This is where the player jumps in. Taking control of Ayumi and her two swords which can also shoot and takes on hordes of enemies, finds various small artifacts to boost Ayumi's powers and generally escape from death traps. Along the way she meets a guy named Jay who then and when helps her in battle. His forte is light magic, which is either a blessing or not for the by now cursed Ayumi. What happens to him depends on your choice of magic.
X-Blades was developed in 2009 by the Russian developer Gaijin Entertainment (yes, that Gaijin of War Thunder) based on the game Oni Blade, to which it is mostly an update in terms of graphics and gameplay. Blades of Time, also made by Gaijin Entertainment is something of a spiritual successor with the inclusion of a Time Control mechanic. It was released for Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 on February 6th, 2009, and for PC on February 9th, 2009 and re-released through GOG.com with re-rendered HD cinematics.
Not to be confused with X Blade, the manga, or the χ-blade from Kingdom Hearts.
Tropes present in X-Blades:
- Action Girl: Ayumi, oh so much. She can kick some asses with her Dual Wielding blades (see below), spells and some acrobatic skills.
- And Your Reward Is Clothes: Alternate outfits are available. Clothes that actually do something. They either heal her much faster or protect her much better.
- Animesque: Ayumi, beginning with her name and ending with her huge eyes, nice face, nice body and skimpy clothing. The FMV scenes up the ante a bit as well by looking decidedly more drawn. Particularly curious since the game is Russian
- Bare-Fisted Monk: Jay. He can actually cast spells too.
- Black Magic: Powerful, but corrupts.
- Cleavage Window: Even the less revealing clothes use this.
- The Corruption: It tries to take over Ayumi but can give her more power as well.
- Curse: The Enlightened One warns Ayumi to not touch the dark artifact. She does it anyway. This is the result.
- Dark Is Evil: The aptly named Dark One.
- Death Trap: If it wasn't for Jay, Ayumi would be Swiss cheese thanks to a spike trap.
- Downer Ending: Choose any darkness spell and you will get this. In their final fight, Ayumi will land a killing blow to Jay, and weep over his lifeless body.
- Dramatically Missing the Point: On the opening sequence, the shop owner doesn't notice the spawning demons until it's too late.
- Dual Wielding: Ayumi, wielding two gun-slash-blade hybrid. Successive upgrades make it larger.
- Elite Mooks: Summoners, and most of the bigger enemies.
- Fire, Ice, Lightning: Available spell types are light, darkness, various support types and these three.
- Flaming Sword: A possible spell you can buy, in addition to Ice, Lightning, and Light magic.
- Global Currency: Souls. Dropped by enemies, destructible props, and used to purchase everything in the game.
- Girlish Pigtails: Three of them for Ayumi.
- Golden Ending: Available by refusing to buy darkness spells. Ayumi refuses to outright kill Jay, and manages to channel her Light Magic to not only reverse his corruption, but also cleanse the entire planet of the Darkness, and the two are seen sitting together enjoying a sunset.
- Good Is Not Nice: The Enlightened One is a total Jerkass.
- Good Old Fisticuffs: Jay fights this way.
- Healing Factor: The standard one where Ayumi stands still and slowly heals herself. It is accelerated a lot when she cleared a level.
- Heroes Prefer Swords: Ayumi prefers two. Jay however fights barefisted.
- An Ice Person: Ayumi can learn ice spells (among other elements).
- Impossibly Cool Weapon: The X-Blades.
- Jiggle Physics: Ayumi's breasts bounce when she runs or jump. She also provide a non-fanservice example of this trope: her hair waves at every movement.
- Male Gaze: Ayumi's ample assets are quite exposed in her default outfit, and feature prominently in cutscenes.
- Marked Change: When Ayumi's curse, or light magic, takes over, large glowing marks appear on her body.
- Mooks: More than you could possibly count, with many levels revolving around cutting down seemingly endless hordes while a meter ticks down with every kill, or some rooms with killable monster generators.
- Mook Maker: Several levels feature Summoning Orbs that will spawn enemies indefinitely until they are all destroyed.
- Ms. Fanservice: Ayumi is a curvy girl with an outfit that leaves practically nothing to the imagination.
- Nice Guy: Jay rescues Ayumi, then suggests to lift her curse, before even really knowing her name.
- Panty Fighter: Ayumi isn't clad in much more than a bikini and some small-coverage JRPG-style boots and gauntlets.
- Playing with Fire: Fireballs, swords on fire and more.
- Remaster: X-Blades HD on GOG.com features remastered 1080p quality FMVs over its original 2009 release, but the rest of the game's graphics are the same.
- RPG Elements: You increase Ayumi's powers by buying spells with souls and finding items. Healing her actually costs souls, not "rage".
- Shock and Awe: Lightning skills are quite effective against spiders later on.
- Stripperiffic: Ayumi's initial outfit is a small white bikini top, an equally-sized thong and what might appear to be trousers cut down and outfitted with small armour plates and... that's it.
- Swiss-Army Weapon: The X-Blades are guns and swords in one.
- Third-Person Seductress: The selling point of this game, since you get to stare at Ayumi's ass during the whole game.
- Thong of Shielding: Ayumi seems to think this is appropriate wear. Considering most other characters who are guys don't wear much more either, it's probably a typical fashion. Amusingly, the Japanese PS3 version censors her thong and replaces it with a bikini bottom instead
◊. Even more amusingly, the ingame models retained said thong, making the whole thing rather pointless. - White Magic: Light Magic. Weak but useful against those weak to it, where it hits really hard.
- "X" Marks the Hero: Played with, by Ayumi taking an X pose with her blades on one of the covers.
