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"Ninja Gaiden - Good and bad"

Got it on Friday.

It's good because ninjas are good. It's innately cool to do ninja stuff, and unless your name is Sho Kosugi, it's unlikely you can actually do that stuff for real.
It's bad because, for all the excellent graphics, awesome speed etc, it relies on that creaking cliche of end-of-level bosses.
I mean really, in an age where you have soft-physics systems in Splinter Cell 2 and independant AI in Half-Life 2, must we still be forced to drudge through that ancient game-stretch technique of making you face multiple Bosses?

Throw yourself at it until you realise the weakspot.
*yawn*
I prefer games where, if your skillfull and observant enough, you can make it through and feel like you're participating and actually controlling what's happening.

Ninja Gaiden?
Checkpoint reach - FMV - Boss.
SMASHPUNCHKICKSTAB
Dead
Restart
SMASHPUNCHKICKSTAB
Dead
Restart
SMASHPUNCHKICKSTAB
Dead
Turn off and smoke several cigarettes to calm down and stop yourself from putting the controller through the tv
Return to game
SMASHPUNCHKICKSTAB
Dead
Restart
SMASHPUNCHKICKSTAB
Dead
Restart
SMASHPUNCHKICKSTAB
Defeat Boss
Continue

2004. Half-Life 2, Doom 3, mobile camera phones, internet, txt messaging.
Good things that have progressed since 1980 when video games were dull and bosses were prolific.
Ninja Gaiden - ninja excellence, cool weapons, awesome graphics.
End of Level Boss.
They're as cheesy cliche as ladder-death in FPS and bugs too small to shoot.
Why?
And whilst I'm fuming about bosses, the other thing that's boiled my blood about this game?

LET ME SAVE WHEN I'VE DONE AN IMPOSSIBLY HARD BIT
Don't give me set-save points that means when I die (and you will, continously), I don't have to redo huge portions of a level.
I'm thinking specifically about the first time you reach the Vigoor capital.
You have to fight large groups of black ninja (ridiculously hard), regular enemies and ever-oncoming foes.
With not a single save point. Not one. Anywhere.
A level that takes 10 mins once you know where to go and what to do.
And not one solitary point at which to save your game.

What kind of retarded level designed came up with that idea?
"Oooh oooh, I know! The first time the player encounters Black Ninjas with exploding stuff and impossibly fast attacks...let's not give them a save point anywhere!!!!"
"Cool! That'll frustrate them beyond bloodboiling!"
"Yeah! Let's have the player fight these new foes 3 times in a level with no saves! And only 2 health potions to collect!!!"
"nice one!!!!!"

It's a good game, but for me the lack of saving after I've done a really hard bit (of which there are many) makes it a tedious thing to plow through level sections again and again and again and again and again.

Feel free to preen like acne-stricken peacocks and brag about "Well I did it with no problems so it must be you then", it's nothing to boast about that your hand-to-glans combat skills enable you to have pointdexter levels of accuracy.

It is excellent, truely magnificent. It's a complete throw back to classic Nes/Snez and in a way it is like the original Alex Kidd. You battle your way through some tough sections and face the boss, if you lose you go back to the las**t checkpoint and s**tart again, tough sh*t, if you aren't good enough to beat him then going back to an eariler part gives me the chance to try out new moves on the Ninjas leading up to the boss battle where I try something different.

Devil May Cry worked in a similar way, very very hard at points and thew boss battles were s**tupidly hard at times but it didn't detract away from what is one of the bes**t games of the modern era.

You were warned by plenty of places before buying it, the immense difficulty and frus**tration levels were pointed out on mass. If you chose to ignore them or reserve judgement then I fail to see how you can suddenly s**tart complaining.

Quit whinging you big pussi, it's hard, it's frus**trating but it's better than 90% of modern easy crap.

That reminds me, Splinter Cell PT, great game but s**tupidly easy. Would you rather have that or a game that really did tes**t you?

The whole issue with the Bosses reminds me of the bit in Resident Evil: Nemesis where you face off with the aforementioned in the church yard. Of course being RE you have a save point which is close to the start of the action (well you'll certainly be saving your progress when you get anihilated the first time) and then you have to spend a couple of minutes skipping the cut scenes and so on.

Then you fight this abhorrent biological weapon and get pulverised. It's too fast, too strong, too tough and too skilled at grabing you and ripping your arms off. So you die and start the fight again, after a couple of minutes of skipping cut scenes and so on.

Shoot, run, shoot, panic, run , run, stop, die.

And so on.

Then you decide to make a stand. Running is getting your carpace mashed so let's do something stupid and go toe to toe with the behemoth of terror. And it works. Using the dodge button to good effectc you are suddenly making it look cumbersome, as you roll around popping caps into its big monster ass. Then when you've pulped it and mashed its face up real bad the booger gets up to whup you again, as you've pumped all you ammo into the twitching mess on the floor. Thus you die.

Then you reload.

And so on.

Then when you do finally succeed you still have to reach the next typewriter save point without being zombie chomp.

Thanks you game designer bastardos.

This is one of the only games where I actually get nervous before going back to it.

I can kill most of the things with ease, especially with those nunchuckas, but I just know there'll be something a thousand times harder lurking around the corner. I don't like the way that some of the baddies respawn as well.
But meh.
I still love it.

Can't wait for this to arrive - I'm not really bothered about difficulty, it's a nice change to have something challenging as most games these days are a bit... tame. The odd few like Viewtiful Joe, Ikaruga and R-Type are a great change.

Bosses... I like them. Well, it depends really, if they're clever enough, tough enough and aren't mindless faeces formed into a massive evil crush-death-ogre thing, it's a nice change of pace from most games. Games like Metroid Prime really favour them, the bosses are the hardest part in it and even if they do take a couple of attempts (the Omega Pirate.. what a b*tch) they're still damn good, kick ass battles.

I'm hoping I'm going to get really pi**ed off with this game.

It's an excellent game, but it does almost seem like the designers set out to have you loving it one minute and then wanting to throw the controller at the screen the next.

Bosses do my nut in on any game, the fact that you have to replay half the level to get back to them is just plain retarded. I'll stick at it and hopefully complete the game eventually, but I can understand why people would just give up. It's just so damn frustrating at times which can make it more of a chore to play than actual fun.

I know what you mean. This game is beyond frustrating. If anyone wants to use this tactic, it might help you a little. On most levels, you'll come accross an area where you'll get a bunch of bats swooping for you. Take out just a couple of them, then do the charge attack holding the Y button. When this hits the other bats, you'll get more cash then just killing them normally.

Sometimes you'll have quite a few bats, so just keep repeating this tactic. You can then walk out the areas you fought them, take a few steps out, then go back in. The bats will be back again and they don't do much damage if they hit you. If they start to bring your life down, just kill them normally to hopefully get some blue orbs to put your life up again.

You can keep doing this until you have shedloads of cash to spend at the shop on life saving stuff and weapons upgrades. The time it takes to put your cash right up depends on the amount of bats, but its certainly helped me get through the game and those poxy multiple bosses in levels. You can only hold a certain number of each potion and stuff, but its much better to go into the big fights with a few potions rather than one crappy potion that adds next to nothing to your bar.

I'm on chapter 14 and I can tell you all now, you WILL need this tactic because later on, the enemies get really annoying. The main thing thats had me throwing psychotic swearing fits and wishing death on every Tecmo employee that played a part in this games production is when enemies have a good variety of moves such as explosives, fast combos and throws. You get a group of them who procede to keep you pinned down - a couple of them will keep you blocking by attacking you with combos while the other either uses explosives on you or gets in and throws you.

I'd actually love to goto Japan right now to the houses of the people who made this game, grab the back of their head and slam it on a table, then slam a 2 litre Coca cola bottle up their back passage and see how THEY like it. Then of course charge them the equivelent of £40 for doing it.

Wouldn't you say that it's having so many save options that make games so easy these days?

I can't think of a single game that I have that gave me a huge challenge. some parts of them may have taken me 10's of tries, and many profanities to complete, but having the ability to save wherever I chose certainly helped me a great deal.

prince of persia was an absolute beast of a game, but it was so easy that I'd finished it after just a couple of evenings solid play.

I remember the game alex the kid in miracle world, on the master system - you had 3 lives, and if you lost them all, you started the game from scratch, even if you were near the very end. infuriating, yes, but I still loved the game.

In the 'great old days' of gaming, saving your progress was a luxury, now you can do it pretty much when you feel like it. I like the convenience, but it's definitely making them easier to complete. take max payne 2 for example. I can save that (and often do) before I go into a room. If I die, no sweat, I can do it again, AND I'll know what to be ready for.

it's taking the thrill out of gaming in this way - why do I need to worry? I have endless goes to get it right.

Of course, all this is just conjecture, I'll have to try Ninja Gaiden for myself and see if punch marks appear in my flimsy plaster walls.

*seethe*
So I manage, finally after almost 3hrs on and off of attempting, to defeat the 3 dragons.
BANG - straight into massive end-of-level boss.
I lose. Because I have no health potions, being only 2 in the level previous.

No problem, restart and I'll have...what? WHAT? I have to go right back to my previous save, which means defeating armies of black ninjas and the 3 dragons again???????
Well Namco, you can blow your lazy level design out of your ass. Don't use repeated attempts at levels and bosses to increase the longevity of a game.

Prince of Persia - that was a pleasure to play. Intuitive controls, excellent camera and you didn't have to repeatedly battle through sections.
It appears to extend the time of this game, there are precious few save points, stupid difficulty to make you restart enormous chunks of a level and retarded, 20year old end-of-level boss cliches.

What a waste of potential.

Savatt78 wrote:
> Its a good game and stuff, but it could have been so much better.
> Keep the human beheadings in, add a decent save system to the game,
> take that bloody difficulty down a notch so you don't wanna put your
> foot through the screen every 30 seconds and set it all in a decent
> time such as feudal Japan.
-------

Bang on.
That's my complaint 100%

I'm trying to defeat 3 dragons.
Oh, and then another end-of-level boss after the 3 dragons.
This is why I'm taking this back tomorrow and getting something else. I just don't have the patience or the will to repeatedly throw myself at a level time and time and time again until the one time I manage to do it.
My free-time is precious to me, and I don't wish to spend it repeating a level for hours simply because it's too difficult and poorly designed.

The level I'm on is a perfect example of the bad points of this game.
I manage to defeat 3 black ninjas - lightning fast and throw sticky exploding bombs on you. Hard enough. So having killed them, I save. Nice one, I can explore the level now.
Nope - infinite spawn points
*sigh*
So each time I reload, I now have to defeat the same 3 ninjas again because they respawn if you enter that part of the level again.
Ok, I'll kill those 3. It's hard but not impossible, used half my health.
Oh...there's only 1 semi-health and 1 full health on this level though.
Read that correctly?

You have to defeat 3 black ninjas. Then 3 guards and 2 cannoneers.
Then another 4 black ninjas. Then another 3.
Then 3 mini-boss dragons.
Then the end-of-level boss.

With zero save points and 1 and one half health potions to collect.
*puts disk back in box*
Nope, sorry.
Whatever plus points this game have (and there are some) are totally negated by infrequent save-points, excessively long levels between saves, minimal healths and repeatedly respawning nails-hard enemies.
I mean for chrissakes, end-of-level bosses? Most games restart you just before you fight, because you will die until you finally, by chance, finish them.

Not Ninja Gaiden though, the save point for having to fight 3 dragon bosses and then the main boss means you have to battle through 3 groups of 4+ black ninjas with negligible health pickups.

Toss.