With Ninja Gaiden 4 inching its strategy to its closing launch this month, Workforce Ninja and Platinum Video games have introduced a number of thrilling additions to its gameplay loop to make sure that the franchise reclaims its place as certainly one of fashionable gaming’s most fun motion titles. The brand new launch ends an extended spell of dormancy for the franchise, and will doubtlessly breathe new life into it within the course of.
However why has a franchise that stood proper up there with the perfect motion titles round been with no mainline instalment for thus rattling lengthy? We expect Ninja Gaiden 3 might have had one thing to do with it, regardless of the best way wherein Workforce Ninja tried to repair the issues that got here with its preliminary launch.
That’s a narrative that has us pondering that it was maybe a good suggestion for the studio to attend till it was prepared to usher in a brand new instalment to the franchise. However what made Ninja Gaiden 3 fall so flat within the eyes of its gamers and critics alike? How did Workforce Ninja try to show issues round for the sport with Razor’s Edge? Did issues work out for it will definitely?
Learn on and discover out as we flip again the clock on Ryu’s adventures!
The Third Time Wasn’t The Attraction
We’re going to preface this part by saying that it’s fairly exhausting to usher in a 3rd title that achieves the highs of its predecessors for any studio. And whereas Workforce Ninja’s abilities are actually there for all to see, Ninja Gaiden 3 confronted a monumental activity because it needed to both measure as much as or exceed the success of the franchise’s extensively praised second title, which is not any simple feat.
It’s value mentioning that the ambitions the studio had for Ninja Gaiden 3 have been fairly evident. It aimed to deliver contemporary new touches to its formulation, with the Metal on Bone approach, as an example, being a good way to counter enemy assaults, full with an ideal digital camera angle. However it primarily changed the dismemberment mechanic from the earlier sport, which didn’t make sense. It might have been nice to have the brand new approach alongside one of many earlier title’s greatest options.
The brand new Kunai Climbing mechanic was a equally artistic contact that was in the end a let down due to how slowly Ryu really climbed when utilizing it. It was extra of an annoyance quite than a pleasant contact, a logo of a good suggestion marred by poor execution, which was one thing Ninja Gaiden 3 was infamous for.
Whereas most individuals weren’t selecting up a Ninja Gaiden sport for its story, the plot in Ryu’s third journey was so disparate and in every single place that it deserves to be talked about among the many causes for the sport’s failure. It actively restricted the potential for extra weapons, as an example, whereas taking away Ryu’s iconic Dragon Sword due to the curse that was positioned on him by the Regent. It introduced betrayals at each flip, making each really feel much less impactful than the final till the top of the story.
It additionally introduced some tedious ethical issues into the equation, having Ryu haunted by all of the lives he had taken up till that time. Whereas which may have been a good way to inject some life into the story in a sport the place it wasn’t actually a precedence, it was irksome that there was no weight assigned to the truth that it was both kill or be killed for our protagonist.
Contemplating that exposition typically got here at the price of extra motion, it was a very egregious a part of our complaints in regards to the sport again within the day. It added no emotional heft to the story, though which may have been what it was supposed for, and did not deliver some much-needed nuance to the desk, offering a story framework for the motion like in previous titles.
Moreover, we’d argue that it was part of the explanation why the sport’s fight felt so lackluster, because it supplied the narrative scope for Ryu to face hordes of enemies, however eliminated so most of the issues that made dealing with these enemies value it. Workforce Ninja’s efforts to make the sport extra interesting to a wider viewers additionally contributed to this, because it took away quite a lot of the problem that franchise veterans got here to anticipate.
It was a center floor between the franchise’s brutal problem and a extra approachable fight system that the studio failed to seek out, and issues didn’t finish effectively for the ultimate launch construct of the sport. It was unlucky, however not solely sudden, that the sport was so poorly acquired by its gamers and panned by many critics alike. Maybe the sport’s new administrators went too far with their ambitions, or just did not capitalize on the artistic imaginative and prescient that put the franchise on the map within the first place.
When all of those elements have been considered as an entire, Ninja Gaiden 3 was an expertise that felt like a drastic departure from the franchise’s traditions and profitable formulation, one which went in solely the incorrect course.
However then there was Razor’s Edge.
Turning Issues Round
It’s a testomony to Workforce Ninja’s tenacity and resilience that it refused to surrender on its title and determined to attempt to make a greater sport out of it. Though Razor’s Edge initially made its strategy to the Wii U, a stable port of the sport for different consoles quickly made it a model of Ninja Gaiden 3 that introduced it nearer to the unique imaginative and prescient its creators had for it.
For starters, Ryu had entry to a bunch of cool new weapons over the course of the marketing campaign. That was a direct plus, because it introduced again the Karma system and made it fairly helpful whereas additionally giving gamers a bit extra incentive to play by means of the quite a few battles they have been confronted with. Since every weapon had its personal moveset and a bunch of further strikes to unlock, it was the proper method so as to add depth to the unique launch’s one-dimensional fight, eradicating repetition in favor of a extra dynamic loop.
There was additionally Akane, making her method over from Useless or Alive, and instantly introduced extra selection to the sport. Together with her personal missions, distinctive playstyle, her presence in Razor’s Edge was very welcome certainly. She was quick, trendy, environment friendly at dispatching enemies, and an honest various to Ryu. The Black Spider Clan’s return was additionally a pleasant contact!
Conserving consistent with its title, one other addition was the return of dismemberment and a number of other different mechanics from earlier titles that instantly made the sport really feel and play like a Ninja Gaiden title as a substitute of a confused mess that didn’t actually know what it was about.
One other vital enchancment that it dropped at the desk was the improved enemy AI. They have been extra aggressive and keen to aim assaults in the event that they misplaced a limb, making fight really feel extra like a determined battle for survival on either side, simply as a Ninja Gaiden title must be. The hidden skulls and Checks of Valor constructed on that very effectively, making the fight really feel as brutal and difficult because it was within the franchise’s previous.
However did all of those additions handle to show issues round for Workforce Ninja? The reply is sure for essentially the most half. They confirmed that the studio paid consideration to the suggestions it acquired and acted on it fairly intelligently. There’s a purpose that this was the model of Ninja Gaiden 3 that was on the Grasp Assortment, in spite of everything. It’s additionally a possible purpose for Ragebound being nearly as good because it was, with it having all the classes Workforce Ninja needed to study the exhausting method at its disposal.
A New Chapter Begins
These classes are form of evident within the strategy that Workforce Ninja has taken within the new twists it has introduced in Ninja Gaiden 4. A number of protagonists, weapons, enemy sorts, and a seemingly higher narrative this time round are all direct outcomes of its previous errors and point out a extra nuanced strategy to an formidable new title.
There’s a particular stability between the previous and the brand new that has impressed early previewers of the brand new sport, incomes it quite a lot of goodwill forward of its launch. We’d say that Ninja Gaiden 3 crawled greater than a decade in the past simply in order that its successor might fly in our current.
In fact, we’re going to have to attend and see if the brand new entry to the long-standing franchise can stay as much as the hype that it’s generated. However given Workforce Ninja’s apparent penchant to study from its previous errors, issues are trying excellent for Ninja Gaiden proper now, and we couldn’t be happier.
All that’s left is to dive into Ryu’s newest bout with the Darkish Dragon subsequent week and discover out for ourselves!
Word: The views expressed on this article are these of the creator and don’t essentially signify the views of, and shouldn’t be attributed to, GamingBolt as a corporation.
