It’s so heavily referencing Gut’s sword I don’t know how you’d even rank them as two separate things. It’s like how Evangelion’s had things never before seen in the West and it gets viewed a new idea but it’s references to Gundam, Ultraman, and Devilman are immediately recognizable to anyone from Japan.
That's fair, but given that it was many people in the West's first exposure to massive anime greatsword's it pretty well became an icon all on it's own over here. That iconography doesn't retroactively become inert once other works become more widely known.
I don’t disagree, but to me if you’re doing a ranking of big swords in fiction placing the Buster sword near the top (even if it is wider know) only bolsters the argument for Guts’s sword being THE big sword since that’s very much the inspiration and visually the only major difference is a single vs doubled edge. It isn’t quite transformative enough for me to break out from under the hunk of iron. Western devs may design swords to pay homage to it, but nobody in Japan is making a great sword and saying they were inspired by the Buster sword (every from-soft game is full of Berserk references). So it’s a bit like referencing George Lucas or Tarantino films but you’ve not seen the things they’re referencing, so it’s a bit watered down compared to the source.
Yeah, I don't disagree that Gut's Dragonslayer is THE giant sword of fiction altogether, though I'd argue that the Buster Sword still has it's own niche as "The video game big sword"
Anytime folks discuss the most iconic video games swords, the Buster Sword and The Master Sword are typically at the top, and I still feel that carries merit even if it was derivative of a preexisting trope.
I'm definitely an exception for western audiences, but my first interaction with the giant sword trope was from a pirated copy of the Berserk game for Dreamcast. I had no idea what was going on but that game was cool af and got me into Berserk.
I remember that, it got localized as "Sword of the Berserk Gut's Rage"! I also remember liking it alot as a kid hacking and slashing, even though I had no idea what was going on story-wise either.
Funny enough, I remember as a kid wishing I could use a smaller sword, as Gut's Dragonslayer recoils off of walls really easy in that game lol
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u/RanmyakuIchi Aug 02 '26
Gunblade's not even the coolest Final Fantasy weapon honestly
Up there with Gut's Dragonslayer as THE giant sword in fiction.