Review: Ninja Gaiden II

Ninja Gaiden II is an action game for the Xbox 360. It was developed by Team Ninja and Microsoft. It is the second Ninja Gaiden game for the Xbox. It has gotten a rerelease for the PlayStation 3 called Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2.

Ryu, inbetween killing hoards of enemies.

The Black Spider Ninja Clan has stolen the Demon Statue from the Dragon Ninja Clan and unleashed the Four Greater Fiends on the world. Dragon Ninja Ryu Hayabusa has to track down the Black Spider Clan while killing the Four Greater Fiends one by one.

Ninja Gaiden II is broken up into fourteen levels. Ryu has to go through each level killing everything, and fight the boss at the end.

Almost all of the game is Ryu fighting crowds of enemies, either other ninjas or Fiends. Ryu has a weak, quick attack, a more powerful attack that takes longer to be used and can be charged up, and a block. The player can push the attack buttons in certain sequences, which will make Ryu perform more complicated and damaging attacks. But it is just as easily to mash the buttons until the enemy Ryu is fighting is dead.

There is more strategy when using the block button. Pressing it works almost immediately and is very valuable when Ryu is being swarmed by enemies.

Ryu has a number of weapons he can collect throughout the game. Each weapon, like the staff, scythe, or clawed gloves, plays differently. Some weapons are heavier or faster than others. It gives the player a chance to use a weapon that they feel more comfortable with, which may change depending on the enemy. The player can make upgrade Ryu’s weapons by collecting nimpo, a currency of sorts that the enemies drop, and spending it at the shop statues found throughout the level. Ryu can also buy healing items and ammo from the shop statues as well.

There are also projectile weapons that Ryu can use, though they are almost too weak to be useful. Every so often the game forces the player to use the bow and arrow set to take down flying enemies or enemies that are too far away. This is always really boring.

The player can charge up one of Ryu’s attacks by holding the down the stronger attack button. This unleashes a much more powerful attack. Holding it down for a little while charges it to level one, and holding it down longer charges it up to level two. This will also attract the nimpo to Ryu, which will make him charge up faster. Attacking enemies with stronger attacks makes them drop more nimpo than usual, so the trick is in charging up when nimpo is around before an enemy knocks Ryu down and then attack again more quickly when more nimpo appears.

Ryu has other skills as well, like running along walls and jumping off cliffs. These are used whenever the game wants to break up the nonstop fighting. After the first two levels they are not used that often, except for the water walking.

The bosses are okay. Most of them are easy as long as Ryu has a couple of health items. It is fun how the bosses can be attacked at any time, instead of the usual cliché of them showing a weak point after going through a sequence of attacks, instead focusing on how quickly the player can dodge and attack. Except for the bosses which can only be killed with arrows; those bosses are extremely dull and usually have the cheapest attacks.

The game has a problem with its camera. Normally it is a foot lower than it should be, and it will often point in the wrong direction so the player cannot see all the enemies attacking Ryu. There is a button that resets the camera behind Ryu, but it is hard to remember in the middle of a fight.

Some levels are more interesting than others. All the levels that take outdoors are beautiful, and all the regular cave and sewer levels are dull. Thankfully the outdoor levels outnumber the cave levels.

The game is rather easy, which is a surprise when compared to its predecessor. Enemies just attack Ryu all at once without blocking or dodging. The challenge they present is that they can easily take off large chunks of Ryu’s health. There are enough health items around to counter this though. The enemies do not become really challenging until the last couple of levels. At least there is a hard mode, which unlocks a harder mode when it is beaten, which unlocks an even harder mode when it is also beaten.

The story is not very good, and the characters are not notable. But it at least the plot makes sense and can be ignored.

Ninja Gaiden II is a fun, mindless game. It can get slightly boring with the nonstop fighting and annoying camera, but it is just challenging varied enough to be entertaining.