Gundam Breaker is a great game for serious Gundam fans who have always wanted to design and build their own mobile suit, then take it into battle. The only problem is that those battles start to feel very similar, very quickly.
Gundam Breaker looks swell, just as the other Vita-based Gundam game, Gundam SEED Battle Destiny, did before it. I was playing on the new, slim Vita 2000 model with its LCD sceen, so I can't say how it looks on the original Vita's OLED. I presume it looks a bit richer. What makes looking at them even more fun is the fact that you're designing your own mech from scratch; the level of suit customization is insane. In the real version of the game, you'd gain most of your parts from defeating enemies; but in this TGS demo, I was given a whole pile of them right away, to demonstrate what was ultimately possible. Building and re-building my own custom Gundam was just the kind of thing I dig.
You can mix and match pieces to make your own crazy machine, or design exact replicas of your favorites from throughout the Gundam universe. As you swap parts in and out, you'll see a multitude of stat changes, meaning you can design a Gundam to your liking, both aesthetically and functionally. What's more, parts of the same name and appearance can have different levels and stats, meaning the hunt for the perfect part may never truly be over.
Remember Grandia Xtreme for PS2? It was an RPG which took the Grandia battle system and made it the whole focus, but sacrificed story and therefore, got a whole lot of hate from reviewers and fans alike. Gundam Breaker seems similarly laid out, in that the treasured story of its elders seems very trimmed-down here. Even demos try to tell some of the story here and there, but this demo, as well as all the info and preview stuff from Namco Bandai, didn't really focus on anything other than the bare bones. "You must defeat the enemy." Normally I wouldn't bring this up, but the PS3 version also suffered here, so given this TGS showing, it's a safe bet that the Vita version will not include any additional story bits. This is clearly a game made to give fans a world in which to tinker with Gundams rather than to show them a piece of the saga. You make your own story, let's say. Some people will feel disappointed by this for sure, while others might not mind.
If you love the world of Gundam and want a great way to build your own, Gundam Breaker might be worth an import. With many menu items already written in English and some translation FAQs bound to become available (especially thanks to a PS3 version already dropping this past summer), it might be a temptation to take advantage of Vita's region freedom. But if you want a little story to make repetitive mission objectives not feel like such a chore, you might want dress in a different mobile suit.
