My Hero Academia: All’s Justice Review (PS5, Xbox Series X/S, & PC)

Just something different about actually being an in-game character in an anime battle arena. Nothing like reading a manga or watching an anime. It’s interactive and fully dependent on your moment-to-moment decision-making. Your smarts and skills at beating the opponent. Plus, you can choose how you show up to battles, and the special attacks and finishing moves you bring down the curtain with. 

It’s the very reason there have been more than enough games inspired by manga and anime: Naruto, Dragon Ball, My Hero Academia… The latter has three games now, telling the One’s Justice trilogy. As usual, you control characters from the anime and manga, reliving iconic battles via cinematic storytelling and in-game action. So far, we’ve had 2018’s My Hero One’s Justice and 2020’s My Hero One’s Justice 2. And the recently released My Hero Academia: All’s Justice finally brings the trilogy to a close. 

But is it a finale worth playing through, whether you’re a newcomer or a long-time fan? Let’s find out in our My Hero Academia: All’s Justice review today.

Solo Dolo

First things first, will newcomers be lost diving into My Hero Academia: All’s Justice? Quite so, I’m afraid. Being the ending to a trilogy, the story mode dives straight into the final war arc of the anime series. And thus, fans will enjoy the climactic battles a lot more, pinpointing their favorite moments brought to life in cinematic and live-action scenes. That’s not to say that you won’t enjoy the experience. There are certainly enjoyable storylines to be digested here.

In addition to the story mode’s final showdown between the heroes and villains of My Hero Academia, featuring the journey of Deku and other characters building up to the final war arc between One For All and All For One, you’ll enjoy side stories in the Team Up Missions, Hero’s Diary, and Archive Battle single-player modes. Think of Team Up Missions as open-world exploration, where you team up with Class 1-A heroes and complete missions together. But this isn’t as in-depth as open-world adventures you may be used to, with the environments eventually feeling generic, and the missions becoming repetitive over time. There are only so many similar platforming and combat encounters you’ll play before moving on.

On to Hero’s Diary, then. Here’s where My Hero Academia: All’s Justice has crafted new, original stories for individual Class 1-A characters. You’ll find some unique interactions here and never-before-seen daily life stories of your favorites. And finally, Archive Battles. This is more like a fan service featuring 15 iconic past battles of the My Hero Academia series. 

Justice Where Due

Overall, there are genuinely funny, wholesome moments in the story. Lots of emotion, especially in the majestic battle moments that, being the final war arc, serve up pretty spectacle moments of delight. Characters, as well, are charming, especially when they are fleshed out in the Hero’s Diary single-player modes via dedicated side quests specially curated for them. But the different modes can feel disjointed in relation to the main story. Some side quests are simply fetch quests and can feel like filler content. Others barely have any impact on advancing the characters or story. 

It’s also awkward for the side quests to be unlocked via exploring the open world rather than the main story itself. Navigating an in-game mobile phone menu to select the next main quest, while a creative idea for immersion, ends up feeling out of place. 

In any case, the sound and visuals are a pleasant delight. With the battles, you know what you’re in for: flashy visual effects and dramatic sounds. And My Hero Academia: All’s Justice certainly delivers with the splashes of color on screen and climactic orchestral and rock pieces. Characters themselves look charming, as do the beautifully rendered environments they’re in. Perhaps my only gripe with the visual presentation is that some cutscenes use still images, especially when others have delightful animations. And, voice acting is pleasant, with English and Japanese dubs well-authentic and accurate.

Down to Business

Anyway, what’s probably most enticing to players are the 3D arena battles. These have an offline and online option. In offline mode, you can choose from 1v1, 2v2, or 3v3 battles. Fighting against the AI is surprisingly satisfying. You’ll face unexpected comebacks, be it counters or your own combos thrown back at you. And thus, forcing you to think on your feet, while planning two steps ahead of your opponent. Here’s where you learn the mechanics, especially given the lack of a tutorial (unless you actively look for it in the menu). 

Given the versatile toolsets at your disposal, it can take a bit of time to bend them to your will. And therein lies the benefit of the Normal mode, a newly added feature in My Hero Academia: All’s Justice. This automates combos for beginners. That way, battles flow more smoothly and feel more rewarding. But once you’ve learned the flow of combat, you can then switch to Manual, where you input the button combinations for sleek combos yourself, like in Mortal Kombat. 

More Than Meets the Eye

It’s here that the depth and strategy in My Hero Academia: All’s Justice begins to set in. The basic attacks, dodges, counters, and special attacks don’t just demand accurate timing but also anticipating opponents’ moves. Like rock-paper-scissors, the abilities and strategies you use can hit a wall when the opponent outsmarts you. Not to mention that the battles are faster-paced than ever before, thanks to getting rid of double jumps and dashes. It feels more grounded, while still making room for aerial combos, which adds another layer of strategy to maneuver battle arenas and position characters strategically. 

Speaking of battle arenas, they render beautifully in both offline and online modes. However, more stages could have certainly been much appreciated. Still, you can customize your characters’ outfits and colors to a pretty wide extent. And add touches of your personal style to the gauges on screen or even the UI. Speaking of the gauges, it’s interesting to have the rising meter, another new feature added to combat. This fills up as you attack opponents and take damage. Once filled, it boosts your damage output, speed, and health, or even unleashes special attacks.

Battle Fest

In fact, for much of your time in My Hero Academia: All’s Justice, you’ll be jumping from one battle to the next. It’s, after all, the final war arc. So, it makes sense that there’d be plenty of climactic battles as the heroes and villains of the One’s Justice trilogy clash for the last time. These are genuinely thrilling, with much thanks owing to the freedom to switch characters and experiment with their unique quirks and abilities. Indeed, both heroes and villains come heavily equipped with skills that differ in some way from your last pick. And it’s so much fun to discover the flashiest ways to take down opponents. The abilities are also relatively well-balanced across the board. 

Perhaps, balancing issues arise in the battles themselves, where certain enemies can be a pain to fight. When there are multiple of them. And worse, when you have no way to inflict damage on them until you strip them down of their armor. It also feels strange when these frustrations rear their ugly heads out of nowhere. From enjoying a sweet breeze through the story to running into buffed enemies that take multiple tries to finally take down. Some AI opponents can seemingly predict your next move. So, no matter what you do, they’re always a step ahead of the curve. Yet, these issues are never too dire to completely write off the overall satisfying battle system.

I suppose the technical issues, especially with frame rate drops, will be addressed in the future. And since they’re annoying, yes, but never too bothersome to quit playing, I’ll leave this particular issue as briefly as that.

Verdict

Content has never been an issue for most anime adaptations. And My Hero Academia: All’s Justice hasn’t certainly been left behind on that front. It comes packed with lots of fan service for veterans, while still keeping in mind newbies. Although the execution of the single-player modes can feel disjointed at times. Perhaps if the side stories were deeper and more connected to the main arc, the overall story mode would have been a perfect storm. 

Fortunately, battles remain as thrilling as ever. It’s a familiar combat system that should be easy to get into for veterans. But newcomers should find it accessible as well, with mechanics that are easy to learn but hard to master. And soon, you’ll find yourself finessing your timing, tagging in other characters to extend combos, and optimizing the deep and strategic toolsets My Hero Academia: All’s Justice provides to skyrocket to the top of the online leaderboards.

If technical issues with the frame rate drops are addressed, and the difficulty spikes are balanced out, My Hero Academia: All’s Justice will be a seamless playthrough, from start to finish.