In 4, Tokugawa Ieyasu's normal praise is "You're an asset to me", which is fine. If he said it to Ii Naotora, though, it unwittingly means something else.
Aluminum Christmas Trees: Western neophyte players in particular might just be surprised at how much of what's presented in these games is based closely on historical fact. For example, the "Star-Crossed Lovers" arc for Ōichi and Nagamasa Azai? Yep, that one's out of Japanese history, as is her death at Shizugatake, albeit the game has her fighting alongside Katsuie Shibata, who was her husband after Nagamasa, instead of committing seppuku with him.
When Naotora was announced as an addition, fans expected her to be a total badass, being one of the few female daimyo in Japanese history. Unfortunately, she wasn't exactly welcomed by Western fans due to her meek, Reluctant Warrior personality, which reminded Warriors veterans of how Daqiao is portrayed in Dynasty Warriors, including her blatant Fanservicey character design and her constant apologizing. While the presence of her adopted son Ii Naomasa in Samurai Warriors 4-II may have improved Naotora in terms of Character Development, she's still looked down by Western fans for being a cliched moe blob character who was added to the roster merely to pander to the fanservice crowd. It doesn't help that she made constant appearances in promotional materials of other Koei Tecmo games and is the series producer's favorite character. Meanwhile, the Japanese fandom adores her for the same reasons Western fans hate her, considering that they keep voting her in several popularity polls.
Mitsunari Ishida also runs into the same problem with Naotora: he's the most popular character in the games (occasionally surpassing Series Mascot Sanada Yukimura), and the Japanese cannot have enough of him due to the values which don't endear him to Western fans - he's a textbook TsundereBishōnen. That alone eclipses his other flaws, such as being a Jerkass to his retainers and his self-righteousness.note It's worth noting that Mitsunari's arrogance and jerkassery are Truth in Television, his lack of tact and respect to his allies such as the Mori and Shimazu, made them not do anything during Sekigahara, costing Ishida the battle.
Angst? What Angst?: Contrasting her reaction in 3: Xtreme Legends, Gracia is surprisingly not too saddened upon hearing of Akechi Mitsuhide's death in 4. During the "Battle of Hiketa" where she sides with Chosokabe Motochika against the Hashiba Army (who were responsible for her father's death), she will only say that she wants to continue her father's legacy. While Gracia does show a little angst in 4-II when she receives the news of Mitsuhide's passing, with everyone labeling him a traitorous criminal, it lasts roughly a few seconds, and she's instantly back to being cheery.
Badass Decay: Imagawa Yoshimoto, when compared to his historical counterpart. The Real Life Yoshimoto is a cunning, effective and menacing daimyo, rivaling the likes of Takeda Shingen and Uesugi Kenshin. Unfortunately, because he's the man who's beaten brutally through sheer luck by Nobunaga in the latter's first big battle (then kickstarted the "Three Unifiers Era" of the Sengoku Period), Samurai Warriors turns Yoshimoto into an incompetent buffoon, the equivalent of Zhang Jiao from Dynasty Warriors. In 4, Koei Tecmo mitigates this by showcasing Yoshimoto with a dark, serious side that is rarely brought to light, one that reveals how terrifying and successful he can be as a daimyo. This is further rectified in 5 where Yoshimoto ditches all comedic aspects of his character and becomes a serious threat, easily dismantling Nobunaga in a cutscene.
Fans are divided on whether character-specific or force-specific story modes are for the better. The latter is evidently easier to implement, but thanks to new characters in major installments often being cast as part of that game's Spotlight-Stealing Squad, it's left some pre-existing characters feel insignificant. The consensus seems to be that clan storytelling works best for its sister series as the characters there are bunched up into larger factions and each mostly serves their chosen faction until their demise. Samurai Warriors characters are far more individual due to the chaotic nature of the era and with only the exception of major clans such as the unifiers, clan stories fail to maximise the potential of character interactions and various hypotheticals tailored to each character are discarded in favor of the historical narrative.
Koei Tecmo's tendency to give possibly-fictional friendships/relationships among the characters: some fans think they are well-written and justified because historical records from some of these characters are minimal, forcing the developers to improvise, but others believe they are, at its worst, badly-written (or campy, at best). This is understandable when some of these fictional friendships can be horribly misplaced - Toyotomi Hideyoshi's friendship with Saika Magoichi? Sounds doable, not to mention it's part of Hideyoshi's Historical Hero Upgrade in these games, but none of the Real Life bearers of the Saika Magoichi name ever got along with Hideyoshi. In fact, one of them, Sadayu Suzuki, is forced to commit Seppuku by Hideyoshi following the Battle of Komaki-Nagakute since he sided with Ieyasu.
Detractors also point out how Koei Tecmo seems to favor these fictional elements more while omitting other potential stories that are prominent in the history of that era, such as Hideyoshi's invasion of Korea, Gracia's religious alignment with Christianity, and her overall relationship with her husband Tadaoki (it's never really shown outside of 3: Xtreme Legends), Kuroda Kanbei and his relationship with foreigners, etc. Supporters appear more understanding that the nature of these potential stories can be disastrous (a la Values Dissonance and What Do You Mean, It's Not Political?) to certain players, particularly Real Life Christians and Koreans, thus it's better if they're not implemented (worth noting is rival series Sengoku Basara also omits the Korean Invasion, even though Hideyoshi is given a Historical Villain Upgrade, though the Christianity aspect is dealt a humorous spin due to the over-the-top setting allowing it, while the more down-to-earth approach of the Warriors series might not be the best fit).
3 has a lot of issues that make it considered a downgrade from 2. It only launched on the Wii, played horrendously slow, had unintuitive controls and the levels were no longer as 'open' as previous games. The allied AI was also just bad, with them unfairly dying and the player often tasked to protect many frail allies on different sides of the map in frustrating and borderline impossible ways.
The English dub for 3 falls under this category, particularly the English voice actors' lackluster performances, making many characters' voices contain a tint of Dull Surprise (which sounds incredibly unfitting for spirited Japanese Samurai), among other flaws. However, compared to the second game's cheesy English dub, some of the voiceovers are superior from an acting standpoint, and many fans are unhappy that the fourth title's localization stripped out the dub altogether.
Fans are already divided on the changes to the series coming to Samurai Warriors 5: the drastically reduced roster means that many fan-favorite characters would not make it in, including Mitsunari Ishida, as Word of God dictates along with other characters were alive during Nobunaga's time but are not shown and mentioned in the games (e.g. the Sanada clan and Keiji Maeda). Also, the redesigns of several existing characters have been met with mixed reception to say the least, as well as the possibility of cloning weapons (Katsuie's twin axes are replaced with a spear similar to newcomer Toshimitsu Saito). Fortunately, though Samurai Warriors 5 ended up being the most critically acclaimed game of the series in Metacritic, and Steam had overwhelmingly positive reception, so despite the tradeoff in some of the more devoted and hardcore fans, it attracted enough newcomers to the series to warrant the reimagining and [1], at least from a commercial point of view.
Ranmaru for obvious reasons; case in point, there was so much outrage after he was Demoted to Extra in 2. Since then, Ranmaru's gradually reclaimed his relevance in later installments.
Mori Motonari: he wasn't officially revealed for the initial line-up of 3 until a day before the game's release, nor does he get mixed in with the whole Ho Yay stuff among other members of the roster. His character design renders him nothing close to a Warriors-styled Bishounen (despite being middle-aged), yet fan artists love his appearance.
In a popularity poll coinciding with 3: Empires, Shima Sakon wound up being the fourth most popular character behind Mitsunari (one of the series' most important characters), Yukimura (the poster boy) and Gracia (who owes herself to this trope as well).
Otani Yoshitsugu is very popular as he was placed second in the popularity poll of the fourth game. Prior to his debut, he was one of the most wanted playable characters. It helps that Bishōnen characters in Warriors games naturally attract a lot of female fans.
Todo Takatora is also popular as he was ranked third in the same popularity poll. His character design, which looks similar to Jin Kazama of Tekken, may have attributed to this.
Yasuke, due to being the first Western Samurai introduced in the series, and the most well-known Black Samurai for that matter. His debut in Samurai Warriors 5 coincided around the same time as the Netflix original anime series Yasuke was being hyped. Though it's not the first time Yasuke appeared in a Koei Tecmo title, with Nioh being his most notable appearance, said series is what gave him more mainstream attention. While this technically means Yasuke is taking Ranmaru's spot as 'Nobunaga's closest retainer' (Ranmaru is excluded in 5), even Ranmaru fans didn't mind much because it's Yasuke.
"Honor Trio" for Kanetsugu, Mitsunari and Yukimura due to their vow that they would fight for honor.
"Pedo-yoshi" for Hideyoshi due to his interactions with Chachanote His historical concubine and his son's Toyotomi Hideyori's mother in Samurai Warriors: Spirit of Sanada; historically, Hideyoshi was roughly 33-years older than her.
"Spirit of Oda" for Samurai Warriors 5, in reference to the Spirit of SanadaSpin-Off and how 5 would take the narrative focus back on the Oda clan's rise to power during the era.
First Installment Wins: For a time, 1 was well-received in the West despite the Warriors franchise usually scoring predictably low with reviewers. The story and voice acting were praised and the subtle, but notable departures from Dynasty Warriors fighting mechanics were seen favorably (particularly the Eastern RPG elements, which added additional replay value). Fans are more divided on whether the Sequels improved upon the original or never matched it.
Riding at top speed with Matsukaze, the strongest and fastest mount in the first game with the best overall stats, will allow any character to pull a One-Hit Kill over anything the stallion can mow down.
The five scrolls in the first Samurai Warriors: by equipping all five, elemental attacks turn into One Hit Kills that severely damage enemy officers. On a similar note, the "Demon" element ("Dark" element in the localization) from the second game does the same thing, until it was rectified in 2: Xtreme Legends.
Okuni's charged attacks (notably her second charged attack) from the first game possesses ridiculous amounts of striking power.
Miyamoto Musashi is hilariously broken in Samurai Warriors 2 for three reasons and deliberately so (Word of God states he was made as such so players can use him to truly experience the "Chaos" difficulty): first, he has the Personal Skill "Reversal" - whereas other characters will be Stunlocked if struck several times in succession, Musashi can counter enemy strikes simply by using a charged attack, interrupting an enemy combo to send his attackers-turned-victims flying (with the ending blow of his fourth charged attack). Secondly, his Special Skill 2 (R1 + Triangle) is a Shockwave Stomp quickly refilling the Musou Gauge by a set amount, meaning he can use "Musou Attacks" like no tomorrow once the gauge is filled; furthermore, said stomp causes guard break and stagger when enemies and bosses are hit by it, leaving them open for attack. Not to mention his Special Skill 1 (R1 + Square) from Samurai Warriors 2. A counter move that, if Musashi is attacked during its animation, he'll perform a lightning quick, invincible 3 hit attack that's effective for both crowd clearing and one-on-one fights. And this can be used repeatedly if timed right to single-handedly clear a crowd. With just one move. Finally, Musashi's Musou Attack, due to a combination of damage, proximity and range, is the most devastating out of all characters in the game. His weaknesses tend to be a lack of range outside of reaching fatal-marksmen Mooks and his stationary Musou Attack. It's telling when Musashi, despite still being very good in the Sequels, had his Shockwave Stomp Special Skill Nerfed by only allowing him to fill up the Musou Gauge provided it comes into contact with enemies, along with a new hitbox for his third charged attack input, and his Musou Attack juggling enemies too high to prevent long Combo strings.
Honda Tadakatsu is essentially the Lu Bu of Samurai Warriors (though the interlude compares him more so to Zhang Fei), yet he is faster than both of them (having above-average attack and movement speed between Samurai Warriors characters), and all of his attacks deal high damage. In 2, not only does his Special Skill 1 allow him to regain a division of the Musou Gaugenote The more enemies hit by this skill, the more Musou is gained, making it akin to Musashi's Special Skill 2 and Special Skill 2 causing damage to enemies simply by running into them, his Musou Attack can also clear a room of Mooksin seconds.
The "wheel formation" in 2: Empires: not only does it give players the normal speed and morale boost if it's the advantageous formation, it also doubles attack and defense, effectively turning almost any battle into a Curb-Stomp Battle if the enemy doesn't have anything to counter it (which is a 1-in-3 chance for every formation they still have).
Samurai Warriors 4 introduces the "Stimulus" skill: all rare weapons carry it at maximum strength and it can be found on random weapons at higher difficulties. What does it do? Stimulus boost parameters beyond the 50 Level Cap, which is what makes it so coveted; essentially, a character who is already maxed at level 50 can, with a weapon having Stimulus, keep "leveling" i.e. - gain Experience Points even though their level won't change, yet continue gaining stats until all parameters reach their maximum. It doesn't sound like much, but the trick is that in 4, reaching a 1000 KOs while in combat grants a character every Status Buff in the game all at once for an extended period of time. With Stimulus, these same buffs will also be applied each time the character "levels up" in battle, thus allowing a character to enter the boosted "leveled up" state for the entire duration of a stage, despite technically not being able to level up anymore, and provided there are enough enemies and experience points to earn (greatly helping this is an item that increases the drop rate for experience scrolls whenever Mooks are defeated). Put it all together and players can easily wipe out an entire battlefield clean in a matter of minutes, even at "Nightmare" difficulty.
Musou attacks on horses in 5 are ridiculously overpowered. They charge through the enemy ranks, KO most regular foes in one hit, cut through officers' health like soft butter, and last for several seconds to cover a good distance. They are invaluable for getting S Ranks in Citadel Mode's later levels.
Germans Love David Hasselhoff: When Koshosho was revealed for the line-up in 4, Japanese players were really annoyed at her character design and her list of manipulated men includes "Samurai Warriors fans" that were pissed she made it onto the roster with an incredibly outrageous appearance when other popular choices like Miyoshi Choukei or Motochika's wife Nana didn't make the cut. However, Western players consider Koshosho's overexaggerated aspects utterly fabulous, making her many a player's favorite.
Blue-tipped Spearmen in 5 due to their ability to block Hyper Attacks and counter, breaking both the flow of battle and a combo string.
Riflemen in 5 can also be these if the player is stuck in the middle of a formation of them as their repeated shots that stagger the player make it very difficult to get out of the area.
Nene's dream stage in 2 depicts her "spanking" everyone in Sekigahara, both from Western and Eastern armies, and the whole situation is treated as comedy. The Anime adaptation and Spirit of Sanada instead show that despite being Hideyoshi's widow, Nene really can't do anything to solve the dispute between Mitsunari and Ieyasu.
The opening scene in Azai Story Mode in 4 has Yoshitsugu standing motionlessly while Rain of Arrowsinexplicably miss him completely, and Takatora chastises him for being stupid and almost killing himself. In the anime adaptation, Yoshitsugu is killed in Sekigahara by similar Rain of Arrows while Takatora watches.
Playing Motonari's story in 3 and seeing his sons (Kobayakawa Takakage, Kikkawa Motoharu, and Mori Takamoto) and grandson (Mori Terumoto) as allied officers is a bit harsh when one recalls their descendants (Kobayakawa Hideaki, Kikkawa Hiroie and Mori Hidemoto) are known traitors at the Battle of Sekigahara, even if they betrayed the Toyotomi clan to save the Mori clan (along with the Kikkawa and Kobayakawa clans, given they are retainers to the Mori clan) from the Tokugawa. Likewise, playing the Mori clan's story in 4 and Takakage's own story in 4-II will make players feel this way as well, especially when Takakage loyally fought for the Toyotomi up until his off-screen death.
Hilarious in Hindsight: Hanzo's final scene in Spirit of Sanada was genuinely heartwrenching when he shed tears for Sasuke, realizing that he could have treated him like a son but couldn't express it properly all along, realizing it before he died. Cut to a few years in the future, Hanzo's voice actorexploded in popularity beyond Japan and one particular meme was born, to the point where one can say that Hanzo spent his final scene singing that verse from "Baka Mitai".
I Knew It!: Many players were expecting that a historical Western Samurai (e.g. William Adams and Yasuke) would become playable characters in future games after their appearance in Nioh helped bring them into mainstream attention. Yasuke will be the first via Samurai Warriors 5.
Moral Event Horizon: Mitsuhide's betrayal is usually triggered by Nobunaga going too far and crossing one in his eyes. This is something of a Historical Hero Upgrade on the former's part - the Real Life Mitsuhide's motives for turning on his master are quite contentious among historians, some of whom suggest it was down to Ambition or Revenge.
The sound that accompanies defeating an enemy officer, especially when said officer is part of a mission, followed by the triumphant, "Tekishou, uchitottari!"
The series's Victory Fanfare when successfully completing a battle.
Narm Charm: As per Warriors games tradition, this is bound to happen sooner or later. Furthermore, since Samurai Warriors is more character-based rather than kingdom-based like Dynasty Warriors, dramatic lines or moments which are sometimes over-the-top tend to happen more often than one may expect.
Older Than They Think: When it was announced that Samurai Warriors 5 would focus on Nobunaga's lifetime starting with his days as "The Fool of Owari", a lot of people thought this would be the first time that Nobunaga would be portrayed as such when various media would rather showcase him as Demon King Nobunaga. However, the 2013 SteampunkMechaAnime, Nobunaga the Fool, was one of the first to portray the titular character as the brash, energetic, foolish-type without the "demon king" vibes despite being set in an Alternate Universe.
Not Badass Enough for Fans: Naotora probably wouldn't have that much of flak on the West side if her personality is not that of a shy moeblob, which is perceived to be something very far from the term 'badass'... at least on the surface.
This depends on which version most players have tried first; it certainly doesn't help the roster gets cleaned out with every major installment. Most seem to agree Keiji's voice actor in Samurai Warriors 2 was a definite downgrade from his well-beloved one in the first game.
Hilariously, Keiji's English voice actor in Samurai Warriors 3 and Warriors Orochi is a man who voiced someone else in the exact same type of voice his Samurai Warriors 2 voice actor used.
Hideyoshi in the English dub of Samurai Warriors 2 sounded like Bugs Bunny, which simply doesn't fit in the Sengoku Period setting.
Replacement Scrappy: Despite having her own fanbase, Nene has earned the ire of some fans for displacing Kunoichi (who was removed) in 2. The fact both characters have similar movesets (especially Nene, as she was never a Ninja in Real Life) doesn't help her case. While Kunoichi does return in 3, her role becomes more centered around Yukimura (and, to a degree, Kai) while Nene is shown to do actual Ninja activities (including sharing a relationship/rivalry with Hanzo) doesn't put an end to the "Nene shouldn't be a Ninja" debates.
The Scrappy: Hisahide Matsunaga from Samurai Warriors 4 was ill-received for his ridiculously over-the-top character design (even by Samurai Warriors standards), general pretentiousness, the undue importance put on his presence in the Oda camp (for some reason, he suddenly takes credit to Hideyoshi's accomplishment in Kanegasaki for the Oda Legend chapter, though it's much to Hisahide's chagrin) and soaking up what some feel to be a disproportionate amount of screen-time (see Sequelitis below). Official fan polls also show the likes of Goemon Ishikawa, Yoshimoto Imagawa and Ieyasu Tokugawa not being received well by the fanbase.
Sequelitis: Samurai Warriors has suffered from this more than Dynasty Warriors with regards to the story than game mechanics. While the latter has always introduced a slew of new blood for most installments, focus usually remains on the major players of the "Three Kingdoms" era while working in the debuting characters at relevant points in its history. Conversely, Samurai Warriors tends to give large focus to its new characters, at the detriment of far more important existing ones from a historical standpoint. The Oda force, in particular, has found itself on the unkind side of this beginning with Samurai Warriors 2; by 4, Nobunaga is essentially a supporting character in his own faction off doing things on his own most of the time, while newcomer Hisahide is treated as the central Oda character, instead. Samurai Warriors has also had far more dramatic tonal shifts compared to sister series Dynasty Warriors as it started off fairly realistic and dark in the first game, but has taken on many archetypal, cliche tropes, losing fans who enjoy the "war" aspect of the series. The gradually toned-down AI and threat of Mooks at higher difficulties is also met with derision.
Battle of Komaki-Nagakute from 2 is hellish, especially if you don't grind with a character beforehand. A few minutes after the stage begins, a ram will appear to break doors to Ieyasu's base and you have to keep it from being destroyed by the enemy. But if you aren't able to kill all 6 officers around the area, the troops won't stop and the enemy officers will likely go to the ram. If this happens, it's sure to be destroyed decreasing your morale greatly and you'll slowly lose many of your allies. The hell comes from the fact that you need to kill all of the enemy officers in the area in a very short amount of time and considering that they love to constantly block your attacks while barely attacking just wastes precious time to take out the others.
Also in Samurai Warriors 2, the Battle of Sekigahara, Western Army Side. The mission starts with the objective of defending then-generic Masanori Fukushima and Naomasa Ii. Wouldn't be so hard if they didn't start on a lenghty distance from each other, and the moment you leave one alone to assist the other, their health will be depleted by the enemy, causing a morale loss. While you are juggling two idiotic A.I.s, you have the mission to defend two cannons in the middle of the map and to capture two enemy ones. Faliure to do so causes another morale loss, and if that wasn't enough, faling to do both also stops Hideaki Kobayakawa from defecting to your side, causing ANOTHER morale drop. It's not unusal for the historically decisive battle for the Tokugawa end with the player character defeating all of the Eastern Army inside the Tokugawa main camp.
In Katana, the second Magoichi mission with Ina: players must defeat 15 enemies (including transport units) in 4 minutes (slightly extendable via the Magatama item). The best enemies to defeat would be Ninjas, except they're Nigh Invulnerable whenever they prepare to teleport out of sight. Curiously enough, the game actively avoids Luck-Based Mission here and instead hits Guide Dang It!. How? Any specific enemy appears ONLY when players enter a certain intersection from a certain direction. Once this occurs, the level becomes more a case of plotting out an exact route through the map so as to get the most Ninjas to appear in the shortest amount of time.
Sakon's dream stage is a pain even on "Easy" difficulty: why should it count that Ieyasu escaped if only one of his doubles (and players will know who is the double) does? Adding to this is a strange habit of Hideyoshi, Mitsuhide and Tadakatsu getting to the allied main camp.
Shingen Takeda's Dream Stage in 2 is an absolute hell. At first, it looks like a pretty normal stage, until you realize that every officer has their stats maxed out which means that not only will they deal much more damage that'll likely cause your defeat, they don't take anywhere near as much damage as they would in the normal stages. It also doesn't help that you automatically lose if you lose any of your officers and since you're teamed with Kenshin, you'll have to make sure that neither of the two camps are taken or you'll lose. Unless the stage isn't played on anything past normal or you have his 4th weapon, his dream stage is one of the toughest.
Kotaro Fuma's dream stage in 2 is utter hell, especially if the player is trying to obtain his 4th weapon which not only requires playing it on hard mode but also clearing every mission without fail. The player has to escort an officer to the castle gate, which can be annoying due to said officer insisting on fighting almost every enemy on his way there and fighting Sakon once he reaches a barricade, saving an officer from three enemy officers in the same area, defeating fire ninjas and finding powder kegs throughout the castle at random locations, and when they reach Hideyoshi, Keiji suddenly appears to make the fight much tougher. What makes the mission incredibly annoying is that for a majority of the mission, the player can't use his fastest horse or his bodyguard due to there being no way to get them across a jump only the player can make and if the player uses another horse, they can't use their old horse. Plus this mission requires the player to be incredibly quick with defeating officers and getting to where they need to get to, which can rely on luck depending on what boosts enemies might randomly drop.
For anyone going through 4 in the attempt at getting rare weapons, this applies less to the levels overall, but to any character whose weapon requirements are incredibly ill-thoughtout; in particular, anyone who has to have the weapon mission trigger in a tight time-frame in a level with a lot of dialogue. The problem is the timer doesn't stop for dialogue and events, meaning the best way to race against the clock is by using a Suspend Save when a message starts, then re-loading the save to skip the message. This drags out the process considerably, and even then it's not a total guarantee the method will work.
Many levels in Samurai Warriors 3 could easily take the cake due to combat being slow, the game not running well on the Wii, maps being larger than ever and poor allied AI which die at the touch of a feather. Nene's Odawara Castle is pretty egregious for this, as it involves protecting Hideyoshi, Masanori and Kiyomasa as allied commanders, all advancing at opposing ends of the map which makes it hard for Nene to support all their advances, especially as she is on the weaker side of the roster and the game's slow performance hinders players further.
Mitsunari's final stage in 4-II: if any enemy officer enters the Western Army's main camp, it's an automatic game over. The same applies to several levels in Spirit of Sanada, such as battle of Sanada Maru and Tedorigawa, where if any enemy officer breaches a point in the map, it will result in immediate defeat. What's worse is that AI of certain enemy officers will make a beeline for said point upon arrival and be covered in hyper armor, stonewalling attacks and ignoring player almost entirely, one example being Kanbei from Tedorigawa who arrives dangerously close to the main camp and is hard to stop or even faze with standard attacks, requiring musou to clear distance and defeat him easier.
Samurai Warriors 2 removed Goemon and Kunoichi completely from the roster; contrast Dynasty Warriors, which didn't even start removing characters until the sixth primary installment and was released more than a year after it.
While Ranmaru and Okuni do appear in 2, neither of them get dedicated story modes.
None of the English voice actors from the first game reprise their roles in 2. When CrossoverWarriors Orochi was released, none of the voice actors from 2 returned, either.
Samurai Warriors allowed players to turn on the option to have the Japanese audio on. Starting with 2, only the English language was available, but by Samurai Warriors 4, Koei Tecmo began cutting out localized dubs entirely, despite the inconsistent quality throughout the installments. Some fans feel slighted at the lack of Western voice actors when it's hard to read what's going on during the heat of battle.
The whole "Free Mode"-only characters debacle in Samurai Warriors 3 was contentious, as story campaigns of several returning characters are left out.
The Soft Reboot nature of Samurai Warriors 5, specifically its character redesigns, have been met with derision: while some fans believe the new looks are good, others aren't happy with the replacements as they believe it comes at the detriment of overhauling pre-existing characters. This also comes at the cost of movesets, where 5 will only have fifteen shared between a roster of 27 characters, including a weapon switching system Dynasty Warriors has been using. Fans have decried this approach for Samurai Warriors when weaponry unique to a character is often considered to be part of their identity; borrowing it from another character can be see as a form of Lazy Artist. There are also personality changes in the old characters which many fans find worse particularly on Katsuie's, Magoichi's and No's.
Koei Tecmo ignored the reason Gracia's well-known in the first place in favor of an original story with her and Magoichi in her first appearance for 2: Xtreme Legends; The Other Wiki has a good article on her actual history. 3: Xtreme Legends certainly pays a little more attention to her history, though it still skips on the reason why she's historically famous. Chances are the publisher wants to avoid any sort of religious controversy and the only clues to her Christian background are her foreign name (instead of her default name "Tamako") and her outlandish fashion style (evoking Elegant Gothic Lolita).
Koei Tecmo also deliberately avoids any references to Hideyoshi's infamous and disastrous "Korean Campaign", not to "whitewash" Hideyoshi but to avoid simply pissing off Korean players.
Toy Ship: After their first encounter in Spirit of Sanada, a young Chacha and Yukimura instantly triggered this impression among certain fans.
Despite Yasuke, the African Samurai under Nobunaga's service, being a somewhat popular request for the series due to his unique historical status, and an Anime starring him coming around the same time as Samurai Warriors 5, no one actually predicted that he would seriously join the cast of 5, which previously caused much derision due its trimming down of characters to focus on a particular period.
Kazuuji is a peculiar choice for a 5, since the game is centered around the rise of Nobunaga. Historically, he was irrelevant to the Oda, and he only gained relevance in the Toyotomi administration as opposed to any battlefield feats. Even as a generic, Kazuuji was seldom seen in past entries as opposed to the likes of Nagahide Niwa and Kazumasu Takigawa, which makes it a slap in the face for those clamoring for the more Oda-relevant officers to become playable. The developers have mentioned that the game has a connection to Kirin ga Kuru, a Jidaigeki television show set around the same time and includes Kazuuji as well the many unique non-playable characters as well, though that requires knowledge of the drama's existence to understand the reasoning behind Kazuuji (and other characters') debuts.
Unpopular Popular Character: Shibata Katsuie's relationship with Oichi (historically, it's rumored they were engaged to be married before Nobunaga decided a political alliance with Nagamasa was more profitable) is severely downplayed in Samurai Warriors to the point of it being non-existent in favor of her relationship with Nagamasa. However, when fighting at the "Battle of Shizugatake" (Katsuie vs. Hideyoshi to "succeed" Nobunaga), Oichi will side with Katsuie.
It's easy to mistake Ranmaru for a girl, particularly when it's also an In-UniverseRunning Gag: he uses female motion sets, is voiced by a woman in the Japanese and English versions (the latter starting from the second) and is frequently used to induce Unsettling Gender-Reveal on Chivalrous Pervert Magoichi and other characters or simply to make fun of his feminine appearance (such as setting him up in a beauty contest). Though in 4, his voice becomes slightly more masculine, so it becomes less possible to mistake him for a woman again.
Due to his young age, relatively high-pitched Cross-Dressing Voice and androgynous outfits, this happens with Takenaka Hanbei just as often.
With one glance, but without closely examining him, Sasuke in Spirit of Sanada; however, this is mitigated by the character actually being voiced by a man, unlike the two previous examples.
Many characters could be considered this depending on what story for which installment players are going through. Ranmaru in the first game is a good example - everyone he cares about is trying to kill each other.
No: "Ranmaru...did you ever know...happiness?"
In Spirit of Sanada, Chacha: she personally witnesses her father Nagamasa staying to die as Odani Castle burns to the ground; many years later, she dies in a similar fashion at the Siege of Osaka Castle.
With the additional screentime, Hanbei Takenaka in Samurai Warriors 5 is very much this. A loyal strategist to Saito Dosan, he can only watch helplessly as his lord is betrayed and killed by his son, Yoshitatsu. Afterwards, he is forced to join Yoshitatsu's forces against his will and fight his fellow Saito retainers, including Mitsuhide Akechi, a fact that he resents very much. When Nobunaga invades and conquers Inabayama, he is very happy to defect to the Oda, but this happiness doesn't last thanks to his illness.
In SW 5, Hanbei is constantly blackmailed into hard decisions against his better judgment by the Saito clan, especially Yoshitatsu and once they are defeated, he joins Hideyoshi and presses himself forward to help Hideyoshi as much as he can. Once his new friend Kanbei is captured, Hanbei suffers from illness but gives one last effort to find Kanbei with every fibre of his being and it proves too much for his frail body, with him passing away from overexerting himself, not getting to see Hideyoshi's rise to power.
Katsuyori Takeda hits it hard in SW 5. Nothing goes right for him when he assumes ownership of the Takeda mantle. The clan's cavalry and elite generals all get slaughtered at Nagashino, and his supporters are dwindling from relentless sieges by the Oda. After Motonobu Okabe's death, there is no great generals left and most of the Takeda vassals abandon him in Tenmoku, making Katsuyori's last stand quite somber and pathetic.
In the Japanese version, defeating an enemy officer makes the character exclaim "Tekishou, uchitottari!" ("Enemy officer defeated!"). While Dynasty Warriors usually goes with a direct translation (until Dynasty Warriors 5), Samurai Warriors translates with variations to the point that by the second game, no character ever uses the line again when defeating an officer. In 3, each character has two variable "Enemy officer defeated" lines with the first one being the standard one and the second one tailored to the character's personality.
Amusingly, since 4 does away with the English dub, players can clearly hear almost every officer still using the basic exclamation. Despite that, the speech bubbles for nearly everyone still use a tailored victory cry.
Some characters have certain portions of their names cut out during their battle announcements: a notable example is Mitsuhide's nickname of "Juubei", as he goes by Mitsuhide "Juubei" Akechi.
. 3: Xtreme Legends certainly pays a little more attention to her history, though it still skips on the reason why she's historically famous. Chances are the publisher wants to avoid any sort of religious controversy and the only clues to her Christian background are her foreign name (instead of her default name "Tamako") and her outlandish fashion style (evoking Elegant Gothic Lolita).