Trivia / Samurai Warriors

• Acting for Two: While its cast isn't as large as Dynasty Warriors, it's still a trend for Samurai Warriors as the series keeps rolling out new installments.
  • Hideo Ishikawa voices Hideyoshi Toyotomi and Motonari Mori; for the former, it wasn't until the second game and he also uses his unique goofy high-pitch for him. Ishikawa also voices two completely different sounding figures in Dynasty Warriors.
  • It's surprising to hear Yuji Ueda either as the Boisterous Bruiser Keiji Maeda or hear him shriek with insanity as Kojirō Sasaki.
  • Joji Nakata as Kenshin Uesugi and Ieyasu Tokugawa; in fact, Nakata uses an exceptionally close tone of voice for both, but the difference can be determined via the volume of their respective dialogue - Kenshin is soft-spoken, whereas Ieyasu is emotional and gruff.
  • Naomi Shindo as Ranmaru Mori and Ginchiyo Tachibana.
  • Wakana Yamazaki is Okuni and Nene.
  • Nobuyuki Hiyama pulls a Playing Against Type: as Masamune Date, he keeps the Hot-Blooded aspects his other famous roles are known for, but as Kotaro Fuma, he uses a subdued voice, albeit in a sinister tone.
  • Hisao Egawa for Goemon Ishikawa and Yoshihiro Shimazu, though both voice tones are noticeably different. Again, he also voices a historical figure in Dynasty Warriors beforehand.
  • Masaya Takatsuka as Kanetsugu Naoe and Kanbei Kuroda.
  • Eiji Takemoto for the calm, yet Jerkass Mitsunari Ishida and the silent, Hot-Blooded Katsuie Shibata.
  • Umeka Shoji is Hanbei Takenaka and Aya; in the former's intro, she even uses her normal voice for his disguise.
  • Ryota Takeuchi as Kojuro Katakura and Kagekatsu Uesugi; the former uses his usual voice, while the latter is more gruff with few words to speak.
  • Katsuyuki Konishi as Toshiie Maeda and Naomasa Ii; as he previously voiced Shuten Douji in Warriors Orochi 3, this is the second time he's voiced two figures in one Warriors series.
• Creator's Favorite: Naotora Ii; not only is she the only character on the roster modeled after a Real Life actress, she's favored by the series' producer which is ironic that she was cut from Samurai Warriors 5 despite being alive around Nobunaga's life time.
• The Danza: As of Samurai Warriors 5, Oda Nobunaga is now voiced by Nobunaga Shimazaki, a connection Shimazaki was made fun of over in the past.
• Dueling Games: With Sengoku Basara; while Samurai Warriors features less over-the-top personalities, but more grounded historical fiction aspects compared to the former, it has better international appeal and marketing. Koei Tecmo makes it more clear this franchise is geared for all audiences. Meanwhile, Capcom and Sengoku Basara (at least in the latest installments) likes to target itself with the Yaoi fandom - this is shown with how this series likes to insert its fair share of women, whereas Sengoku Basara piles on the Ho Yay moreso than Samurai Warriors.
  • To make this more apparent, both series has a pseudo "competition" of sorts with one another with regards to new character inclusions: if there's a historical figure in the Sengoku Period added in a new installment of one series first, chances are the other series will add their own rendition of the individual for their next installment (and vice versa). For example, Yoshihiro was part of the Sengoku Basara roster in its first game before the character made his debut in Samurai Warriors 2; likewise, Hanbei was added to the Samurai Warriors 3 cast following his appearance in Sengoku Basara 2.
  • Furthermore, Samurai Warriors started to use particular character "archetypes" Sengoku Basara used first for their cast: take Gracia, for instance - she's meant to be the "Christian" representative of Samurai Warriors when Pontiff Xavi pulled this schtick originally in Sengoku Basara (until he was replaced by Sorin Otomo). Meanwhile, characters like Ujiyasu Hojo and Takakage Kobayakawa are the "representatives" of their respective clans in Samurai Warriors in contrast to Sengoku Basara using Ujimasa Hojo and Hideaki Kobayakawa.
  • Spin-Off Samurai Warriors: Spirit of Sanada was meant to be Koei Tecmo's answer to Capcom's Sengoku Basara: Sanada Yukimura-den, capitalizing on the popularity of the NHK television drama Sanada-Maru. Koei Tecmo's approach for this particular installment was to add more content in response to Capcom's less-than-stellar rhetoric for Yukimura-den, such as a revamped campaign system, aging up characters appropriately as the story progresses ("old Yukimura" has a different moveset than when he is a young adult), a new female character (Chacha), adding a popular historical figure that has been in Sengoku Basara (Sasuke), and of course, a localized release. As a result, Spirit of Sanada kept the franchise afloat while the competition became a Franchise Killer.
• No Dub for You: After Samurai Warriors 3, the subsequent games to come out in the West (Chronicles, Chronicles 3, 4, 4-II, 4 Empires, Spirit of Sanada and 5) were released with the Japanese dub only. Subverted with the Animated Adaptation, which was dubbed by Funimation.
• No Export for You
  • All expansions of Samurai Warriors 3 (Xtreme Legends/Z, Empires and Z: Special) and Samurai Warriors Chronicles 2nd have not received an international release. For the former, this is likely due to 3 being released in the West exclusively for the Nintendo Wii that included a character from The Mysterious Murasame Castle, originally made by Nintendo.
  • The Nintendo Switch port of Spirit of Sanada, made in celebration of Omega Force's 20th anniversary, has yet to leave Japan since its release in 2017.
• The Other Darrin:
  • Daisuke Gōri voiced Shingen Takeda, but his 2010 suicide gave Ryūzaburō Ōtomo the role starting from Samurai Warriors 3: Xtreme Legends.
  • The original voice actor for Hideyoshi in the first game and Xtreme Legends expansion was Munehiro Tokida, but was mysteriously replaced by Hideo Ishikawa permanently when Samurai Warriors 2 was released. Likewiwse, Takayuki Sasada voiced Nagamasa Azai in the first game, until Hiroshi Kamiya was brought in to replace him after becoming a playable character in Samurai Warriors 2.
  • Hidetada is voiced by Yusuke Handa in Spirit of Sanada after his character design was revamped. However, originally Hidetada was voiced by Shouta Ebina in the Anime.
  • Ujiyasu Hojo's voice actor, Unshō Ishizuka, passed away from esophageal cancer on August 2018. Masashi Ebara takes over his role for Warriors Orochi 4 and may likely take over for any future appearances.
  • Since the English dub for the Anime was recorded at Funimation in Texas, everyone was inevitably recast.
  • With Samurai Warriors 5 being a Soft Reboot, some of the playable characters were recast with younger voices such as the aforementioned Nobunaga Shimazaki as Nobunaga, replacing Jurota Kosugi, while Yukiyo Fujii replaces Mariko Suzuki as Nō.
• Playing Against Type:
  • It's practically unthinkable to hear Nobuyuki Hiyama not voice a character without him going Hot-Blooded with loads of Large Ham, but besides Masamune, he also voices the calculating, chaos-loving Kotaro Fuma.
  • Joji Nakata is known for voicing sinister characters, but he voiced Ieyasu Tokugawa and Kenshin Uesugi, who are far more honorable characters.
• Real-Life Relative:
  • Takeshi Kusao (Yukimura Sanada) married Yuka Saito (Naotora Ii) in 2015.
  • Ryōtarō Okiayu (Motochika Chosokabe) married Ai Maeda (Oichi) in 2013. This is actually his second marriage after he divorced Nao Nagasawa^note The voice actress, not the actress.
• Role Reprise:
  • Vic Mignogna, the English voice actor for Mitsuhide Akechi in Samurai Warriors 3, voiced Tenkai in Sengoku Basara 3. In this case, Tenkai in the latter game is really Mitsuhide in disguise.
  • Johnny Yong Bosch voices Yukimura Sanada in both Samurai Warriors and Sengoku Basara.
    • Ditto for his counterpart named Ryou Sanada in Ronin Warriors, also voiced by Takeshi Kusao in Japanese as well.
  • Gina Bowes voiced Kunoichi in the first game; due to the character's removal in Samurai Warriors 2, she returns in Samurai Warriors 3, making her the only English voice actor for this series to return for not only another game, but the exact same role.
  • While some of the original cast in Samurai Warriors 5 are replaced with younger actors, there are still some who retain their roles such as Hikaru Midorikawa as Mitsuhide and Eiji Takemoto as Katsuie.

---