This game was not without its appeal. The mechanics of fighting were reminiscent of Rock-Paper-Scissors but had some interesting elements. Story mode was horrible, but the Vs. and endurance games were better. However, this is not a contender. The depth offered by the Virtua Fighter and Street Fighter series is under no pressure from this game.

Let's start with the good stuff.

Fighters each use projectile and hand-to-hand attacks. Both types use the same set of buttons, so the game decides when you are out of range for hands and switches to projectiles. Three buttons attack, one each for Power, Fast, and Spread. Other abilities include Jump, Dash, and Block. You have a meter for health, and the projectile meter refills rapidly. The three attacks can also be combined, to make a fast, powerful attack, or a powerful spread. You can fire in any combination of up to three buttons (the meter depletes for each attack button press, three being the limit), and the results are often devastating.

To be honest, they should have made the dash move the default movement because it's used constantly, and walking a button press. Blocking is done two ways: you have the standard block, which stops hand-to-hand attacks, and weaker projectiles, and you have another method for powerful projectiles, which requires you to first press one of the attack buttons, then hit block, to throw up a 'psychic bubble' to deflect the projectiles.

Each arena is a 3D area, much like Bushido Blade, but far smaller, and in a three quarter perspective. There are bridges, columns, hills, steps, walls, and every other obstacle or terrain feature, and you can use this to your advantage because the projectiles have good tracking ability.

Unfortunately, we have now come to the part of the review where the bad opinions are expressed. If you liked this game, read no further, but if you haven't made the purchase yet, please read the following -- it may just save your life (well, fifty bucks anyway).

We'll go with the least offensive, and build from there.

Though the mechanics are sound, they just don't have enough depth. Matches end up being each person flinging magic as fast as their meters can fill and running around the arenas all willy-nilly. (Great phrase, isn't it?) There really is no strategy, just whoever gets the most shots off and remembers to block usually wins. I had to play some VF2 just to cleanse myself.

Next up is the music. It's terrible. Period.

The final nail in this coffin is the story mode. Now, it doesn't really affect your decision to purchase because it's a small part of the game, but it had some possibilities. Unfortunately, not only was the plot pathetic and predictable, but the voice acting was worse than Resident Evil. (Now that's bad!) Story mode is essentially around 30 matches strung together by cut-scenes that provide background for the battles. Throughout the story, you play as nearly every character in the game, occasionally against characters you once were. It's the cut scenes that make this nearly unbearable. The only way it can be described is this: the developers must have been given a set amount of time for the story to last through the scripted scenes. The timeframe was roughly 40 minutes, but they only had 20 minutes of script. So, rather than writing more, they inserted pauses. SERIOUS pauses. We're talking 3-7 seconds between delivery of the lines, and the deliveries are really poor to begin with. Over-acted and unemotional. I swear that the guy who was the voice for He-Man plays the oldest cast member. No lie!

Essentially, Destrega can't compete with the other 3D fighters out there, but if you don't need the depth and strategy of the VF's and SF's, then you might enjoy it. I definitely recommend a rental, but a purchase is too extreme.

Overall: 6.8