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"SHOWTIME!"
Date Masamune

Sengoku Basara is more or less a copycat of Samurai Warriors, only created by Capcom. However, once you look past their similarities, it becomes clear that Capcom didn't want a historical simulation like the one Koei made. What they wanted was a stylish new-generation Hack and Slash with a loosely-based Sengoku setting, and increasingly ludicrous and over-the-top gameplay, characters, storylines, and general aesthetics.

The result was a franchise that abandoned such things as logic, physics, general subtlety, and historical accuracy, and instead ran entirely on Rule of Cool, a World of Badass chock-full of Flanderization, for better or worse. Despite a failed attempt by Capcom to bring the first game to the west by giving it an edited translation in the form of Devil Kings, which changed the characters' names and removed all Sengoku Period references (leaving Capcom reluctant to localise the sequels), the series maintains a strong fanbase, especially in Japan, mainly because, if nothing else, it's just fun.

There are four main games so far, as well as several spin-off titles for various consoles:

  • Sengoku Basara / Devil Kings (2005) PS2
  • Sengoku Basara 2 (2006) PS2
    • Sengoku Basara 2: Heroes (2007) PS2/Wii
  • Sengoku Basara X (2008) Arcade/PS2
  • Sengoku Basara: Battle Heroes (2009) PSP
  • Sengoku Basara 3 / Sengoku Basara: Samurai Heroes (2010) PS3/Wii
    • Sengoku Basara 3: Utage (2011) PS3/Wii
  • Sengoku Basara: Chronicle Heroes (2011) PSP
  • Sengoku Basara 4 (2014) PS3
    • Sengoku Basara 4: Sumeragi (2015) PS3/PS4
  • Sengoku Basara: Sanada Yukimura Den (2016) PS3/PS4
  • Sengoku Basara: Battle Party (Announced at 2019) iOS/Android.

An anime adaptation of the series by Production I.G started airing on April 1, 2009. A second season began July 11, 2010 followed by a feature film debuting in cinemas June 4, 2011. FUNimation picked up the series to be dubbed, as Sengoku Basara: Samurai Kings rather than Devil Kings, and with an equally-popular cast of who's-who in voice acting. A standalone anime, titled Judge End, aired from July 5th 2014, this time produced by TMS Entertainment.

In the wake of the anime's success, Capcom announced that Sengoku Basara would be brought to the US and Europe once more, starting with the third game, translated faithfully, and titled Sengoku Basara: Samurai Heroes. In August 2012 the first two games and expansion were collected in an Updated Re-release for the PS3.

Each game in the series has had one or more manga spin-offs to its name, drawn by various different artists in various different styles. In 2012, a two volume English translation of the second manga by Yak Haibara, named Sengoku Basara: Samurai Legends, was released. A High School AU called Basara Academy is also being published, and got an anime adaptation in 2018.

As if that wasn't enough, it's got its own series of stage productions, Butai Sengoku Basara, first performed in 2009 and still being produced. A Live-Action Adaptation of the anime titled Sengoku Basara Moonlight Party also aired in 2012.

Not to be confused with the Real-Time Strategy game Sengoku, the shoujo manga Basara, or trash.note 

This page contains spoilers for both the games and the anime.


The games include examples of:

  • Absurdly High Level Cap: The maximum level in Sumeragi is 999.
  • All There in the Manual: The manga, novels and drama CDs all contain information that is left out of the games, and some of them even tell a completely different set of events. Due to the non-linear nature of the games, other media are free to do what they wish. The anime takes inspiration from both the games and the first manga, but its plot is entirely separate. This makes it hard to decide on what is 'canon'.
  • Amplifier Artifact: The Personal Items/Inscriptions that can have various effects depending on the character, usually an easier access to or a permanent Super Mode.
  • Anchors Away: Motochika.
  • Animal Motifs: Usually linked to the character's name or epithet. Some examples:
    • Masamune and Kojuro with dragons.
    • Shingen, Yukimura, Hirotsuna and Naotora with tigers.
    • Nohime with butterflies.
    • Sasuke, Keiji and Hideyoshi with monkeys.
    • The Ninja with birds.
    • Yoshiaki with foxes.
    • Mitsuhide with snakes.
    • Mitsunari and Magoichi with crows.
    • Matabe with dinosaurs (specifically the Tyrannosaurus Rex).
    • Shikanosuke with deer.
    • Hisahide with spiders.
    • Yoshiteru with peacocks.
    • Tsuruhime with cranes.
    • Yoshitsugu and Maria with moths.
    • Sakon with dogs (specifically the Shiba Inu).
    • Kanbe with moles.
  • Anime Theme Song: "Crosswise", by T.M. Revolution. It's so awesome that as a tip of the hat to Fist of the North Star (which was partially made by the same company, Arc System Works) it's used as the theme song for the Basara K.O. in Cross.
  • Art Evolution: The most startling example of this is not the CGI, but the anime style used in the games noticeably evolves over time. From Devil Kings, to Heroes, to Cross to the anime itself.
    • The CG has become less realistic and more stylised over time, to match the ludicrously over-the-top design.
  • Ash Face: The player can do this over and over to Kanbe Kuroda in Sengoku Basara 3. Just select the 'Bad Bomb' super art and keep pressing the super art button. Watch a big Cartoon Bomb fall on Kanbe's head, laugh at his Double Take upon noticing the bomb, watch him get blasted through the air screaming "WHYYYY?" the whole time, then crash in an explosion... only to pull himself out of the crater, blackened from head to toe, and shake it off.
  • Author Appeal: T.M.Revolution has a long-standing affair with this series. The only title he (or his band abingdon boys school) didn't make an opening song for was 2, and that theme is significantly less popular than any of the others.
    • When it comes to female characters, be sure you'll see plenty of ass and legs. While Kasuga and Magoichi also show their cleavage, every single one of the girls gets some focus below the waist.
    • Gundam. The Japanese cast is pretty chock full of Gundam alumnus, especially the boysnote  (or alternatively Code Geass, which gained massive popularity during Basara's rise, especially for the 3rd game. In other words, Real Robot Genre for the casting choices even if the game looked closer to Supers in spirit), one of the characters is designed to look like a Gundam (Tadakatsu), and the franchise could afford to make a spin-off game based on one of Gundam's own spin-off series.
  • Awesome, but Impractical: Many characters adopt logically impossible positions while on horseback. Ones that come to mind are Keiji, Tsuruhime, Magoichi, Masamune, Yukimura, Sakon, Hideaki and Yoshiaki. And then there's Kotaro and Sasuke...
    • The best example of this is probably Takeda Shingen, who stands on not just one, but two horses. The anime takes it to the next level too.
      • Impractical, but possibly true, as some historical accounts state that Shingen was such a big guy that he had to sit astride two horses at once (in fairness, Japanese horses were quite small).
  • Awesomeness Meter: How your combos are rated.
  • Badass Arm-Fold: Most notably Date Masamune (who rides his horse like this), but also Takeda Shingen, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, Tokugawa Ieyasu (from 3 onwards), and Fuma Kotaro who do this constantly.
  • Badass Army: Sorta averted for you as the playable character...for you've got plenty of moves to butcher'em mooks without breaking a sweat.
  • Badass Biker: Masamune in the anime. Except his bike is a horse with exhaust pipes.
  • Badass Cape: Naotora. Muneshige has one on each shoulder and Nobunaga's can attack people in older games.
  • Badass Longcoat: Kojuro. Kenshin wears a sleeveless one, with five snowflake-like tails at the end and Matabe wears one resembling a lizard tail.
  • Badass Preacher: It's hard to say that Xavi is badass, being a jolly Love Freak, but he's got big guns...
  • Bait-and-Switch Boss: Hyakkimaru in 4. You started off fighting Akatsukimaru/Rising Sun (which you shouldn't have trouble fighting if you spend quite an amount of time in 3/Utage) but when it's on half health, it will fuse with the giant face you probably mistook as a harmless part of the stage at first, and there you go, you're facing a much tougher and more annoying Hyakkimaru.
  • Bash Brothers: Masamune and Kojuro, Muneshige and Yoshihiro. Also Masamune and Motochika when they get together.
  • Battle Amongst the Flames: The Incident at Honno-ji stage nearly always takes place amid the already burning temple. In Heroes, Hisahide sets Todai-ji on fire before you fight him there.
  • Battle Couple: Toshiie and Matsu, Nagamasa and Oichi, Nobunaga and Nohime. Kenshin and Kasuga would count, if they only got together before their endings, in which case the wars have ended.
  • BFG: Xavi's cannons, Nohime's gatling gun, Magoichi's rocket launcher.
  • BFS: Keiji, Yoshihiro, Naotora.
  • Big Guy, Little Guy: Hideyoshi and Hanbe, Muneshige and Yoshihiro, Muneshige and Sorin, Tadakatsu and Ieyasu, Shingen and Yukimura.
  • Blade Lock: Usually about once a battle, particularly if the characters are prominent rivals.
  • Bloodless Carnage: What with the flashy gameplay, you don't notice it so much, but in cutscenes (particularly animated ones) the complete lack of blood becomes quite jarring.
  • Blond, Brunette, Redhead: The Ninja. Kasuga = blonde, Sasuke = brunette, Kotaro = redhead.
  • Bodyguard Crush: Kasuga and Kenshin.
  • Boss Rush: The Takeda Dojo in 4, unless you pick the white board challenge.
  • Boss Subtitles
  • Breaking the Fourth Wall: Some of the Mini Sengoku Basara episodes are about Chosokabe and Mori trying to get more airtime.
    • If you leave the game alone long enough without doing anything, the character might scold you!
    • In the second game, Nobunaga's Victory Pose is him shotgunning the camera.
    • Yoshiaki plays with the camera to draw your attention to him during his introduction, and Satake walks right into it.
    • In Sumeragi, Shingen's Victory Pose is him punching the camera.
  • Bribing Your Way to Victory: The fourth game features online microtransactions for additional in-game money and resources as well as heavily customized weapons for each of the characters.
  • Break the Cutie: Oichi, to a T.
  • Calling Your Attacks: Masamune and Yukimura do this with almost all of their attacks, and they're certainly not the only ones.
  • Capcom Sequel Stagnation: They milked the continuity around Sengoku Basara 2 for a couple of years before the third game came out.
  • Cast Full of Pretty Boys: It's actually easier to count the male characters who aren't young and attractive.
  • Cast of Snowflakes
  • Casual Danger Dialogue/Talking Is a Free Action: Characters are somehow able to hold conversations with each other at any point during a stage, even with the whole battlefield in between them. And if whoever you're fighting against is your friend or ally, most likely they'll chat away happily as if nothing were wrong while you're slaughtering their mooks. They're even able to hold conversations from across the country.
  • Changing of the Guard: Ieyasu and Mitsunari steal the main character/poster boy slots in SB3, removing Masamune and Yukimura from the spotlight somewhat.
    • It happened again in the fourth game with Masamune and Mitsunari taking centre stage in advertising alongside Sakon and Katsuie.
  • Character Level
  • Charles Atlas Superpower: Everyone. Well, everyone who is a main character, since their ridiculous strength and fighting ability is what makes them applicable for this role. However they're still normal humans, apparently. Except for Honda Tadakatsu, who's a mecha.
  • Cherry Blossoms: Because it just wouldn't be Feudal Japan without 'em. In the fourth game, activating Hero Mode causes cherry blossoms to sprout out whenever you hit enemies.
  • Chewing the Scenery: Motonari, when introducing himself, gets strangely hammy: "I AM THE CHILD OF THE SUN, MORI MOTONARI! NOW COOOOOMMMMEEEE!!!"
  • Child Soldiers: Ranmaru and Itsuki aren't even in their teens yet. Tsuruhime may also count. Many characters draw attention to how young they are and dislike fighting them (though they tend to quickly make an exception for Ranmaru).
  • Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Kennyo? Who's Kennyo...?
    • Then again, while Nohime, Ranmaru, Hanbe, Nagamasa, Yoshimoto and Hideyoshi were dumped for plot relevance, Musashi, Itsuki, Xavi and Hisahide simply disappear without a reason (though Hisahide returns in Utage).
      • Xavi's fate, at least, is mentioned in Sorin's stage several times, with rumours such as "He was homesick and didn't like this land's food". At least it keeps in line with the historical figure he's based on, St. Francis Xavier, who didn't stay in Japan for long.
  • Church Militant: Xavi's goal is apparently the conversion of all Japan to his faith. How you ask? Superior firepower.
  • Clothing Combat: Maria.
  • Colour-Coded Characters: Most notable are main rivals Yukimura and Masamune, who wear red and blue respectively, as do their older counterparts, Shingen and Kenshin. Motonari and Motochika also sport complimentary colour schemes, green and purple.
    • Mitsunari and Ieyasu too. Mitsunari wears black and purple to represent the moon, whereas Ieyasu wears yellow to represent the sun.
    • Ieyasu's yellow aura also contrasts with Nobunaga and Hideyoshi, who both have red auras.
    • Keiji tends to switch between yellow and pink - in opening movies, it's yellow to contrast Masamune and Yukimura, but in-game it's pink.
    • As for the rest; Kasuga, Oichi and Tsuruhime have pink auras, Hanbe's is purple, Kojuro's is light blue and Mitsuhide/Tenkai's is green.
  • Color-Coded Wizardry: Oichi has a pink/purple aura and Maria has a green/white aura.
  • Darker and Edgier: Sengoku Basara 3 and its expansion are much much darker and more serious story-wise than their predecessors.
  • Dark Is Not Evil: Along with sinister light elementals, there are also non-evil dark elementals such as Oichi and Sasuke.
  • Deadly Force Field: One of Motonari Mori's skills is to create a circular green barrier. Enemies would get knocked back if they run (or get knocked toward) said barrier, dealing some damage; one common tactic of using it is to place another barrier at a distance in front of the first one, knock some enemies to one barrier and watch as the barriers deflect the enemies towards each other while dealing constant damage.
  • Demoted to Extra: In the third game; Kenshin, Kasuga, Sasuke, Kojuro, Toshiie and Matsu are now NPCs, and Hisahide, Musashi, Itsuki, Xavi and Kennyo don't appear at all. However in Utage the former are all player characters once again, along with Hisahide.
  • Devil Complex: Oda Nobunaga, under a massive Historical Villain Upgrade, is a Card-Carrying Villain who openly proclaims himself to be the Demon King of the Sixth Heaven. In later games he's become literally demonic after coming Back from the Dead. Of course given how many Evil Overlord tropes he uses, it's not like having a devil complex could make him any more Obviously Evil than he already is.
  • Difficulty by Region: One of the changes Devil Kings made was altering the difficulty levels to be a step above the Japanese release’s counterparts, so easy mode in Devil Kings is the equivalent to normal mode in Sengoku Basara. The difficulty based rewards were kept as they were for their labels, so in Devil Kings, choosing easy effectively gave you normal difficulty with the rewards for the original easy mode, which said rewards were not balanced around, making the game even harder still.
  • Divergent Character Evolution: Initially Matsu and Kenshin as well as Kasuga and Sasuke shared the exact same movesets. However they soon managed to gain their own fighting style by the second game. Similarly, Kid!Ieyasu and Ujimasa copied Toshiie's polearm moveset before moving on.
  • Don't Try This at Home: The trailers introducing the playable characters of 4 start with disclaimers that the techniques contained therein are for Sengoku heroes only, and that viewers should never try to replicate them.
  • Dual Wielding: Masamune scoffs at your feeble dual-wielding and prefers to wield six swords at a time (three in each hand). Yukimura dual-wields spears, and Mitsuhide dual-wields scythes. As for Rikyu, he dual-wields fans, but attacks with psychic powers anyways.
    • But wait, in Utage, Masamune takes it up another notch in War Dance mode where while using Phantom Dive he wields all 6 swords at once in ONE HAND! I dont think anything aside from the Rule of Cool can explain how he is doing this.
    • The Ninja Sasuke, Kasuga and Kotaro also dual wield. Sasuke with shuriken, Kasuga with knives, and Kotaro with ninjato.
    • Oichi originally had two naginata joined together before the dark arms became her signature weapons.
    • And Muneshige trumps them all by dual-wielding chainsaws.
    • Musashi, the original dual-wielder, once accuses Yukimura of stealing his technique, despite Yukimura never having heard of him before.
  • Dude Looks Like a Lady: Uesugi Kenshin, justified that even his real life counterpart was suspected by many to be a woman disguised as a man. Nevermind that he was based off Takarazuka performers.
  • Easy Evangelism: Occasionally other characters end up being ensnared by Xavism. Motonari, Yoshihiro, Kanbe and Shikanosuke have all shown up as Xavists, with Motonari in particular having deeply suppressed sentiments from the third game onwards. In Sorin's drama route of the fourth game, he manages to get Maria, Nagamasa and Oichi to join Xavi Land (though in Nagamasa's case he's more or less dragged along by both Maria and Oichi).
  • Elaborate Equals Effective: Though sometimes it's subverted, particularly in the fourth game, where weapon appearances were completely cosmetic and you can customize any weapon you want to be the best.
  • Elemental Powers: Include fire, ice, lightning, wind, light, darkness, quake and feeling.
    • Fire causes damage over time when juggling an enemy.
    • Ice can momentarily freeze enemies.
    • Lightning damages multiple enemies at once in the earlier games and cause continual damage in the later ones.
    • Wind can either suck enemies towards the player or knock them back.
    • Light can break the enemy's guard relatively quickly in the second game. The third game makes them easier to stun.
    • Darkness simply drains enemy health to supplement your own.
    • Quake causes the earth to split near the are where your attacks land, greatly widening your range.
    • Feeling either drains your foes' will to live, incapitating them, or intensifies their zest for life, causing them to attack everything indiscriminately.
  • Epic Flail: Kanbe, using the ball and chain attacked to the stocks binding his wrists together to do some serious damage, including the occasional storm.
  • Evil Is Hammy
  • Evil Sounds Deep: Nobunaga, Mitsuhide, Hideyoshi, Yoshitsugu, and Mitsunari (though he's not really evil per se).
  • Evil Versus Evil: Nobunaga, the resident Evil Overlord is often pitted against Ax-Crazy Mitsuhide (appropriate, as Mitsuhide caused Oda's death in Real Life). Basara 2 had evil but Well-Intentioned Extremist Hideyoshi as Nobunaga's official rival.
  • Eye Beams: In the opening sequence for Battle Heroes, frickin' 100 foot-tall versions of Nobunaga and Hideyoshi shoot frickin' LASERBEAMS out of their eyes! It was awesome. Shame it didn't happen in the game itself.
  • Eyepatch of Power: Masamune and Motochika make being half-blind cool. And hot.
    • Though while Masamune was indeed missing his right eye in Real Life, there is no record to suggest that Motochika was in the same situation. It probably just adds to his piratey image...
  • False Flag Operation: Pulled in 3/Samurai Heroes by Yoshitsugu and Motonari, pinning the Shikoku Massacre on Ieyasu to ensure Motochika didn't ally with him
  • Fashionable Asymmetry: Keiji, who treads a fine line between this and Rummage Sale Reject.
  • Flanderization: To the max! It's arguable one of the game's selling points.
  • Fighting Game: Sengoku Basara X (pronounced Cross).
  • Flight: In a Japan based on Rule of Cool, what could one expect? The stewey Tadakatsu employs flight in his Flight Mode, while Sen no Rikyu can fly and stay afloat anytime as a psychic.
  • Foe Romance Subtext: Fills this to the absolute brim. You may as well take out the term "rival" and insert "love interest" every time it comes up.
  • Friendly Enemy: Masamune and Yukimura. Ultimately, they always go back to being rivals.
  • Full-Name Basis
  • Gameplay and Story Segregation: Allies in the third game. Use Tokugawa Ieyasu as Ishida Mitsunari's wingman? And then bring this unholy alliance to go fight Ieyasu and watch the game ignore how the same character is appearing twice? Why not indeed?
  • Gang of Hats: The various armies. Like Kanbe's army, blue collar workers who use tools like pickaxes and rakes instead of swords and pikes.
  • "Get Back Here!" Boss: A gimmick often employed by various commanders in-game in some fashion or another.
  • Giant Mook: Giant enemies are bigger than every playable character but Honda. This includes Kanbe, Yoshihiro, and Muneshige!
  • Gratuitous English: Frequently used by Date Masamune. PUT YA GUNS ON indeed. Second place is Xavi's faction of Love Freaks
    • The opening theme of Sengoku Basara 3, "Naked Arms" by T.M.Revolution. Sung in English in the localised version. By T.M.Revolution. Good luck making any sense of it.
  • Grey-and-Grey Morality: There are very few characters who can be defined as evil in the series (aside from Nobunaga, but he doesn't count), only a group of ambitious people who have similar goals which they will do anything to achieve, and who inevitably come to blows. As Hisahide points out, no matter how honourable a samurai's ideals may be, they still cause destruction and death for the sake of their own gains. The whole conflict is extremely chaotic.
  • Guns Are Worthless: Riflemen mooks have short range, in many cases have visible and dodgeable projectiles, and don't do any more or less damage than the associated melee weapons. Gun users exist as player characters and are about as effective as everyone else, leaning towards Glass Cannons.
  • Handicapped Badass: Masamune and Motochika are both missing an eye.
  • Hard Mode Perks: After a certain point the only way to level up quickly and increase your luck in order to get more money, better weapons or rarer items is to play on hard mode.
  • Harder Than Hard: The Basara difficulty introduced in Utage. You'll die in about three hits from a mook. note 
  • Headbutting Heroes: Most of the designated heroes are actually enemies, so this is bound to happen when they are forced to work together.
  • Heroic Spirit: The series feeds on it! The aptly named Hero Mode can make time slow down or increase your attack power a hundredfold.
  • Heterosexual Life-Partners: If you chose not to interpret them as romantic couples, there are a lot of these. Masamune and Kojuro, Yukimura and Sasuke, Mitsunari and Yoshitsugu, to name a few.
  • Hidden Depths: Despite not putting great stock in Character Development, if you really pay attention it may be surprising to see how often characters drop subtle and unexpectedly philosophical hints as to their true feelings or past experiences. Unfortunately, these are rarely expanded upon.
  • Historical Badass Upgrade: Most of the cast. Granted, some of those ancient warriors were actually pretty badass on their own....
  • Historical Relationship Overhaul: Date Masamune and Sanada Yukimura are depicted as having a rivalry on the battlefields. Historically, they likely only met once when Sanada Yukimura and his army engaged in a battle against Date Masamune's force during the Siege of Osaka.
  • Homoerotic Subtext: Tends to happen when roughly 90% of the cast are male and the writers love teasing their fangirls.
  • Horse Jump: Forget jumping, these horses can fly!!
  • Hot-Blooded: Particularly Yukimura ("OYAKATA-SAMAAAA!") but the emotion is spread around to all the characters in some way.
  • Hot Witch: Oichi and Maria are both attractive and have magic powers.
  • Implausible Hair Color: Surprisingly, most characters have realistic black or brown hair. The exceptions are Kasuga, Sorin and Rikyu, who are blond; and Magoichi, Yoshiteru and Kotaro, who are redheads. No one draws attention to this. There're also no fewer than six (young) characters with white/silver hair, implying it's an even more common occurrence than a blond or a redhead in the Basaraverse. Finally, Sakon's hair is half brown and half red. Apparently this is natural.
  • Improbable Weapon User: Pick a character. Just about any character...
    • Joke items made it even worse, as in Toshiie using a swordfish or Yoshihiro using a bottle of liquor/a shishkebab.
  • Innocent Innuendo: In the fourth game, Naotora's habit of constantly referring to the Takeda men as "hot" (she means Hot-Blooded), and all of the Hot Springs Episode dialogue between her, Maria, Tsuruhime and Magoichi.
  • Kid Samurai: Musashi, Ieyasu (pre-timeskip) and Yukimura, who are all in their teens. However growing up in a feudal country does that to you, just like their historical counterparts. Ranmaru is an exception, being an archer.
  • Killed Mid-Sentence: Hideyoshi at the end of Nobunaga's campaign in the second game.
  • Kung-Fu Wizard: Maria can fight physically and magically.
  • Leitmotif: Most of the characters have their own individual theme, as well as a different theme for their stage. Oichi gets her own Image Song.
  • Lethal Joke Item: The joke weapons (which change every game) are often some of the most powerful, if not the best weapon for any given character.
  • Light Is Not Good: Villainous light-elementals exist, most notably Motonari and Hideyoshi.
  • Limit Break: The Basara Attack. The fourth game adds the Giga Basara attack, in which if both you and your partner character's basara gauge are full, you can trigger a devastatingly powerful Combination Attack that more or less acts as a screen-clearer.
  • Lip Lock: The English dub of the games is very guilty of this. The anime, on the other hand, does a good job of avoiding it.
  • Live-Action Adaptation: Sengoku Basara Moonlight Party.
  • Lovely Angels: Magoichi and Tsuruhime when they team up at Sekigahara.
  • Mage Tower: Maria’s stage has one and it appears to be Arabian architectural.
  • Magnet Hands: Other than in some cutscenes and death animations, no one, even the common soldiers, has ever let go of their weapons no matter how badly they're flung around the battlefield.
  • Meaningful Name: For the whole series - "Basara", other than being the name of a demonic entity, was a word used to describe very eccentric and rebellious people of the time, befitting with the general atmosphere of the games.
  • Mêlée à Trois: Certain battles in the series involves crashing a battle between two characters and wiping them both out, ending in a fight between all the commanders
  • Metal Slime: The fugitives, who drop either stat boosts, weapons or simply a large number of resources when killed.
  • Mighty Glacier: Xavi is the slowest character in the games but has a Limit Break capable of, if not outright killing them, taking off massive chunks of a boss' health if used properly.
  • Monster Mash: Some characters have some attributes to certain spooks from horror fiction;
  • Multiple Endings: The third game introduces this to the Drama Story Mode, making the ending you acquire depend on the choices you make when deciding which battles to fight. The fourth game has this as well, though certain characters have only one ending.
  • The Musical: No, really. And the DVD is available in Japan now.
  • Naginatas Are Feminine: Covers both Lady of War and Yamato Nadeshiko variants:
  • Named Weapons: Every single weapon is named and some even have more than one. The only exceptions are Mitsunari's swords, which are specifically called 'Nameless'.
  • Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Tiger of Kai, War God of Echigo, One-Eyed Dragon, Demon King of the Sixth Heaven etc.
  • Neutral Powers Bad People: Hard to explain, but usually elements like fire, wind, and lightning are associated with good/sympathetic characters, while ice, light and darkness are usually connected to negative/unsympathetic ones. There are some exceptions, like Kenshin, Sasuke, Oichi, Mitsunari, Ieyasu, and Hisahide.
  • Night and Day Duo: Ieyasu represents The Sun while Mitsunari represents the moon. The final battle in Sekigahara is represented by a solar eclipse.
  • Ninja: Sasuke, Kasuga and Kotaro are all playable, and ninja mooks regularly pop up during stages.
  • Ninja Log: This exact trick is actually used by ninja grunts in 3.
  • Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: By the third game, the series managed to include examples of all of these.
    • Ninja are standard fare, with playable characters Sasuke, Kasuga and Kotaro.
    • Motochika is a pirate, along with his crew.
    • Nanbu Harumasa commands an army of zombies through magic or something.
    • Tadakatsu is a Humongous Mecha and other robotic enemies turn up occasionally (usually when the aforementioned pirate is involved).
  • No Hugging, No Kissing: For a series with so much implied romance, there is very little on-screen action to be had. The only characters who have kissed are Toshiie and Matsu in 2, and Nagamasa and Oichi in 4, and you don't even see either of them.
  • Older Sidekick: Muneshige to Sorin, Kojuro to Masamune, Tenkai to Hideaki, Magoichi when she's employed by Tsuruhime.
  • One-Hit Kill: Yoshihiro has a move like this, which will kill anything and anyone no matter how powerful. Masamune's TESTAMENT comes close, if charged correctly.
  • Parting the Sea: Hideyoshi did this during his confrontation with Motochika. He didn't need magic powers or the power of God. Just one fist and the power of his badassery!
  • Patriotic Fervor: A meta-example: There's a good reason why Sengoku Basara 3 was released on the Playstation 3 and the Wii (which are both Japanese-made consoles) and NOT for the Xbox 360 (which is an American model), despite the Xbox 360 being capable of handling the game better than the Wii (and not the fact the Xbox 360 has fewer sales in Japan doesn't count.)
    • In another odd example, images of Date Masamune from the game were used on posters encouraging people in the Miyagi prefecture (the real Date's old stomping grounds) to vote in the mayoral election.
  • Pirate: Motochika, complete with Pirate Parrot, and his crew.
  • Popularity Power: The series breathes in this. Popularity means more screentime, more merchandise, and more development. It explains Mitsunari's Breakout Character status to the point that he took over Yukimura as Masamune's main rival (after beating Yukimura out as second most popular character by only 50 votes), or the promotion of some NPC into playable characters and personal scenarios (Motochika and Motonari in 2, Kojuro, Oichi, Nagamasa and Kotaro in 2 Heroes). Tellingly, those who have little popularity (e.g: Nohime, Ranmaru, Yoshimoto, Kennyo, Xavi, many Area Warlords, etc) tends to either get replaced with another character with similar theme (Magoichi for Nohime, Tsuruhime for Ranmaru, for example) or demoted into unplayability to the point of obscurity or removed from the game, or becoming nothing more than glorified cannon fodder.
  • Power Floats: The SB characters laugh in the face of gravity!
  • Power Glows: The more the characters power up, the more brightly they glow. Pretty much all of Rikyu's moves in particular come with an obligatory yellow glow.
  • Power Trio: In Shimazu's alternate paths of 3/Samurai Heroes, he forms one with Kanbe and Muneshige, known as the Third Force of the South.
  • Practical Taunt: Many taunts have an effect on the character's moveset, for example, powering up one of their special attacks. They can also be used to charge the Basara Attack Gauge.
  • Pre Asskicking One Liners
  • Puppy Love: Itsuki and Ranmaru, both about 12 years old.
  • Purely Aesthetic Era: The 'Sengoku Period' here was just a backdrop of water to excuse several character relationship and design, as long as the Rule of Cool and Rule of Fun quota are filled. Some major examples:
    • Masamune's horse with chopper exhaust pipes, handlebars and soldiers looking like delinquents and his Number Two (Kojuro) sometimes acts like a Yakuza are meant to evoke the image that the protagonist is an archetypical Engrish-speaking Delinquent with his own gang, not because the actual Date Masamune was onenote . A lot of characterizations can evoke a similar feeling that they are meant to represent a character archetype more than the actual historical character and their accomplishment.
    • Honda Tadakatsu being a Gundam evokes his ephitet that he's called 'The Strongest' of the Sengoku Period, so what better and cooler way to enforce that image than to give him futuristic tech (that was a little downgraded to near Japanese steampunk) and turning him into a robot?
    • The existence of modern guns or ones that gets even more ridiculous and modern. Of course, it's with the basis that gunpowder and gun lessons have been a rather big thing in the Sengoku Period, but the game wouldn't be cooler if they didn't put things like Gatling Gun (this one became more prominent in the Bakumatsu era) or Rocket Launchers (Goes even beyond).
    • Figures and character relations that spanned across time:
      • Tsuruhime still existed despite living in an era before the Sengoku Period (but otherwise, they don't have any other potential 'klutzy shrine maiden' candidate).
      • Mouri Motonari still continued to exist until Sekigahara instead of being succeeded by his children (Mouri Terumoto) because that's against his characterization (being a loner Jerkass commander), plus Capcom can't afford to just boot his pretty boy look.
      • Ashikaga Yoshiteru would've been dead right before the period started, but since his successor (Yoshiaki) was kind of a patsy, they needed a more dignified member of the Ashikaga clan, so they picked Yoshiteru and pretended he never died.
      • Shibata Katsuie became rivals with Shima Sakon, while Masamune played as his Big Brother Mentor, despite the actual Katsuie dying before Masamune's time or Sakon's prime time as Ishida Mitsunari's right hand man.
      • By the 4th game (when they introduced Yoshiteru and Katsuie), Capcom probably decided "Screw it" and made the story about 'Creating Your Own Sengoku Period' where anything goes and historical accuracy got punted to oblivion. Not to worry, it's still a fun and cool interpretation where your favorite archetypes aren't going anywhere, just don't come for history lesson.
  • Rated M for Manly: This series will teach you that manliness can achieve anything.
  • Recycled In Feudal Japan: The two PSP entries in the series are basically Gundam Vs games, except with the cast of Sengoku Basara replacing the Mobile Suits.
  • Red Baron: From The Tiger of Kai, to The One Eyed Dragon, an awesome nickname is practically a badass necessity.
  • Red Oni, Blue Oni: Masamune as the Blue Oni, Yukimura as the Red Oni. The Shingen/Kenshin rivalry also counts (with Shingen as Red Oni, Kenshin as Blue Oni).
  • Redshirt Army: The ordinary soldiers at times seem like nothing more than ablative meat shields for the commanders.
  • Refuge in Audacity: No one questions how ridiculous any of it is. Such is the power of the Hot-Blooded.
  • The Remnant: In Samurai Heroes, Mitsunari Ishida is continuing in the name of Hideyoshi. More explicitly, Oichi leads the "Oda Remnant" forces. Or rather the Oda Remnants forcefully pulled Oichi back from her sleep and had her become their figurehead, often screaming about how the Demon Queen will rule the land. Also, Sorin's faction is apparently all that's left of Xavi's converts.
  • "Risk"-Style Map
  • The Rival: This series loves these. Established as of the fourth game are:
    • Masamune and Yukimura
    • Ieyasu and Mitsunari
    • Masamune and Mitsunari
    • Yukimura and Ieyasu
    • Sakon and Katsuie
    • Motochika and Motonari
    • Shingen and Kenshin
    • Hanbe and Kojuro
    • Yoshihiro and Tadakatsu
    • Oichi and Maria
  • Rule of Cool: The franchise thrives on this trope.
  • Say My Name: Used for humor, but also for drama. Or both, even.
    "Yukimura!!"
    "Oyakata-sama!!"
    "Yukimura!!!"
    "Oyakata-sama!!!"
    "YUKIMURA!!!!"
    "OYAKATA-SAMA!!!!"
    And so on...
    • "TADAKATSUUUUUUU!!!!!"
    • And then Mitsunari joined the fray... "IIIEEEYAAASUUUUUU"
      • If either Mitsunari or Ieyasu are in their rival's versions of Sekigahara in the third game, they start the battle by saying each other's name (Mitsunari lets out an angry "IEYASU!" while Ieyasu lets out a solemn "Mitsunari...")
    • This: "NAGAMASA-SAMA!!"
  • Scam Religion: Xavism is seemingly this since making money plays a large part of it (and both Xavi and Sorin have unique skills related to money-making) but Xavi does seem to believe his own schpiel about love. It's mostly a Parody Religion meant to function as a stand-in for Christianity.
  • Sean Connery Is About to Shoot You: Nobunaga's victory cutscene has him do this. Also, Magoichi's boss intro.
  • Serial Escalation: This game revels in its crazy fighting game action. For example, Masamune wields six swords. Not bad to start with, however this obviously just wasn't enough, so one of his alternate weapons has three blades to each hilt, making a grand total of 18 swords. How's that, eh?
  • Serrated Blade of Pain: Yoshihiro's default BFS.
  • Shout-Out: The characters can wield weapons from the first Devil May Cry game, with Masamune wielding six Alastors, Yukimura Dual Wielding Sparda and Ifrit and Nohime using Ebony and Ivory.
  • Sinister Scythe: Mitsuhide. Twice the scythes means twice as sinister.
  • Sissy Villain: Imagawa Yoshimoto wears make-up and prefers dancing to fighting (which he does with a fan). From the third game onwards he's replaced by Mogami Yoshiaki and Otomo Sorin.
  • Skinship Grope: Implied to be going on between the girls at the hot spring stage in 4. It's Not What It Looks Like.
  • The Smurfette Principle: In the spin-off fighting game, the only female main fighter is Oichi. Kasuga, Nohime and Matsu are limited to support only, and Itsuki doesn't appear at all.
    • It applies to the series, unlike Samurai Warriors or Dynasty Warriors who don't hesitate to include almost every good looking female historical figure as a fighter. Sengoku Basara tries to avoid that, relying on fictional characters to fill in certain niches.
    • Except that they did it with Oichi and Nohime too, to a greater and more implausible extent. So they don't exactly "avoid" that much. Never mind the fact that Saika Magoichi was historically a guy as well.
  • Solar and Lunar: In the third game, Ieyasu is represented by the sun and Mitsunari by the moon. The Battle of Sekigahara is represented as a solar eclipse.
  • Spin Attack: Basara attacks generally contain a lot of spinning to help raise the hit count. Yukimura, Motonari, Nagamasa, Kotaro and Kanbe also have a lot of Weapon Twirling involved in their movesets.
  • Stock Ninja Weaponry: Sasuke, Kasuga, and Kotaro all use appropriate ninja weapons, namely a Fuuma Shuriken, kunai, and a couple of ninjato.
  • Switch-Out Move: Implemented in Utage where, rather than a bodyguard, you can have a second character who tags in at any time. The fourth game improves on this system with the second character fighting alongside you as an ally that can be given simple orders but has to be level 50 in order to be tagged in.
  • Sword and Gun: Nobunaga pulls this off with a Sawn-Off Shotgun.
  • Sword and Sorcerer:
    • Nagamasa (sword) and Oichi (sorceress (of course they're married)).
    • Mitsunari (sword) and Yoshitsugu (sorcerer).
    • Yoshiteru (sword) and Maria (sorceress).
    • Nobuyuki (sword) and Masayuki (sorcerer).
  • Sword Beams: Several characters can do these. They tend to be fairly powerful as not only do they push the enemy away, but can also have multihit properties to them.
  • The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Masamune for Nobunaga, and he gets very pissed when Mitsuhide beats him to it. He later also claims this over Yukimura, who reciprocates the rivalry.
  • This Is a Drill: Tadakatsu's weapon will be the drill-spear that pierces the heavens!
  • Tiger Versus Dragon: Such imagery is prominently used with Yukimura and Masamune.
  • Took a Level in Badass: Ieyasu took a massive one, with a little help from his Plot-Relevant Age-Up.
  • Total Eclipse of the Plot: Used to represent the Battle of Sekigahara, between Ieyasu (the sun) and Mitsunari (the moon).
  • Vague Age: The case for just about everyone, since the creators seem to have no intention of making up their minds on the matter, let alone making it public. It's at least widely accepted that the poster boys - Masamune, Yukimura, Keiji, Ieyasu, Mitsunari, etc. - are all around the same age, between their late teens and early twenties. The others can generally be placed "somewhere in their teens/twenties/thirties", and so forth...then you get people like Kenshin and Mitsuhide, who are obviously Older Than They Look.
  • Vain Sorceress: Maria, need we say more?
  • Very Loosely Based on a True Story: And as the series has progressed, it conspires that the true story gets chucked out a window more often than not.
  • Video Game Historical Revisionism: Make that major revisionism...
    • Devil Kings even decided to throw the historical part out of the window in favour of an original story. Which, when the revisionism you had is deemed awesome, is not such a good idea.
  • Weapon Tombstone: After their defeat at Odawara in SB3 Masamune puts the swords of all the Date troops Mitsunari slaughtered on a mountainside in their memory.
  • What Measure Is a Mook?: The Sengoku Basara world is not a very pleasant place to be if you're not in possession of outrageous fighting abilities, to say the least. Mooks very rarely contribute much to a fight and will always inevitably be killed by the hundreds.
  • Whip Sword: Hanbe's weapon.
  • White Hair, Black Heart: Mitsuhide, Hanbe, and Mitsunari all play it straight. Motochika subverts it by being more rugged and a really great guy.
  • Wooden Katanas Are Even Better: Did someone say Musashi?! His ultimate weapon is a pair of incredibly plain-looking katanas however.
    • One of the pre-order DLC for the fourth game is Masamune in his training clothes as well as wielding a bokken.
  • World of Badass: Where even the horses are badass.
  • World of Ham: Everything is done in as Epic and as Rated M for Manly a way as possible.
  • Wrestler in All of Us: Ieyasu can pull off a rather thunderous elbow drop, and Kanbe can do a Final Atomic Buster that causes a localized tornado on impact, dragging in nearby grunts to set them up for massive combos. Several of Hideyoshi's moves generally involve grapples in some form or another.
  • You Get Knocked Down, You Get Back Up Again


The anime includes examples of:

  • Absurdly Sharp Blade: Sharp enough to cut through solid granite anyway...
  • Adaptational Wimp: Arguably, Matsunaga: in the games, while making use of hostages or reinforcements, he can fight equally with Masamune and Kojuro simultaneously. In the anime, he first forces Kojuro to fight through the Miyoshi Trio, has him poisoned twice before fighting him himself but is quickly defeated in a single attack once the poison is cured.
  • Adapted Out: Since The Last Party focuses exclusively on the Mitsunari vs Masamune/Ieyasu conflict, Kuroda Kanbe, Saika Magoichi, and Tsuruhime are left out of the movie.
  • Affectionate Gesture to the Head: At one point, Shingen is about to give a Megaton Punch to Yukimura but switches to patting him on the head at the last second.
  • Anachronism Stew: In the DVD extra Mini Sengoku Basara Chosokabe and Mori are watching the anime on TV.
  • Animation Bump: The animation seems to change a little every single episode, for better or for worse. This is mostly fixed by the second season.
  • Anyone Can Die: Whether or not they actually stay dead however is another matter entirely.
  • Artistic License – History: No one dies in the historically correct time, place or way. Also, everything else is just wrong. But hey, Rule of Cool is God.
    • More like they didn't care. This is Basara you're talking about.
  • Awesomeness Is Volatile: Aside from Matsunaga who actually makes extensive use of gunpowder, others are able to generate giant explosions thanks to their sheer badassness.
  • Back-to-Back Badasses: Yukimura and Sasuke pair up like this at one point in Episode 2 of the Judge End.
  • Badass in Distress: Two people on the battlefield noticed that Kojuro faked out Takenaka Hanbe. One of them was Sasuke; the other one, unfortunately, was Hanbe himself. He retaliates as only Hanbe can.
  • Battle Aura: All the time. Takeda even disintegrates an opponent in a giant wave of Battle Aura.
  • Battle in the Rain: Episodes 2, 3 and 9 of the first season, and Episode 2 of the second season.
  • Beam-O-War: Happens a lot. Particularly between Masamune and Yukimura.
  • Big "NO!": Episode 9, courtesy of Kasuga.
  • Bridal Carry: Usually with Sasuke involved, carrying either Kasuga (who doesn't enjoy the experience) or Yukimura to safety. In a rare female example, there's also Kasuga carrying Oichi out of Azuchi Castle's keep in this fashion.
  • Cool Horse: Masamune's infamous Harley Davidson Motor-Horse.
  • Cue the Sun: Happens twice. The first time is in Episode 1 when Yukimura and Masamune battle each other to a standstill. The second is Episode 12, after Nobunaga is finally defeated.
  • Dancing Mook Credits: The credits from Sengoku Basara:The Last Party feature mooks from all over, in a big ending dance number.
  • Dancing Theme: "JAP".
    • And here's the full dance.
    • Also, no matter how hard it seems, it is possible for normal people to do it!
    • "The Party Must Go On" from the movie finishes the series really well.
  • A Day in the Limelight: The OVA, which takes place between Episodes 11 and 12, focuses on Motochika, Motonari and Keiji.
  • Deadly Closing Credits: Episodes 5 and 11.
  • Death is Cheap: It certanly is for Oichi, Yoshihiro, Mitsuhide and Hisahide.
  • Debut Queue: Takes this one further by introducing the entire cast in the first episode!
  • Demoted to Extra: Shingen in the second season.
  • Despair Event Horizon: Episode 10. Until Masamune comes along. Then it's a different matter.
  • Diabolus ex Machina: Does the anime loves this or what?
  • Dramatic Thunder: Whenever Nobunaga is on the scene.
  • Dramatic Wind: Where would we be without it?
  • Due to the Dead: Yukimura is very big on this for Nobunaga, despite the fact that Nobunaga was evil. Matsunaga Hisahide doesn't get his logic.
  • Elite Mooks: Four of Date's retainers (Bunshichi, Yoshinao, Samenosuke, and Magobei) get quite a lot of attention.
    • Season 2 also introduces Oyamada Nobushige, a Takeda retainer, however he gets unceremoniously killed off a few episodes later.
    • Akagawa Motoyasu, a Mori retainer. Later on he appeared to be The Mole, but failed to assassinate Motonari and got butchered.
  • Empathic Environment
  • Enemy Mine: Kenshin, Shingen and a reluctant Masamune form a temporary alliance against Big Bad Nobunaga. The theory is that with him out of the way, they can be free to fight amongst themselves.
  • Evil Old Folks: Hojo Ujimasa is turned into a weak, Don Quixote-like coward who tries to use Fuma to kill Shingen.
  • Eye Scream: In Episode 12, when Nobunaga has Masamune cornered, he torments the poor boy by threatening to gouge out his other eyeball with his finger.
  • Face Palm: Sasuke, whenever Yukimura does something particularly stupid.
  • Fainting: Yumekichi the monkey faints in the second season. Apparently it's from worry.
  • Faking the Dead: Hisahide.
  • Faux Action Girl: Matsu and Oichi in season one. Ok, Oichi at least killed Nohime with her dark hands, but still...
  • Foe-Tossing Charge: Seriously, this is the only reason those Mooks exist at all...
  • Fragile Speedster: A notable mention goes to Kotaro Fuma. In the first season he almost diced Shingen in Odawara with a deadly combination of his swords and his greater speed. He got pwned by a single fist from Shingen.
  • Get A Hold Of Yourself Man: Sasuke hauls off and slaps Kasuga in Episode 10.
    • Later on in the same episode, Masamune is forced to beat some sense into Yukimura after he becomes too scared to fight.
  • Glowing Eyes of Doom: Shingen, as well as Masamune when he gets excited.
  • Got the Whole World in My Hand: Hideyoshi does this in the second opening, lifting Japan out of the sea with one hand.
  • Go Through Me: In the second season, Masamune's followers pile onto him bodily to protect him from Toyotomi Hideyoshi.
  • Gratuitous English: Plenty of it in the Season 1 OP track, and Masamune is pretty fond of it as always.
  • Half the Man He Used to Be: Tenkai shouldn't have let his guard down.
  • Ham-to-Ham Combat: "YUKIMURAAAA~!" "YOUR LORDSHIIIIIIP~~!"
  • Heroic BSoD: Yukimura has one after Mitsuhide wounds Shingen badly enough that his survival is questionable, which he blames himself for not being able to prevent. Only a manly Rousing Speech from both Masamune and Kojuro is able to snap him out of it.
  • Heroic Sacrifice: Honda Tadakatsu. Twice.
  • Hollywood Healing: Subverted with a gunshot wound Masamune obtains in the anime, which renders him bed-ridden for two episodes and serves as a major handicap in the Final Battle.
    • Played straight later with Motochika, who appears to be in great condition just days after getting beaten to a bloody smear by Hideyoshi.
    • Also, Episode 1 of Season 2. Yukimura has bandages on with his arm in a sling after he was beat down by Masamune at the beginning of the episode, but he undergoes instantaneous healing when Takeda punches him.
  • Honor Before Reason: This trope explains why Nagamasa and Ieyasu remain allies of Nobunaga despite being an Obviously Evil Overlord.)
  • Human Shield: Mitsuhide attempts to use Ranmaru as one against Kojuro. It doesn't work. Kojuro just throws Ranmaru out of the way and kicks Mitsuhide's ass.
  • Hurricane of Puns: The English dub of Season 2 Episode 13 seems to be an attempt at this by the writers/voice cast. It ends up being genuinely funny, and ten times hammier and more ridiculous than the rest of the season put together.
  • I Can Still Fight!: Masamune's gunshot wound makes it impractical for him to go after the men who were taken hostage. Still, Kojuro has to carefully and gently beat this into his master.
    • This seems to be developing into a habit of his.
  • The Immodest Orgasm: Kasuga's reaction to Kenshin's praise. See here.
  • Incoming Ham: The show is like a food fight in this regard.
  • Just Whistle: Subverted. After Sasuke realizes he can't stop Kasuga from trying to pull a one-woman Roaring Rampage of Revenge on Nobunaga, he instead gives her a flute and tells her to blow it should she find herself in danger. When the time does come to use it, it turns into a rocket-powered glider instead of summoning the other ninja.
    Kasuga: I thought you were supposed to appear when I blew into it.
    Sasuke: Well, that's obviously impossible. But hey, I'm here now!
  • Kansas City Shuffle: With the help of Sasuke , Kojuro pulls one of these in fine SenBasa-style in the first episode of the second season against the Toyotomi army, saving not only his own lord and their men but the Uesugi and Takeda armies as well, and doing it all in such a way that none of them lose face or owe any favours. He pays for it later.
  • Killed Off for Real: While the anime has brought back some people, Kennyo, Ujimasa, Yoshimoto, Nagamasa, Xavi, Nohime, Mitsuhide, Hideyoshi and Hanbe seem to be gone for good.
  • Large Ham: There's loads, but mostly the guy WHO'S ALWAYS SCREAMING ABOUT HIS OYAKATA-HAM-AAAAAAA!
  • Leave Him to Me!: Kojuro vs Mitsuhide, Episode 12.
  • Lighthearted Rematch
  • Lightning Reveal: How Nobunaga makes his anime appearance.
  • Lyrical Dissonance: "FLAGS", which opens the film, sounds just like a lively rock song akin to the other anime themes, and consists of T.M.Revolution's usual flowery lyrics. However it highlights the instability of the era, portraying the samurai as tragic figures whose lives have no meaning without war, and encourages warriors to live for the moment because they're probably going to either die young or fade into obscurity, unable to adapt to the changing times.
    • By contrast, the film's ending song essentially says "yeah, the whole country has gone to hell, but we may as well make the most of it!"
  • Mauve Shirt: Those four Date soldiers who are kidnapped in Episodes 7 and 8.
  • More Dakka: Whenever Nohime pulls out that gatling gun of hers from Hammerspace
  • I Have Just One Thing to Say: Shingen gives Yukimura a wordless example when Yukimura comes back from Hisahide's hostage situation with everyone alive, but without the ceremonial armor. After Yukimura gives his explanation ("people are our treasure"), Shingen lets loose his usual Megaton Punch, only to stop just before contact to ruffle Yukimura's hair.
  • Ms. Fanservice: Kasuga, even more so than in the game. Her Stripperific clothing probably help a lot.
  • The Mole: In Season 2, it turns out the Date army have one of these in their ranks.
  • Mood Whiplash: Episode 5: After that Funny Moment above, we're presented with...Nagamasa's dramatically tragic death, all to make Oichi suffer.
    • And in the very next episode, Tadakatsu goes BOOM, much to Ieyasu's despair.
  • Mooks: Every single soldier. One even wonders why they even bother gathering soldiers in the first place...Probably to keep the mooks from the opposition busy while their bosses fight the 'real' battles.
  • Neck Lift: Nobunaga does this in the last episode. Masamune must weigh about as much as a bag of sugar.
    • In Season 2, Masamune gets this treatment again, from Hideyoshi this time.
  • Necromancer: Ujimasa Hojo use his pike to summon the spirits of his ancestors to fight Shingen. He simply make him join them.
  • Never Trust a Trailer: "The Tiger of Kai Dies at Midaigawa," my ass!
  • No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Hideyoshi delivers several of these in the second season.
  • No One Could Survive That!: Notice that the smoking black crater where Honda used to be is suspiciously lacking a dead body at its center...
    • Also, Kenshin gets shot twice in the chest by Nohime and lives to fight again. Sengoku Era medicine must be very good.
    • Sasuke lampshades this by calmly noting that a normal person shouldn't be able to survive being punched through a sliding door and a stone lantern and into a wall. Yukimura is not a normal person.
  • No One Gets Left Behind: After Hisahide kidnaps his men, Masamune is determined to rescue them, despite being wounded, on the grounds that the Date Army can't afford to lose anyone.
  • Nothing but Skulls: Nobunaga's throne is made up of a pile of skulls in the anime. He even uses one for a cup.
  • Not Quite Dead: Tadakatsu. Twice.
    • As as of the second season, Oichi, Ieyasu and Yoshihiro as well. Despite Nobunaga shooting his prone body at point blank range in the head.
      • The movie has Tenkai appear as well.
  • Ominous Latin Chanting: German actually, but fits the bill. Hideyoshi instead has a mix of German and English in his.
  • One-Hit Kill: Shingen curb-stomping Ujimasa Hojo in Episode 2 with his flaming fist attack.
  • Post-Victory Collapse: Masamune is miles away from the battlefield before anyone even realizes that he was shot in the side after the fight with Nagamasa.
  • Rain of Arrows: How Ranmaru gets rid of Yoshimoto's Kagemusha. Also his main attack. It doesn't work so well against Kojuro or Masamune.
  • Rated M for Manly: Have a drink for every time 'man' or 'men' is mentioned (even in crazy made-up words) during the Season 2 OVA. You'll be back in the Sengoku period in no time!
  • "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Nobunaga spends a good ten minutes informing Masamune and Yukimura how foolish they are for thinking they could defeat him. Naturally, they defeat him.
  • The Rival: Yukimura considers Masamune his Only Worthy Opponent/One True Rival, and vice-versa.
  • Rivals Team Up: Episode 12, when everyone comes together for the Final Battle against Nobunaga.
  • Rousing Speech: "PSYCHE UP GUYS!!!!"
  • Rule of Cool: So many to count, but most prevalent would be Shingen using two horses to ride to the battlefield, all while standing up, each foot stepping on each saddle. And he can get the horses to run on walls.
    • Speaking of horses, Yukimura rides only one, but to dodge bullets, he stabs the ground with one spear and spins around it, while still riding the horse.
    • Masamune rides without handlebars. On a motorbike-horse. He's that cool.
  • Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: Many characters in the dub, to match the highly antiquated and flowery Japanese used in the original.
  • Scenery Porn: While the character designs can be a bit sketchy at times, the backgrounds are gorgeous and never fail to impress.
  • Shirtless Scene: Masamune received a rather obligatory shirtless scene in Episode 8, much to the viewers delight. The writers probably thought that with Yukimura going round half-naked all the time, they should give Masamune a chance to be shirtless as well (and improve their ratings).
  • Sparkling Stream of Tears: Oichi and Ieyasu do this as they cry for Nagamasa and Tadakatsu, respectively.
  • Stuff Blowing Up
  • Super-Deformed: Mini Sengoku Basara: Chosokabe-kun and Mori-kun, which follows Motochika and Motonari as they get into all sorts of adventures. Hilarity Ensues. See here.
    • The second season continues this, only this time around the whole cast gets to participate.
  • Sword Limbo: Mitsuhide does this during his fight against the two heroes in Episode 11.
  • Sword Sparks: Complete with Shakeen!
  • Technicolor Blade: Very common.
  • Terrible Trio: Hisahide's "Death God Squad" is composed by three Malevolent Masked Man who use poisons and spears.
  • Third-Option Adaptation: In the third game, the Saika can form a contract with either Ieyasu or Mitsunari, in order to help with their respective ambitions to conquer Japan. In Judge End, Magoichi instead forms the contract with Keiji, to help him search for Matsu.
  • Third-Person Person: Ranmaru and Oichi, like their game counterparts. Oddly enough, the Italian dub has Oichi speak normally, but keeps the quirk on Ranmaru.
  • Too Long; Didn't Dub: Nobunaga's title in the Italian dub, rather than the literal translation of "Re Demoniaco del Sesto Cielo" is reduced to "Sesto Re Demone" (Sixth Demon King) to match the shorter pronunciation of the original "Dairokuten Mao".
  • Trap Is the Only Option: In Episode 11 Masamune decides to walk into Nobunaga's trap, confident that he'll be able to figure something out once he gets there and kick butt. It turns out that the trap was actually set for Mitsuhide.
  • Unexplained Recovery: Despite being used as a punching bag by Toyotomi, then being caught in the epicenter of his exploding base and then being almost drowned, Motochika shows up two episodes later looking as fit and healthy as ever, AND has a mind to steal Masamune's horses.
    • Matsunaga Hisahide, Oichi and Shimazu Yoshihiro are other examples. One blew himself up and the other two were killed by Nobunaga, yet they're alive and kicking by the second season. Though Oichi has become little more than an Empty Shell and has to fight off possession by her brother, who it seems isn't resting in peace either.
    • This anime has absolutely no shame bringing back supposedly dead characters for the sake of a possible third season. Just how did Ieyasu manage to grow so much in such a short space of time? How did Tadakatsu put himself back together after being blown up by Nobunaga?
  • Unflinching Walk: In Season 2, Hideyoshi pulls this as he approaches Motochika's Fugaku fortress-ship, while cannon fire decimates his mooks around him.
  • Volleying Insults: Motonari and Motochika always seem to end up doing this when they meet. They get especially creative in the movie.
  • War Is Hell: Sure the individual duels may be glorious, but the ongoing war and chaos is always presented as a bloody and terrifying waste of human life that brings sorrow to all involved.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: Averted with Ranmaru: after Honnoji's incident and Nobunaga's fall he's shown to have just met Itsuki.
  • What Were You Thinking?: What Shingen asks Yukimura after learning that Yukimura let Kojuro (who, along with Masamune, was under their care) confront Hisahide alone and with only half of the demanded ransom. He did not like the answer he got.
  • Why We Can't Have Nice Things: Shingen and Yukimura regularly smash holes through the doors and walls of their mansion. In the movie, they go so far as to demolish and entire building, much to the surprise of the men inside it.
  • World of Ham
  • Worthy Opponent: A conversation between Shingen and Kenshin in the anime implies that the two of them collaborated to arrange for Masamune and Yukimura to meet in battle specifically in the hopes that the two of them would become Worthy Opponents.
  • You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: When Oichi tells Nobunaga that she has accidentally killed his wife, Nobunaga calmly responds by saying that a woman like Nohime can only go so far. He then kills Oichi for the same reason.
    • And this is after he has already sent Mitsuhide to die against the heroes by giving both him and them a false location of his stronghold. Though to be fair, Mitsuhide was going there to kill him as well.

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