Nagamasa Azai (Sengoku BASARA)

"My mission is to erase all evil in the name of justice!"

- Azai Nagasama

Azai Nagamasa is the daimyo of the Azai clan, husband of Oichi, brother-in-law to Oda Nobunaga and an ally of Asakura Yoshikage. He has a sister named Kyōgoku Maria.

He is only mentioned in Sengoku BASARA 3 within Oichi's dialogues, indicating his death was a stepping stone to her own fall from grace.

He makes an appearance in Sengoku BASARA 4 as a playable character. He is unlocked by completing Shibata Katsuie's story. Completing his story will unlock Oichi.

Description
A former ally of Oda Nobunaga, now rebelling against him. He is a man fighting for justice and vows to destroy anybody who creates chaos, namely Nobunaga. Wields a long sword and a folding buckler. His fighting style and mannerism are similar to that of a typical superhero, primarily the Metal Hero Series. He's also often seen roughly telling Oichi to shut up or stop crying, only to shyly declare his love (sometimes with flowers), making him a male tsundere. He is playable in Sengoku Basara 2 Heroes.

His story revolves around ridding Japan of the chaos, preferably Nobunaga, and his relationship with Oichi which started out with love, then turn to hatred and eventually leads back to loving her again. Nagamasa's story can be looked at a tokusatsu point-of-view due to certain elements of the genre present. He is the husband of Oichi.

Gameplay
Nagamasa is an agile character, though not to the same extent as the ninja characters. His S-String comprises of slashes with a combination of shield throws. Unfortunately, due to the series' portrayal of him acting like a Super Sentai Hero, almost all of his attacks ends with a pose, leaving him vulnerable to attacks for a brief period.

Also, Nagamasa is the only character who is able to extend his aerial "downward" attack (skill button while in air), pushing his enemies further along the ground.

In later games, Nagamasa's special gimmick revolves around his buff skill. His buff has three levels indicated by a red glow on his equipment- sword only, sword+shield, sword+shield+self. Whille buffed the glowing equipment has more range and deals more damage. At max level, Nagamasa also gains some stagger resistance and a powerful laser slash accompanies each slash in his S-String, increasing his range, attack and hit count. Additionally, at max level, Nagamasa is able to perform a powered up version of each of his other skills. Nagamasa's buff is lost upon performing a powered up skill.

While the buff is obviously acquired by using its own skill, there are a few other and faster ways to acquire it.

At the end of each skill (and S-String), Nagamasa's shield or sword will flash. The player must press R1 when the sword or shield blinks to get one level of the buff. The player may simply fight normally. After killing enough enemies, Nagamasa will automatically get a buff level. Performing his Basara Attack will instantly put Nagamasa to max level buff. When performing his buff skill, Nagamasa will raise his hands twice before charging. Nagamasa's hands will also flash that those points. The player must press R1 on both instances to instantly get a max level buff (Nagamasa will skip the charging part). If the player mistimes either R1 press, Nagamasa will continue his buff skill as normal.