Path of the Warrior…

I never played the original Ninja Gaiden primarily because I never had an original xbox.  Despite having bought the next genreation microsoft console I still had no intention of buying the second Ninja Gaiden when it was released a couple of weeks back.  Some of the characters and settings were all too familiar for me given a beat-em-up which I frequnted briefly a year or so back.  I actually used Ryu Hyabuasa as my most playd character in Dead or Alive 4, mastering many’s a ninjitsu-esque stance and the formidable combo which inevitably led to me dropping any opponent on their head amidst the deadly, spinning ‘Azuma Drop.’  Despite this, I was never sold to the idea of Ninja Gaiden 2.

About a week before the second installment came out, the good people at Team Ninja released a first level playable demo onto the xbox live marketplace.  On the first play through, I have to admit, I was enjoying it.  By the second play through, I was ready to be inducted into the ranks of the nearest clan of ninjas – the overtly realistic feeling of the game convincing me that I was training myself in the “old ways.”  Admitedly, the game is gorey, but that in itself adds to its realism (gravity defying warriors and crystal dragons aside) given that, as the player, it’s like you feel every slice of your dragon sword as you desecrate your enemies limbs and leave them grasping for vengeance with their last breaths… nasty!

Nonetheless, I became caught in the whole experience and quickly found myself desperate for the eventual coming of the games release date.  At one point I actually hovered over the first Ninja Gaiden game on amazon, tempting myself to purchase it despite knowing that it probably wouldnt even arrive before the second installment came out.

Anywho, long story short I bought Ninja Gaiden 2 when it came out and what can I say other than “It’s excellent.”  Harsh critics can find places to be really severe; the complete lack of lighting effects in the game, the nasty slow down when more than a handful of enemies are on-screen and the times when Ryu’s weapons glitch through his costume and, at times, the scenery.  You do, however, get over this rather quickly.  The game has, in my opinion, verging on the best combat system I have encountered on the Xbox 360 and a graphics engine and storyline to boot.  It comes with my approval, but Im guessing since this is only my third post on OMS and, infact, my first game review ever, that probably doesn’t mean much.

None of that is really the reason I wanted to blog Ninja Gaiden 2 on OMS.  Oh no!  That merely serves as something to introduce you to the next few paragraphs

You see, there is this one point in the game; just after having destroyed the evil, demonic, ninja robots (got that right!) on the enemies impenetrable flying airship of death (hell yeah!), blowing the whole thing to billyo by destroying the control panels of the ships fusion reactor cores (man this is awesome!) and escaping the doomed vessel by riding your ninja motor-cycle out of the hanger bay with a leather-clad blonde bomb-shell stradling the second seat (how much do you want this game right now!) only to find yourself in the midst of the secret “end of level” boss fight against what can only be described as the fire-Armadillio of doom (just gets better doesn’t it!).  As if that wasn’t enough; after having beaten the nasty “magma-tainted” dasypodidae, Ryu finds himself in a sleepy town come *sigh* military base.  Now, this place is clearly Russian.  There’s just no other way to say it.  I hope that everyone playing the game knows its Russian.  I’m not even just saying “hey, it might be a Russian town,” no, it just is.  We’re taling red-brick, golden stars, ushankas and blatent Russian military uniform and displays.  In fact, I’m pretty sure that at one point I found myself in Red Square.  What I don’t get is why everyone speaks with an american accent… I mean unless Itagaki has been learning about America by watching episodes of Alias, I’m fairly sure there are no Russian town’s in America or vica versa.  To be honset I let that point slide rather quickly because one starts to focus much less on the FMV soldier dialogue when you find out that Zedonius, fire demon and greater fiend has claimed this little base for the location of his earthly foothold; the precursor to his plan to overthrown the planet (yes!).

This particular level of the game is the most annoying game level… perhaps ever!  The thing is, it really wouldn’t be if it weren’t for one particular point in said level.  After fighting your way through a department store (which, for continuitys sake, looked remarkable like Gum on the inside) you find yourself in an alley way.  Now at the start of this alley you notice some mines on the ground.  The meta-gamer inside you then takes over and notices that the rest of the alley is clear except for a set of foot-prints which zig-zag the whole way through it.  I guess you can see where that is going.  The one question I had in my mind (and yes, I do think this deeply about games) is why the presumably scarey evil ninja mine layer got bored whilst burying the mines in the alley way and just figured that the last five didn’t really need buried any way!  I mean, come on!  This aside you begin by using your Ninja-bow of awesomeness to destroy the initial mines and then begin to follow the foot-prints through the rest of the alley.  If I ever find out who coded the “hit-boxes” for those mines, I swear, he will find himself sleeping next to a horses head.  I honestly believe that they blew up for no apparent reason!  As if that wasnt enough, when one mine blows up, it propells you, the greatest ninja in the world, deeper into the untrodden part of the alley and further into the nest of unexploded mines.  Needless to say, escaping that alley cost me a few hit points.  None-the-less, I persevered, thinking to myself “well, that mishap took a few of them out it’ll be easier this time.”  I should be so lucky… Oh no! The mines apparently have the ability whereby, on destruction, they frigging self-replicate.  I died. 

On my return to the alley, the second time through, I think to myself “I’m such an idiot, I’m supposed to be the greatest ninja in the world!  I’ll just jump over the first part and then use my crazy wall running ability to traverse the rest!  Genius!”

Nope! 

Ryu makes it about three quarters of the way before falling, all be it rather gracefully, into the afore mentioned hive of unexploded mines.  Again, I barely escaped with my hit points, but proceeded to try, once again, to get through this infernal alley way.  By this point, the evil arch-fiend Zedonius, probably observing Ryu’s misfortune by way of his scary demonic omni-presence, is laughing and probably saying to himself “boy, that two for one deal on mines really paid off…” Curse you Zedonius!  This time, I’m particularly careful and even when I do set off a mine I make my way, rather precariously, back onto the trodden path.  “Hallelujah!” I think to myself as I see the end of the alley.  Making it to the end, I turn the camera around to see that apparently, probably while shopping for mines, Zedonius’ evil ninja goons have picked themselves up a few rocket launchers… I mean, ROCKET LAUNCHERS!  Anywho, a rather pleasant mini-rcoket lands at my feet, knocking Ryu senseless and blowing him back, you guessed it, into the repository of unexploded mines… I died again.  By this stage, I’m frustrated, esecially given that the last save point is an obscene 5 minutes away and I respawn there every time.  So, I tread the path as carefully as possible, traverse the alley way, whip out the bow, ping the rocket launcher dudes as quickly as possible, set off a few mines in the process but heave a sigh of relief as the last enemy ninja falls.  Brilliant.  Just then, I notice that in the corner of the piece of the map into which I have just emerged is a nice shiney “crystal skull”, the collectable gubbins of the Ninja Gaiden 2 world.  So I run over to pick it up. Part of me should have seen it coming, but yes, you probably guessed it, the whole thing is surrounded by mines.  I mean the evil scary ninja mine-layer thought, on seeing this crystal skull, that it was somehow important enough to surround with pressure sensitive anti-personel mines, but not quite important enough to pocket and take to the evil arch-fiend Zedonius for closer inspection.  This time, there was no way to negotiate the path, there were no visible clues, no use of the bow, just the cold bitter emptiness of death…. again.

I think by the third time, I as just about ready to trade the game in the next day.  It didn’t help that I was chatting to a friend over Xbox Live at that moment and that he kept informing me that “It’s just Ninja Gaiden games! They’re hard!”  Now you see, I wouldn’t mind that statement normally, but the thing is that it made no sense.  I never died anywhere else that level.  Even when I made it to the hell-spawned arch-fiend of oblivion himself; Zedonius, I beat him without too much bother.  No, it was the fact that the nemesis of the supposed greatest ninja in the world was a completely unneccesarily mined alley way.  I mean, so far I’ve beaten literally hundreds of evil ninja acolytes, 3 arch-fiends and the queen of the arch-fiends herself all whilst the evil priest of nastiness complains about their inability to stop me when really all it would have taken wold have been to layer every inch of my journey with anti-personel mines… This games makes no sense!

I’ve yet to complete the game but I’m sure I will, unless of course the final boss is just like a big freakin’ mine… at which point I’ll probably jsut give up.

I’ll let you know how it turns out.

Jim