Despite not being a huge turn-based strategy game fan (I've only ever liked Advance Wars) I was intrigued to see how Capcom, Sega, and Namco Bandai could cram all their franchises into one game. On paper it sounds like it could be a huge mess, but in reality it makes a lot more sense, and is a lot of fun.

There were a couple levels on display at Tokyo Game Show. I played the city level (the other being a graveyard); whether it was taken from any game in particular wasn't obvious to me. In it, several groups of heroes dot the city and each turn you take switches you over to another team for the next turn.

This is where my lack of knowledge of Namco Bandai characters comes into play. I only knew those of Sega (from Space Channel 5) and Capcom (Ryu and Ken from Street Fighter, and Jill and Chris from Resident Evil), all of which looked great in 2D. They were all chibified, yet detailed, versions of how they look in their respective games.

Despite the Street Fighter characters starting off their gaming lives in 2D, they did look different from how they've ever have before, and of course this is the first time the Resident Evil characters have looked like this (officially). I thought they looked great, maybe even a little adorable.

Street Fighter vs. Everyone

The D-pad spins the camera around the city scene, with up and down letting you zoom in and out. You can pan really far back and see the whole battle scene, which is taking place across a huge area of the city. In a classic, sprite-based way, the characters look the same from whichever angle you look at them—a stylistic choice or just a way to save from redrawing every one of the hundreds of characters from every angle? We'll never know.

When it's your turn to move, a grid appears beneath your feet, letting you easily see exactly how far you can walk. Walk up to an enemy (weird, Xenomorph-style aliens) and you are prompted to hit A to start an attack. This is where the viewing angle changes to a side-on, Street FIghter-style look.

Attacks are simpler than they are in 2D fighters, though (up + A, down + A, hold Y, etc.). Nothing anyone couldn't handle, and they're all explained on the touch screen anyway.The fighting animations were reminiscent of a 2D fighter, like Marvel vs. Capcom or Street Fighter Alpha—lots of leaping up and hitting enemies 50 times in the air before slamming them to the ground. Hit points are taken off in real time, and when you've used up your moves from that turn it tells you how much damage you did to the enemy. Of course if you kill the enemy, you leave the screen immediately.

The super attacks are spectacular, too, as you are always controlling two characters per team. These attacks usually involve the pair forming up for a massive, screen-filling attack, with an animated overlay in 3D on the top screen. Ryu and Ken's were what you'd expect: lots of fireballs and hurricane kicks, with the 3D overlay taken from Street Fighter IV. The Resident Evil crew were all about the big weapons; I think I saw a rocket launcher being deployed at one point.

I can't wait to find out how they explain all these different characters coming together. It probably won't make any sense, but in the end it won't matter—this is shaping up to be crazy fun!