- Tons of gameplay hours to be had
adventuring in an amazingly detailed and varied world
- One of the most beautiful video games to appear on not only
the Xbox, but all current-generation consoles
- Spectacular array of ninja weaponry and moves
- Presents one of the most
difficult challenges you’ll ever face in trying to complete a
video game
- Camera can get misaligned and out-of-place in regards to the
gameplay at times
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Ninja
Gaiden Black
Score: 9.4 / 10
Your tools of the trade are razor-sharp
swords, skull-crushing nunchakus and flesh-piercing shurikens. After
mastering millenniums-old ancient fighting techniques, you become a
deadly and stealthy killing machine. And, you get to wear a nifty black
wardrobe. Yes, being a ninja has got to be one cool profession. There’s
been a fair share of ninja games highlighting the life of the mercenary
assassins, including Shinobi and Tenchu. But the ultimate ninja game has
to be Ninja Gaiden Black for the Xbox, which has tons of ninja weapons,
fighting game-style moves to master, a hugely varied and expansive
gaming world to explore, an extremely difficult challenge level, and
just happens to be one of the best-looking games to come out on any
current-generation console to date.
Ninja Gaiden Black isn’t an entirely new game, because it really is just
the original Ninja Gaiden Xbox title packed with the two Hurricane Packs
that could be
purchased online via Xbox Live. If you’ve
bought both Ninja Gaiden and each of the Hurricane Packs already,
there’s not much new here. But for gamers such as me who didn’t play
Ninja Gaiden when it first came into the gaming realm, Ninja Gaiden
Black is the perfect collection of the entire Ninja Gaiden experience.
You’ll take the cause of Ryu Hayabusa, the master ninja of the
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Hayabusa Ninja Clan with the slicing and dicing Dragon Sword, on his
expedition to protect the evil Dark Dragon Blade, which transforms its
possessor into the Devil Incarnate. Ryu is charged with the tasks of the
Dragon Lineage, protectors of the Dragon Blade since ancient Japanese
times. It is Ryu’s responsibility to ensure that the Dragon Blade stays
out of the wrong hands, and fight to the death to reclaim it if someone
does somehow threaten to pilfer it. As you would expect, the sword’s
protection does get comprised by a malevolent force, so it’s up to you
as Ryu to defeat the denizens of evil and return it to its rightful
place, away from those who would use its immeasurable power for
malicious purposes.
The story honestly doesn’t always make much sense, but you won’t really
care, because you’re not playing Ninja Gaiden Black for the story. It’s
the long and winding road filled with an army of enemies that you’ll
inflict devastating, buckets-of-blood-spewing ninja attacks on.
On your journey, you’ll traverse plenty of different places, meeting
people (and creatures) both willing to help you and willing to destroy
you. Ninja Gaiden Black has a diverse range of environments, inside and
outside: there are caves and caverns, mountain retreats, cities, small
towns, even a flying dirigible ( indoor and outside). The sheer amount
of places you’ll visit on your fantastic adventure is one reason that
Ninja Gaiden Black has so many gameplay hours packed inside. Expect it
to take in the 20-30 hour neighborhood to complete your Ninja Gaiden
Black lengthy venture, but the trip will definitely be a memorable one.
What probably is Ninja Gaiden’s most rewarding and at the same time
frustrating feature is the unbelievably hard challenge level. You can
“pick” your own difficulty level, and each contains its own nuanced set
of features, but no matter what the challenge level (even the lowest
difficulty level will be outrageously taxing), if you complete Ninja
Gaiden Black, you’ll know you deserved it, because as the game
progresses, tougher and tougher enemies must be vanquished not to
mention the bosses that will require you to engage in some of the
biggest, most epic boss battles ever.
One aspect of the gameplay is on item collecting, including health,
power, monetary, and weaponry items that will be needed to keep alive
and fighting at your most peak performance. But it’s the fighting aspect
of Ninja Gaiden Black that reflects the best that the game has to offer.
Since Ninja Gaiden Black has been developed by the same minds that
brought us the excellent Dead or Alive fighting game franchise, it’s no
surprise that Ninja Gaiden Black uses a fighting game-style
multi-button-pushing move, attack and defense scheme to control Ryu
during gameplay. By pushing the right combo of controller buttons, Ryu
will pull off different moves that are determined not only by what
buttons you press, but which one of the array of ninja weapons Ryu is
currently holding. No matter what, many of the moves you unleash on
enemies are simply spectacular in both their execution and their deadly
results. You won’t just punch and kick your way through Ninja Gaiden
Black. You’ll smash from beginning to end with the devastation of a
50-megaton bomb with smooth-animating,
so-amazing-an-actual-ninja-would-be-jealous attacks.
In addition to the attacks, you will also control blocking defensive
moves and general ninja movement, including climbing, running along
walls, hanging, swimming, and wall clinging. Ninja Gaiden Black has left
no ninja move behind.
As good as the gameplay is, what will absolutely impress is the
drop-dead gorgeous graphical presentation of Ninja Gaiden Black. This is
without a doubt one of the most beautiful games ever created fore the
current generation of consoles. The in-game visuals are rendered with
sharp-as-a-Hattori-Hanzo-sword magnificence. The Particle effects that
are displayed during battles from Ryu’s powerful attacks are some of the
best around, and short of Final Fantasy or World of WarCraft, the
stunning cinematics are without peer. Your eyes will thank you for
bombarding them with the artistic beauty of Ninja Gaiden Black’s
graphical masterpiece. The only negative that will affect your visual
delight during gameplay is the sometimes misplaced camera. It doesn’t
happen enough to consider it a flaw, but you will encounter camera
schizophrenia at inopportune times on occasion while playing.
Unfortunately, Ninja Gaiden Black doesn’t have any sort of online play,
although you can upload your stats to a leaderboard and see how well
you’ve done against others based on your level scores. There’s sadly
nary an appearance of a co-op mode either, but considering the ninja’s
more the solitary type, it’s somehow understandable Ninja Gaiden Black’s
a single-player-only game.
Prepare to be challenged like you’ve never been challenged before to
complete an action-adventure game. If you make it through Ninja Gaiden
Black, be proud, because it definitely is one of the hardest games to
complete that you’ll ever play. Fortunately, the 20-30 hours gameplay
journey is worth the blood, sweat and tears you’ll shed, because Ninja
Gaiden Black is truly one of the best games to ever grace the Xbox.
Expect an excursion full of difficult trials and tribulations, but don’t
forget to enjoy the magnificently rendered scenery (as done by the true
artistic geniuses at developer Team Ninja) while you’re mastering and
using the powerful ninja moves that will be the key to surviving Ninja
Gaiden Black.
