Bleach: Rebirth of Souls is, at first glance, the very type of game that so many anime fans groan at a popular property getting a video game adaptation thats a fighter (not just a fighter, an arena fighter) has practically become a stereotype at this point, thanks in no small part to Namco Bandai, who hold the licenses to several popular shonen anime properties. These arena fighter adaptations of anime are notorious with their fans, owing to their obvious low budgets and lack of appeal for anyone beyond pre-existing fans of the property. In a lot of ways, they recall tie in and licensed games of yore you know, when youd get a game adaptation to go along with a big budget movie release?Even back in the era of the low effort tie in, every now and then, however, youd get the odd licensed game that at least attempted to go above and beyond and be a compelling game and product on its own merits that could feasibly appeal to players who werent already fans of the property the game was based on to begin with.Bleach: Rebirth of Souls is in the lineage of those titles while it is still an arena fighter based on one of the most recognizable anime of all time, it isnt merely coasting on the built-in fanbase and audience that Bleach has, and is trying (operative word trying here) to be a robust and full-featured, well playing game in its own right.Credit has to be given to developers Tamsoft here. It would be far too simple to get away with a straightforward arena fighter and call it a day. However, they have fleshed out the combat system in the game to where it is genuinely, legitimately compelling and fun enough to play that even someone who is not interested in Bleach or even anime at all would probably enjoy playing it merely as a fighting game, with no knowledge of the source material at all."They have fleshed out the combat system in the game to where it is genuinely, legitimately compelling and fun enough to play that even someone who is not interested in Bleach or even anime at all would probably enjoy playing it merely as a fighting game, with no knowledge of the source material at all."That combat system draws a lot of inspiration from a lot of other games, with a frenetic, dynamic pace of combat mixing basic light and heavy attacks that can be strung into quick and effective combos, a lot of kinetic movement and positioning, signature finisher moves (that are a great source for fan pleasing references to the source material), and a stock system that, by keeping the amount of lives your attacks take from your opponent on each knockout variable, keeps fights thrilling and engaging.Legitimately, Bleach: Rebirth of Souls is a fun fighting game. Almost every single fight I had felt like one where I had to fight to claim the win, and there are enough special moves, counters, and abilities that all characters have on them at any given time that even an early hefty lead doesnt guarantee victory, and letting your guard down for even a little bit can give opponents the opening they need to stage a comeback. If you are a fan of arena fighters, Bleach: Rebirth of Souls can lay claim to being one of the best ones around, very much in the same vein as last years similarly good Dragon Ball Sparking Zero.Rebirth of Souls also has a sizeable roster of characters, and while I havent gone hands on with every single of the literally dozens of characters the title boasts, the ones I have player all play differently, while still feeling viable enough to hold their own against pretty much any character theyre matched up with.There have definitely been some match ups I have found harder than expected, but what has convinced me of this games mechanical soundness has been that, unlike so many other games of this ilk, it has almost always been simply a matter of getting used to the opponents moves and speed, getting a read on them, and then adjusting my own attacks accordingly, to clinch victory. This is truly a really engaging fighter that fans and non-fans alike can dig their teeth into; the former to recreate some of their favorite fights themselves, and the latter simply because of how mechanically engaging and dense this game is.Fans are, paradoxically enough, likely to be the group that finds the most to complain about in this release. For as great as the combat and fighting in this game are, the story mode is shockingly subpar, and really stands in sharp contrast to how much attention and care the rest of theme seems to have. As mentioned previously, it tries to follow the story of Bleach (at least through to the Arrancar arc) in a visual novel format (interspersed with fights), and it is not good.The entire affair feels extremely low budget, with barely animated character models yammering away for what feels like interminable lengths of time, against sparse seeming backdrops and voice acting that can feel weirdly poor and disconnected. While credit has to be given to Namco for actually bothering with an English dub for the game (again, a lot of these releases forego a dub entirely), the voice direction is not great, and the voice acting can feel grating at times. There are exceptions shout out to Jonny Bosch Yong as Ichigo, obviously but other than that, the English voices can often feel lacking. Of course, a lot of fans will choose to play with Japanese voices to begin with, in which case the voice work doesnt feel as subpar, but all the other criticisms for the storytelling still apply."For as great as the combat and fighting in this game are, the story mode is shockingly subpar, and really stands in sharp contrast to how much attention and care the rest of theme seems to have."The reason I am hard on the story mode is that in the past, I have often found anime game adaptations to be gateways into the anime itself. Long before I ever even watched Dragon Ball, I was fully familiar with the characters, world, story, iconography, and more, because of how many games adapted the story extremely well (shout out to the amazing Legacy of Goku games on the GBA). In other words, I truly believe that these story modes can often act as a great primer for the source material, bringing, potentially, new fans on board.But the story mode needs to be high effort for that both the story and the storytelling need to feel consequential enough that you are invested in what is going on and where it is going. Fans are obviously going to care because its a story they already love. The missed chance here is the story mode not being good enough to make the story of Bleach, which is obviously engaging and captivating enough to have created a whole generation of fans, seem good enough.So yes, youre not going together new fans of Bleach being made because of this game. What you might get are fans of this game itself. While the story mode is truly, truly a missed opportunity, the actual fighting and combat are so well done that this is very much a game worth playing even if you have no interest in the source material (as long as you like fighting games, in any case).The shortcomings and cut corners are obvious, and it is easy to decry what this game is not if only it wasnt another arena fighter! If only the story mode wasnt done so poorly! however, doing that also potentially misses attributing the credit to this game that it obviously deserves in so many areas. Bleach: Rebirth of Souls is still a very flawed game, much like most other anime adaptations are but its highs are much higher, and that gives me hope for a potential follow-up down the line that truly does Justin to this property, and gives it the adaptation that it deserves. Hopefully, it will be the good folks at Tamsoft who bring that to us.This game was reviewed on PlayStation 5.