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If you've experienced any of these symptoms, you may have what's known as 'Ninja Gaidenitis' - a disorder that manifests itself after repeated voluntary exposure to Ninja Gaiden Sigma. In short, Ninja Gaiden is toughdamn tough, but you probably already know that, otherwise you wouldn't be reading this guide. Additionally, I have been talking with NG2 speed runners in the Ninja Gaiden Speedrun discord, and I’m expecting there is more information out there. I know there are a lot of Ninja Gaiden experts here, so I’m reaching out here.
In the first game, Ryu receives a letter from his father Joe Hayabusa (renamed Ken Hayabusa in the original localization), saying that should he not return, Ryu is to journey to America and contact a man named Walter Smith. Believing his father dead, Ryu goes to America to carry out this request. After battling a large man with an axe in a bar, he is subdued by a woman with a tranquilizer gun. He awakens in a prison cell, where the woman (Irene Lew) frees him and gives him a mysterious, grotesque statue. Ryu is puzzled by this, but presses onward. He meets with Smith, who identifies the statue as one of the Demon Statues, a pair of he and Joe discovered and vowed to protect.
As Ryu and Smith talk, the statue is stolen by another ninja. Ryu gives chase, and recaptures the statue, but returns to find Smith dying. Ryu vows to carry on his work, protecting the Demon Statues.However, Ryu is captured by the CIA and brought before A.
Foster, the head of the agency. Foster reveals that Irene is one of their agents, and that she is tracking down a man known as Jaquio, who seeks to release. Foster orders Ryu to take out Jaquio; Ryu, remembering his oath to Smith, complies.
Air-dropped into the jungles of Brazil, he makes his way to Jaquio's fortress, where he finds Jaquio has Irene at gunpoint. Jaquio reveals he has the second Demon Statue already, and; Ryu, being new at the whole hero thing, complies. Jaquio's an old hand at villainy, however, and simply absconds with the statues and the girl — but not before sending Ryu hurtling down a to the catacombs below.Undaunted, Ryu fights his way to the top of the fortress, where he again encounters Jaquio and Irene. As well as Ryu's father, who, is under Jaquio's mind control. Ryu gets the better of Jaquio in battle, and in desperation, Jaquio launches a magic bolt at Ryu, but his father comes to his senses, and dies.
The enraged Ryu proceeds to kill Jaquio. But he's too late, for!Ryu bravely fights the demon, sealing it once more. After the battle, Foster radios Irene and orders her to assassinate Ryu and take the statues. Irene hesitates, and Ryu takes her radio and tells Foster the next time they meet, it will be as enemies.Quite a bit more elaborate than the plots of the day, isn't it?Ninja Gaiden II: The Dark Sword of Chaos and Ninja Gaiden III: The Ancient Ship of Doom both had similarly complex plots, centered around their titular. Due to space considerations, we won't get much more into detail here; however, they offer just as many, if not more, twists and turns as the first game.As for the actual game that takes place between the?
Ninja Gaiden played a lot like — only faster paced and with a more acrobatic protagonist. The games were the very epitome of, with enemies coming at you from every direction at once.
Gamers didn't seem to mind, however — even those who found the challenge to be too much suffered through it anyway to see the next chapter in Ryu's saga.There was also a prequel game called Ninja Gaiden Shadow. Taking place three years prior to the original trilogy, it has Ryu travelling to New York to battle Emperor Garuda, a servant of Jaquio.The Team Ninja series (2004-current).
Sometime in 1999, Itagaki and Team Ninja began work on their first 'action' title, aside from their on-going Dead or Alive series. Although then-Tecmo wanted a tie-in for this new revival with the NES trilogy, this Xbox version of Ninja Gaiden, released in 2004, involves none of the elements. In an interview, Itagaki mentioned he 'prefer not to be influenced by or base it on the original story'.
While Ryu's still the protagonist, none of the above elements are explicitly mentioned.The story establishes Ryu's a member of the Dragon Ninja Clan, charged with protecting the Dark Dragon Blade, a imbued with some pretty extraordinary powers. After the game's tutorial level, he's informed that the Hayabusa Village has been destroyed.
When Ryu investigates, a samurai pledged to the Holy Vigoor Emperor, Doku, kills him with the Dark Dragon Blade.Don't worry,.Thus, the game embarks Ryu upon a and the retrieval of the Dark Dragon Blade. The details of the plot are convoluted and don't add up to anything particularly extraordinary, but Ryu slices and dices his way through Vigoorian soldiers, tanks, zombies, ninjas and ghost piranhas.The Xbox version is, as the kids these days say, really, really difficult as in 'throw-your-controller-at-the-screen-and-scare-the-dog difficult'.
In contrast to other, enemies avert and have no compunctions about suffocating the player at every available moment. In fact, beating this game is an achievement. Hell, there was an called Ninja Gaiden Black which not only fixed gameplay imbalances, placed more enemies and bosses and added in 'Combat Missions', it included two new modes: a ' mode and an ' than mode'!
Unfortunately, it didn't help the 'super-duper-mega-easy' mode was quite hard itself, difficult to the point of inducing trauma.The game was critically acclaimed by all, and considered the best 3D game of its time. A title that it still keeps in the eyes of a lot of people, specially the Black version. Many praised its preserved difficulty from the NES trilogy, but without being unfair, alongside gorgeous visuals and attention to detail in combat and environments by pushing the Xbox beyond its hardware limitations. An of Ninja Gaiden Black called Ninja Gaiden Sigma for the Sony was released in 2007, rounding out the last gameplay additions with a new character , new weapons and enemies, while making it look more pretty with the console's high-defintion capabilities. It also removes or simplifies some puzzles that contained too much back-and-forth.In 2008, Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword was released for the.
This sequel set six months after Ninja Gaiden tells of Ryu and his journey to save his apprentice, Momiji, and find the Dark Dragonstones that can resurrect an ancient Dark Dragon. In the same year, the true sequel Ninja Gaiden II was released for the Microsoft, where another the Dragon Lineage were guarding, the Statue of the Archfiend, is stolen. Ryu must travel the world chasing the Four Greater Fiends as they attempt to resurrect the. Both games retain the difficulty of Ninja Gaiden ( Ninja Gaiden II arguably even harder) and the stories are serviceable, yet the latter's almost completely nonsensical, with more aptly applied. For example, at one point a giant armadillo with marginal fire appears with.Following the release of Ninja Gaiden II, Itagaki stepped down from Team Ninja and left the now merged Tecmo Koei. Current series director and producer Yosuke Hayashi took over and released an of Ninja Gaiden II on the PS3 as Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2.
Notably, the game partly resolves the nonsensical nature of the plot in the 360 original, but also throws in new characters ( from the series and, plus the return of Rachel) and scenarios, a co-op mission mode, a 'Chapter Challenge' mode and a prologue that links Dragon Sword to current continuity ( Ninja Gaiden II never makes a mention of Dragon Sword). It also significantly tones down the 360 game's gore and the number of enemies, making them more resilient instead.In February 2012, Ninja Gaiden Sigma Plus, an enhanced version of Sigma was released for the Vita, it featured new sets of accesories for both Ryu and Rachel, as well as utilizing the Vita's touch and motion controls.Ninja Gaiden III was released in March 2012 on both PS3 and 360.
Contrary to his predecessor, Hayashi wanted to make the game 'more accessible', and the game, while not exactly easy, is noticeably more forgiving than the first two games. For the first time in the series, Ninja Gaiden III features. Set after Ninja Gaiden II, Ryu receives a request from the Japanese government, after terrorists take the British Prime Minister hostage, demanding his appearance. He travels to London and faces the mysterious foes, led by the enigmatic 'Regent of the Mask', who places a curse on Ryu's right arm, making him feel the pain and hatred of the people he killed. The story also marks the return of scriptwriter to the series, bringing back the deep narrative seen in the NES trilogy. It effectively ties the modern games into overall continuity. III also has a much more cinematic and dramatic feel compared to its predecessors.Alas, while Ninja Gaiden III was successful commercially, it wasn't as much critically with players criticizing the aforementioned dumbed-down difficulty, excessively streamlined gameplay and a lack of replay value.: Both Ryu and his old man suck at it in the Original Trilogy.
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And after twenty-plus years, Ryu still sucks at it, as he attempts this in against and fails epically. He does manage to eke out a draw (i.e., killed the mook) in the Arcade intro of Ninja Gaiden.: As Ryu approaches the gate to the Realm of Chaos in The Dark Sword of Chaos, he's greeted by an eerie violet sky with strange stars hanging too close to the surface.:. Ryu doesn't learn Irene's real name until the very end of the first game. However, the manual already spoils this fact. However, the original Japanese manual made her name a complete mystery.
The names of the four human bosses Ryu must face and then some are described in the manual for the first game. The same thing also applies for said first game to the name of each of the stages.: While Ryu could always stick to walls, he could only on select surfaces with ladder-like patterns on them in the original. However, with a little practice, it was easy to jump away from the wall and curl back onto it at a higher spot (which made several areas with difficult platforms, particularly Stage 5-3, much easier). Starting with The Dark Sword Of Chaos, he was able to crawl up any wall.: The Shadow Clones from The Dark Sword of Chaos, which follow in Ryu's footsteps precisely and attack when he does, at no cost. He can have up to two clones out at a time.: The spinning slash and fire shield in the first game. The first causes you to do a spinning slash every time you attack while jumping, which can deal obnoxious damage to bosses, even killing the first one in one hit if landed correctly. The problem is it causes you to do a spinning slash every time you attack while jumping, meaning you can't control how you use your special attack energy, and will probably run out of it (unless you know the trick: hold down while attacking).
The fire shield makes you invincible for a little while, but the problem is that when it times out, you lose it and get nothing to replace it.: The name of the stages in the original trilogy were pretty cool. One such name is 'Place of Red Execution', where Ryu fights Bloody Malth in the first NES game. /: Irene after being sacrificed for Jacquio's goal in The Dark Sword of Chaos. She gets resurrected by the Dragon Sword's magic in the ending.: After beating first boss in The Dark Sword of Chaos, Dando the Cursed, Ryu meets a mysterious army operative who pulls a gun on him.
Before Ryu can react, the man shoots.to finish off the monstrous Dando, who Ryu hadn't quite finished off.: A villainous version. Most of the bosses in The Ancient Ship of Doom use Ryu's Ninja Arts such as the Windmill Throwing Star or mass-fire versions of the Art of the Fire Wheel.: The titular Dark Sword of Chaos is just gigantic, yet Ashtar can wield it easily with one hand. Jaquio in the first NES game. Ashtar in The Dark Sword of Chaos and of the events of the first. When the Demon is revived (twice!) inside Jaquio's body by the Dark Sword of Chaos.
Clancy in The Ancient Ship of Doom, after doublecrossing.: Basaquer, Kelbeross, Malth and even Jaquio fall pray to this in the original NES trilogy. Their actual names were supposed to be 'Berserker,' 'Cerberus', 'Mars' and 'Devil King' (Jakiō.) The mistranslated names do have plenty of charm, though.
'Dando the Cursed' in The Dark Sword of Chaos is supposed to 'The Damned One'. This one is more forgivable, being an actual swear.: In The Dark Sword of Chaos, the last stages take place in the Realm of Chaos. They steadily become more organic, with pulsing organs and faces on the walls, dripping ooze, and veins running across every surface.: One major source of the trilogy's notoriously brutal difficulty. At the end of the first game, you had to fight three bosses in a row, and your health would not be replenished after victory in the first two. Death at the end hands of any boss would result in being sent back to the start of the last level. This made learning boss mechanics through trial and error extremely difficult due to the long amount of time it took to get back to them after a defeat.: The mook with a hockey mask and (named Jackson) is based on.: Either that or bosses in the NES games carry a set of firecrackers which activate upon death.: The first NES game was generally pretty good with checkpoints, as you would usually respawn at the same screen you died at.unless you died to a boss, in which case you're taken back to the beginning of the stage.
If you're unfortunate enough to die at any of the three final bosses, however, you're taken.: The Strategy Guide for The Dark Sword of Chaos followed the game's story between gameplay tips and tricks as a fully drawn comic book. ◊ is a stand-out moment.: The of the first and third NES games.: 'Inevitable' in The Dark Sword of Chaos, which can only be heard with an NSF player.: One of the first games, if not, in between levels to tell a cohesive story. Note Technically, the first game came first, but that game wasn't released in North America until 1992, where it was as 'Tecmo Cup Soccer' (referred to on the title screen as 'Tecmo Cup Soccer Game').: The first game contains one of the earliest examples ever of this trope. Despite being an elite ninja, Ryu is knocked out and captured by Irene Lew in a cutscene after the first level, and only gets out of prison after she lets him out. He later gets captured by CIA agents (the second time he's captured in a span of 3 levels) and forced to work for them. Eventually he is manipulated by a situation in which he hands over the demon statues Jaquio to prevent him from killing Irene.
Natrually, Jaquio takes the statues, doesn't release Irene, and dumps Ryu down a pit trap, forcing him to fight through long levels just to get back to Jaquio again.: Clones of the Malice Four, the bosses of the first game, appear as powered-down mooks in the second game.: The NES version of III has no password feature, limited continues, less checkpoints and stronger enemies than its Famicom counterpart.: The Bio-Noid doppelganger from The Ancient Ship of Doom.: The Kelbeross beasts from the first two NES games, where only one of them was vulnerable but both were very, very deadly. Similarly, Ryu acquired this skill in The Dark Sword of Chaos, where he could generate up to two Shadow Clones that are invulernable, would follow in his footsteps precisely (even stopping in midair if Ryu himself jumped and then stopped moving), and would slash or use Ninja Arts in perfect sync with him.
Ryu: Humans are always striving to achieve. Can never be just a part of someone's plans. Fortunately, mankind is never foolish enough to wipe itself out to achieve some ambitions.: The first NES Ninja Gaiden. Barbarian, Bomberhead and Basquer were all ridiculously easy once you got the pattern down, an easily-exploitable glitch could make Kelbeross a pushover, Bloody Malth is just a matter of getting close to him and mashing buttons and the Masked Devil just requires you to hit the giant orb in the middle. Jaquio, however, is ungodly hard, and the Demon is largely luck-based.
The sequels evened it out quite a bit.: The Dark Sword of Chaos presents a recursive example: an evil-looking tower with a demonic skull for an entrance, which leads to the antechamber of the Realm of Chaos. And inside that, an altar upon which the actual gates can be opened.: The Kerbeross beasts from the NES Ninja Gaiden and The Dark Sword of Chaos.: Irene was a redhead in the original trilogy.
As Sonia,.: Back in The Dark Sword of Chaos, not only is it heavily implied that Robert died while to protect Ryu's back, but the Dragon Sword itself makes a sacrifice to revive Irene at the end.: How did the CIA and Jacquio's troops find Ryu so quickly after he came to America? Maybe it's because he's the only person in modern New York who runs around in broad daylight dressed like a Ninja.: Ryu versus his brainwashed father in the first NES Ninja Gaiden.: The Ancient Ship of Doom takes place after the events of the first NES Ninja Gaiden, but before The Dark Sword of Chaos, which is why Ryu still possesses the Dragon Sword, despite having lost it at the end. The Japanese manual makes the game's setting clear, but the American manual only implies it subtly. After Ryu's victorious duel with Jaquio, Ashtar returned to the bowels of darkness and bided his time.
But another evil creature was already on its way as another adventure awaits the unsuspecting Ryu Hayabusa.: The birds.: What will pour out of the Gate of Darkness to the if Ashtar's ritual is completed. Many foes in the games already hail from there.: Both Ryu and Irene in the first NES game, after an entire adventure without any proper build up for romance. In fairness, Ryu took the fact he was able to meet her as a fitting payment for all the trouble they went through, and Irene seems to have the same mindset on this matter as she disregarded Foster's direct orders to kill him. The result is the couple kissing at the end; as of Dead or Alive, they are and running their Antique Shop together.: Jacquio — Ashtar — Jacquio. Trust us,.: Ashtar from The Dark Sword of Chaos wears a smooth, faceless metal mask with only thin slits for eyes. Or maybe the eyes are part of the mask.: The NES games were fond of this.
In the first, Ryu leaves the statues together too long, releasing the Demon; a year later in The Dark Sword of Chaos, he doesn't pay attention as the pool of blood from Jaquio's corpse reaches the Sword of Chaos, releasing the Demon again.:, a man-sized mutant lizard cyborg with a jetpack and plasma guns.: Used in The Dark Sword of Chaos intentionally, with infuriating results.: Jacquio in the first game, Jacquio again in the sequel and Clancy in the final.: The NES games. If it wasn't bad enough that Tecmo forced you to use the wall cling ability and jump across tiny platforms over pits, they decided to throw in, eagles and even the grunts on full force. Worse, the first two games allow infinite respawns.: Played straight in the NES trilogy, thank goodness. The aspect of the game is hard enough as is; it's almost to think of what it would be like had the several enemies who shot at you or threw shuriken at you did so quickly.: Most of Ryu's Ninja Arts in the NES trilogy revolve around flinging fireballs or encasing himself in them with the.: The Windmill Throwing Star in the NES trilogy and the Windmill Shuriken in the two Xbox games.: In the Boss battle against Ryu's father, trying to strike him will get you nowhere. To win the fight, you have to destroy the statue casting orbs of energy towards him.
(Which isn't hard, once you catch on. Or if you watched the cutscene right before the fight, which shows you what to attack).: In Act 7 of The Ancient Ship of Doom, should you make it to the without dying, you will notice the timer is very close to zero once you reach the end.: The NES trilogy has perhaps the most frustrating examples of such. After killing any mook, if their spawn point even goes one pixel offscreen and back, they're immediately back.
I had this game on my list for a long time now. I added it because I thought its gameplay looked good and heard it was challenging. BUT no one ever told me it would be THIS MUCH HARD!! Gameplay: Being a hack n slash game, the combat is superb.
Very fluid, responsive and diverse. In fact, I'll say it is one of the best hack n slash game combat that I have experienced. You have multiple weapons and most of them are useful. All of them are different with different styles and combos and feel and can suit to specific needs. This game encourages you to use different weapons at different stages. The variety of enemies is also large.
You don't get bored with killing a single type of enemy as they game constantly introduces and shifts new enemies. The boss fights are, for the most part, great too. Now the difficulty, well there is no difficulty setting, the game just throws you in the fight with normal difficulty and I can safely say it was the most HARDEST hack n slash game I have ever played. Seriously, I got so raged at times that I almost broke my remote. It is an extremely challenging game.
But there are some cheap/unfair stuff in it too which makes it a lot more difficult, like ridiculously long checkpoints at some places and no shops. Also, some enemy placement and enemy spawning also feels too cheap. But a lot of the game is fairly tough and really does makes you work hard to reach the next level and the next one and so on.
The feeling of accomplishment is unbelievably immense. Defeating an extremely tough boss will never probably satisfy you as much as in this game. And there are A LOT of tough bosses in it. You get so trained in dodging and blocking and using combos etc that by the time you are near the final chapters, you stop and think that how in the hell were that boss hard and that area frustrating and etc. I myself found the last two chapters and boss fights to be easy, mostly because by that time, I was well trained by that time. The camera sucks in it though.
Most areas are in doors and camera just blocks your view a lot, very annoying. Also, those areas where you have to find things and put them somewhere to progress were very annoying too. Got lost often. Story: Story, characters, cutscenes etc is pretty much MEH. It is just there for a reason to progress and introduce new enemies and areas, nothing more.
Graphics and sound: Being a previous generation game, the graphics were meh. But don't let it bother you. You'll get used to it. It runs at smooth 60 FPS. Soundtrack is pretty sweet in some areas, makes you pump up and not give up. And believe me you will want to give up at many places during this game.
Concluding remarks: If you want a real challenge, something to test your Hack n slash game skills, then this is the perfect game for you. And don't pussy out by abandoning the ninja way (it gives you an option when you die too much:p ). I seriously would have never thought I would give it a high rating when I was in the initial stages, I was hating this game. BUT you really have to beat it to understand it and admire it.
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