eneter
berserk mode visually represented with a red aura. During that, hurting the demon will be hard and stunning them out of the question. Usually the player should avoid the hits by dodging or blocking. These hits deal more damage than the usual one. Last but not least, main plot demons usuaally conclude with a cinematic takedown. Once the final hit is delivered, a cinematic will begin to play with quick time
events for the player to respond. Failing or clicking the button will not cancel the animation or deal damage to the player, everything will go as scripted with the only negative output being a bad rank.
The general battle gameplay the mechanicks are easy to pick up but have a decent depth that allows for a more competitive gameplay. The formula in these are 2 vs 2,1 vs 2, 1 vs 2 or 1 vs 1. The idea is, if a player chooses to play as a human/Demon Slayer character(the exception being ealry Nezuko) then the player must choose a supporting character, however if they choose a demon then they can only play as
that one character. This is because in the anime, Muzan never allowed his Demons to work in pairs, in fear that if his demons ever developed teamwork, they might try to work againts him. However, playing as one or two characters doesnt make much of a difference, as the same mechanicks exists. For example, the Health bar shared for both heroes. When under attacked, the player can call for an assist which will bring the
ally in the field to grap and push away your character. During Neutral or during on of your combos, the assist button will call the ally to either begin the combo, start the pressure or even expand the combo. Holding down the assist button will change between the heroes. A yellow bar next to the heroes profiles indicate the availability of the assist. When used it starts to recharge. Demons on the other hand, dont
have allies and thus a solution was made to keep them balanced. When comboed, the same assist/escape from harm mechanism exists with the demons themselves leaping away and ally assist are replaced with extra special attacks.
When entering the battle field, the player can execute light combo attacks by mashing the attack button. Different combos can occured by mashing the attach combo and a direction. Holdind down the attack button and a direction can deal a heavy strike. This strike usually charges and grants small shields allowing you to tank some hits before delivering your blow. Ofcourse, a special attack will knock you out of your stance.
Special attacks can happen by using a different button. Each character except demons have three special attacks. These are triggered with the the button it self, the button and a direction or a combination of two. A jump button exist that allows the player to attack from above, or expand their combo into an aerial compact. The dash button can be used to dodge any incomming attack or when held down, the player will rush
towards the opponent. When perfect timed, the dash block can be used to cancel your own combo in order to expand the combo further. Defense wise the player han hold down the block button. A stamine bar, or a visual indications shows how many blows the character can block before being stunned. The block button with a direction can parry the upcomming blows allowing the player to punish the other. Additionally the block button
and the two offensive buttons can allow the player to use the special or perform a grap.
Last but not least the player has a surge bar that fils in during battle. It fills by using combos, blocks and over time. The surge bar can be filled up to three times(3 stacks) however the player can use them at any time. The most common usage is that of performing the ultimate. The ultimate attack is a cinematic move that deals a great ammount of damage. It can be used in neutral or even within a combo. Be aware that
some ultimates are chasing the opponent whilst others simmply strike infront of them. The other usage of the bar is to boost the character. When boosted the characters run faster, deal more damage and attack even faster. Its visually indicated with the characters being surrounded within an aura. If the player has 2 bars, he can boost and then enter surge mode. Entering surge mode, triggers a cinematic where the heroes usually
actiivate their breaths and suround their blade with their breathing styke. For example, Rengoku will glow orange from boost and his blade with be surrounded by flame. Each strike is also escorted with stunning visuals and just like boost every single element is further boosted. Here is where Demons also differ as they do not have a breathing style. Boost is the same however surge acts differently. Instead of having breathing
styles infused with their attacks they simply regenerate lost life over time.
Battles usually last 3 rounds. Winning two games in a row, doesnt matter as a third game can still occur if both players decide to do so. The boost bar and its counts continues into the next battle so feel free to keep them if not necessary. For example, if you have an ult, dont spend it because the enemy will die either way and instead keep it in order to use it next round.
Heres the thing, the gameplay is good easy to pick up and play but it comes with its flaws. None of them are deal breaking to me but i can see people dropping it eventually. First things first story wise, i found the "free roam" decent in some cases and annoying in others. For example, i do not see the reason why some cases dragged as far as they did, eg. The trio departing the old lady's mansion after recovering. Others were hilarious and fun, like Zenitsu's forest walk and others were decent, Like Tanjiro trying to reach Muzan or him and Inosuke entering the spider forest. Exploration usually doesnt reward with bunch of things but in some cases it does. Boss battles are one of this game's strength, however unfortunately despite being cleverly design and having unique mechanicks and quick time events, they re relatively easy. Last but not least the main compact of the game is fun. Its easy to pick up and has some depth to master mechanicks and rise above the competition. Visually sometimes it may be hard to see the oppenings due to the special effects. The characters play abit similary to each other but their animations differ. It fails to do something to stand out from other 3D anime arena battles as technically the only unique feature is the boost/surge however given that its simply a power up it doesnt make it that unique to stand out. The roaster consist of 31 heroes, including the paid/free DLC characters, where some of them are simply reskins of others with different speicals/ultimates. Eg. 4 Tanjiros, 3 Inosukes/Zenitsus 2 Giyus/Shinobus etc.
Demon slayer the Hirokami Chronicles seems to be lacking the Solo content. Seems like the game's true value was the online version which according to many was healthy back when it was released. For me, i played the game in 2025 and unfortunately the games online is pretty much dead, unless you play online with friends or with members of the community who will be willing to play the game. My guess is with the release of the second game, finding players will be even harder. Despite that, Local coop is still available, thus you can play with your friends during a game night or something. Upon completing the story, the players can challenge themselves by trying to receive S ranks in all missions and story battles. Trainning mode not to be confused with Practice will have you play againts a bot where you will have to win with certain conditions. There are 10 heroes each with its own 10 mission challenges. Unfortunately, all the missions are the exact same, making them feel more like grinding than actually enjoyable/challenging. Speaking of grinding, collecting all the collectables in order to collect all the Archives can be an activity. Some collectables are completed by doing the small interaction side quests in the story mode and by spending the ingames currency. I would reccomend spending the currency on the playable characters and the stadiums than anything cosmetic(Audio, Phrases, Attires, profile pictures etc.) Aside from those, theres nothing left honestly, just fight againts bots or players(locally or online with friends/community members).
One thing that is true is that this game is gorgeous to look at. CyberConnect2 is famous for delivering amazing quality cutscenes and they did this game justice. In fact people like to compare it to the actual animated series, thats how good looking it is. As mentioned, Ufotable did work closely with Cc2 providing them with advices, key arts and others.
Throughout the story theres plenty of details in the presentation of the characters and the locations. I ll quickly mention that the Memory Fragments took screenshots from the series and used them to give a brief context to the players. During boss battles, the unique demons mechanics are easily visible and cleverly design the abilities of the enemy. For,
example, Rui's brother spider design made multiple spiders visually creepy following Zenitsu. In normal battles online the game once again its stunning with beutiful effects during each combo. The awakening of each hero activates the heroes beathing which will surround the blade with effects making each hit look far more impressive and impactfull worthy of
each damage boost. The Ultimates are fantastic, with unique camera angles, alot of actions and amazing effects. However, these looks despite looking fantastic, can sometimes hide the action or the parry window. Since the camera of the game is usually placed behind the character, any massive attack effect(Like Rengokus/Tangiro's Tengen.. Δ attack) creates an
effect that people can side step or counter, however the action would be hidden from you leavng you open for an attack.
On the sound department the game doesnt dissapoint and sticks to the roots of Demon Slayer. Some Osts are straight out of the series whilst others are completely unique. Theres plenty of songs to unlock in the Archives and enjoy. Every originl voice Actor returns to reprise their roles for both the Japanese Audio and ofcourse the Dub. I played the game in Japanese and honeslty if you were to tell me that
the voice recordings were taken straight from the anime i would believe you, they re that good(obviously ^_^). The dub's audio is also good, however i havents seen the show in dub and i only swapped to Dub for one VS CPU game. The actors seemed to have done a good job. Last but not least the sound effects from the blades and attacks are satisfying to hear as landing
the normal combo and then fusing a special make those sounds that you feel the impact.
In conclusion, Demon Slayer The Hirokami Chronicles was proven to be a game of its time, or only worth your time(in 2025) if bought on a sale. The game allows the player to experience the main story of the series from the beginning all the way to the events of the Mugen Train. However the narrative is given more through an Abridged Version that can be completed within 7 hours. There are Memory Fragments that can feel in the blanks left from the story. The cutscenes of the game are full of energy and detail on the characters expressions and models. Gameplay wise, the game is simple to follow and everyone for everyone to pick up and play with some mechanics allowing it to be more competitive. Visually the game is stunnng as special effects and unique camera angles make the game stand the test of time. Audio wise, the original cast return and make an excellent job. Different songs were alse made that do the series justice. Unfortunately, where the game fails to deliver, is content. Upon release, the game was lacking a decent size character roaster. This in 2025 is no issue as many were added as free and paid DLC but still it should be mentioned. Additionally, the game was made mostly for online, as any activity in Solo player is limited. Upon completing the game, the player can only play againts the bots in versus mode and in Trainning where all the missions are the same for each hero, making it a hussle to grind. Practice mode is also lacking on content which cannot benefit the player on trying to master actions similar to other shows. Overall, Demon slayer Hirokami Chronicles in 2025 is mostly playable in Single Player or for PVP locally/online(with Friends). A sequel is in the horizon which seems to be an overall improvement of the current one.
This is a video of me reviewing the game