Is There Free Mode in Dynasty Warriors Origins?

One of the most asked questions from long-time Dynasty Warriors players whenever a new game comes out—including the most recent Dynasty Warriors Origins—is about the existence of a Free Mode. This mode lets the player access battles unlocked from the main Story Mode with any playable character—including those from unrelated factions and lifespans.

The short answer to this question is: Yes, Dynasty Warriors Origins does have some sort of a Free Mode. However, you will need to take quite a long time to make it available. Be advised that the more detailed answer below will contain some post-game content spoilers.

Somewhere at the middle point of the game’s overall storyline, you will notice a new “Story” entry added to the Inn or Lodgings menu in any city. This sub-menu will list all of the main storyline’s cutscenes and battles that you have seen. But while you can replay the available cutscenes right away, pressing the confirmation button on a battle entry will still do nothing yet when you just unlock the menu.

It turns out that you must first reach the ending in your story playthrough. The game will then have the so-called Free Mode unlocked as part of the post-game content. Only after that, you can finally access any battles that have been unlocked in the Story menu.

But as Dynasty Warriors Origins is more focused on making the original protagonist “Ziluan” the main playable character, the game’s Free Mode will let you bring a companion character outside of the original faction. If you have unlocked a certain strongest warrior as an extra companion as part of the post-game content, you can also bring him to the battles. However, there are a couple of caveats to this feature.

The first caveat is that you cannot bring companion characters who already appear on the stage as enemies. For example, if you’re playing a stage where you’re fighting against Liu Bei’s faction and both Guan Yu and Zhang Fei appear as enemies, you cannot bring them as your companions.

In addition, companions are only available when the stage does allow bringing one to begin with. That also means since Chapter 1 did not introduce you to the feature yet, none of the stages in the chapter have any companion access.

There are also some stages with other exceptions for the feature, such as the Battle of Changban on Liu Bei’s side. This stage has different starting events and missions determined by your companion choice between Zhang Fei and Zhao Yun, so the Free Mode version still restricts the choices to only those two.

Dynasty Warriors Origins is available worldwide on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and PC.