Ninja Blade is amazingly fun, the action sequences start getting addictive, and look absolutely stunning, with every button pressed correctly a new and exciting, escape, dodge and even a demise of a boss is brought to life.
Bonzai!!!
In The Beginning:
Ninja Blade has been neatly packaged into one of the greatest sword play games of this generation, by seeminglessly merging gameplay with action sequences, Ninja Blade is the ultimate game in the immersion field! Ninja Blade, is set in only a year from now, where scientists have uncovered a new species, code named Alpha Worms, these creatures are able to crawl inside the human hosts where they lay hundreds of eggs which when they hatch take over the host and mutate them into various monstrosities, ranging from flying, to crawling and even shielded foes.
You play Ken Ogawa, a ninja who can leap out of aircraft without a parachute and still land safely thanks to his interactive sequence action scenes. The initial sequence is a bit of a new feeling that one gets accustomed to rather quickly, almost every key is used to attack, dodge and jump this does provide a new twist on such sequences. Unlike other games such as Conan and those who have played Heavenly Sword, Ninja Blade just doesn’t require any real skill for you to succeed, each action sequence rewards you with a rating depending on your reflex speed, and even an achievement if you can string 10 of these button presses perfectly in a row, sadly like a 3 year old child trying to put a star, circle and triangle into their correct locations, they do succeed eventually, and Ninja Blade provides you with various save points in the live sequence scene, which means once the boss is down there is absolutely no consequence to pressing the wrong key in the sequence.
Fox 1
Ninja Blade unfortunately tries so hard to create a cinematic action sequence look amazing that the rest of the game is rather mundane. Ken carries three swords ranging from his trusty Oni Slayer blade which is the perfect combination between speed and strength, the Twin falcon knives which are more like whips and are super fast with little strength behind them, and finally the stone render the ultimate sword strength wise. As you progress through the game there are various items one can collect ranging from new clothes to new symbols and even orbs that increase health permanently. However the most important pick up would be the blood crystals which you obtain from every monster you defeat. Obviously the bigger they are the more blood crystals you are rewarded with upon their defeat. As you stockpile these crystals they enable you to upgrade your swords this can be done at the mission setup screen or in game with a tap of the select button.
Ninja Blade is amazingly fun, the action sequences start getting addictive, and look absolutely stunning, with every button pressed correctly a new and exciting, escape, dodge and even a demise of a boss is brought to life. However, the mobs and challenges to getting to the end of each mission are slightly annoying, Ninja Blade has given Ken the ability to wall run, swing from over hanging poles and a unique feature called Ninja vision, this lets Ken find invisible monsters as well as slows down time to sword time (Bullet time for a ninja) which comes in handy when you are required to send incoming projectiles back to their origin thanks to a well timed attack.
Slice on, Slice off!
Ninja Blade is addictive, providing a much needed button mashing game combined with the reflexes of a ninja to bring a plane earthbound safely to a stop thanks to his unique abilities.
In the Middle:
Having spent almost an hour per level, it is a good estimate that Ninja Blade, with its 9 levels will provide the average gamer with at least 9 hours of gameplay. As you delve deeper into Ken’s missions you start to use his ninjutsu powers more, these are basically shurikens that have been enchanted with the elements of wind, fire and lightning. Wind can aid in vanquishing flames, Fire to light dark areas as well as conveniently setting huge plants a blaze and lighting to stun your foes especially potent when they standing in water. As you slowly level up each weapon and ninjutsu skill you become a potent hero against the alpha worm assault.
Hoola Hoops, Ninja Style!
One reason to keep updating your weapons is that each upgrade provides even more combo’s and of course deal allot more damage, this is a two prong feature though, because as you get more powerful your foes become ever increasingly weaker. The variety of creatures to attack is also limited to about 5 different versions, from flying, to shielded to long range. This being said, the bosses are each unique and require different strategies to defeat them. Although once you have figured out their three different attacks, it becomes Childs play to dodge them and then counter with a powerful combo attack. Once a boss has been defeated you have about 10 seconds to get near him and press A, this will initiate a live action sequence where you then enjoy killing the beast in various ways ranging from squashing them with a giant wrecking ball or sending them falling into a giant fan, each death is an entertaining one.
Another feature is the ability to use gun’s mounted on certain level specific vehicles, this ranges from defending a helicopter to clearing a landing spot on a flying airliner. While this does provide the gamer with a change in pace, it becomes tedious, as there are never really enough enemies to cause any trouble and with unlimited ammo you have nothing to fear.
Ninjutsu wind power can solve this!
Ninja Blade also provides a vibrant backdrop of sound effects and music, Norihiko Hibino has done another fine job, immersing the player into the universe of Ninja Blade, he has provided many games with amazing game tracks including Konami’s Metal Gear Solid 4. One of the greatest advantages to combining highly talent music producers with a game such as Ninja Blade is that you are able to become the character, the sword play sounds clashing with various enemies each produce a melody of carnage with can only be outdone by the skillful timing of music sequences.
While Ninja Blade has become a lot less challenging, I find the gameplay addictive and the amazing CGI interactive sequences intense and rewarding.
In the end:
Planting the crushing blow onto the final foe left me with awe and regret, awe at the ending but regret knowing that my experience was over. Ninja Blade takes a game that at first was frustrating, but evolved into an adventure with addictive gameplay that left you with a longing I have not felt in a game since Resident Evil 5.
Are you talking to me?
Ninja Blade while lacking any multiplayer gameplay does have an online scoreboard capable of recording anything from time per level, to blood crystals and even most combo’s. While many will say Ninja Blade is a game that stole its many idea’s from the God of War series, Prince Of Persia series and Ninja Gaiden series while this may be partial true, it is hard to bring anything unique to a hack and slash genre these days with so many games following this route, but Ninja Blade deserves to be looked in isolation while many games these days borrow ideas from titles across the board, it doesn’t mean the developers were lazy but rather clever, as they took a winning formula and twisted it to suit their needs.
Ninja Blade, will certainly provide two to three rounds of amazing hack and slashing, but will end up being traded in shortly after that. Ninja Blade lacks any real motivation to replay the game more than that, while no doubt a few will keep this as a permanent collection item for a rainy day.
Final Blows have never been this fun!
In the end Ninja Blade portrays a story in detail, and depth which slowly and using various artistic effects such as flash backs, and Boss battles dialogue to fill in any gaps. The story was well written and featured some great twists, which while not quiet blockbuster material they do, do their job very well. Ken has a split personality so to speak, when he is completely serious he speaks in Japanese, and for the rest he speaks English, this was amazing a bilingual hero is something more developers should adopt. The Japanese helped further set the story into stone.
Unlocking your weapons to the 4th and Final level provides you with some amazing combo’s but honestly you only really need to learn to do three combo’s and you will glide through the game, a neat feature was certainly the demonstrations of each move under the combo screen, but this was more of a gimmick than anything of real meaning.
What can't Ken do?
In the end, Ninja Blade will remain one of my permanent collectable games, not because of the collectables I am still missing, but rather because it projected me into Kens reality and with the well planned and perfectly executed transformations between real-time fighting and action sequences. Ninja Blade, while not an amazing game it is a great game and if the producers expand on this novel title, Ninja Blade 2 will certainly compete with the big boy’s of this Genre!
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