On October 21, Ninja Gaiden 4 was released, which, despite the number in the title, became the seventh full-fledged game in the franchise and its second reboot. What is the new project like, what is good about it, what is bad, and how does it differ from previous games — let's find out in the review!
Raven vs. Dragon
The game takes place several years after the events of Ninja Gaiden 3. Tokyo is once again plagued: an ancient evil in the form of the Dark Dragon has returned, and the city is filled with evil spirits: endless rain and crowds of demons have made the capital of the Land of the Rising Sun a gloomy and deserted place.
The main character is a young ninja, Yakumo, from the Raven clan, which operates from the shadows — the opposite of the Hayabusa clan. His mission is to find and kill the priestess, whose death will lead to the expulsion of the dragon. But things didn't go as planned, and the goal turned out to be not as simple as expected: in order to banish the dragon, which Ryu Hayabusa — the previous protagonist of the series — once sealed, it is not enough to simply take the priestess's life, as this will only lead to the death of the soul, but not the body of the dragon, which is the source of evil. Now we have to remove the seal, reunite the soul with the body, and defeat the reborn dragon completely — this is what we will be doing throughout the game.
You will also get to play as Ryu, albeit not for long — through him, we will see the events that preceded what Yakumo is going through and gently pass the baton to the new protagonist.
The game's narrative is simple: it is linear, banal, contains only one major plot twist that is easy to predict, and does not provide enough context for newcomers to deeply understand what is happening. What is the dragon, who is responsible for what is happening, and what are Hayabusas and Ravens? Please — play the previous parts! There is an element of drama in the story, but it is not presented emotionally enough — it is possible to empathize with the hero at this moment, but it is difficult.
Another drawback of the plot is its length — and this is on the condition that the story takes about 9-12 hours to complete, depending on the difficulty. But even so, part of the narrative is simply superfluous: especially when Yakumo is thrown into the abyss, effectively doubling his path to the goal. Why? Like the entire narrative in the game — simply as a reason for the existence of the gameplay and nothing more.
Platinum Ninja
Ninja Gaiden 4 is a hack and slash game designed for battles with a large number of enemies and strong bosses, and there are no problems with this here. The variety of enemies for a ten-hour game is more than impressive: enemy samurai and rocket launchers, demons, dogs, large and small enemies, exploding lamps, machines spitting fire and poisonous clots — you can't list them all.
Although the bosses turned out to be fascinating, their variety is not so impressive, and considering that some of them have to be killed twice, this slightly affects the perception. However, this has to be done for two different characters, so it's not all that bad.
Difficulty — another main component of Ninja Gaiden, distinguishing the franchise from the list of "slashers" — has remained, but has changed. The combat system in the game is based on combinations, and therefore, even at a low level of difficulty, enemies have a large supply of health: it will take a very long time to poke them with ordinary attacks. But sometimes you can perform attacks that allow you to cut off an enemy's limb, after which he opens up for finishing. Sometimes it can be done right away, and sometimes it doesn't work at all. There is no dueling honesty here, when you and your opponent are in equal positions and can lose with a couple of hits each.
Together with Team Ninja — the developers of the series — the fourth part was created by Platinum Games, a studio specializing in games with exciting combat systems, which is constantly traced in Ninja Gaiden 4.
There are four levels of difficulty in the game, but with nuances:
- The easiest level — "Hero" — is actually divided into three: you can simply turn it on, or you can connect additional functions: auto-block and auto-battle. With them — especially with auto-battle — the game turns from "hardcore" into a movie, where the protagonist can't even take damage, let alone lose.
- The average level — "Normal" — is already a balanced "challenge", offering the player exciting battles with enemies, where you have to monitor the environment and react to the actions of opponents in time.
- "High" level — where the player has to rely heavily on their skills: the game can still forgive you for your mistakes, but to a minimum.
- The highest difficulty — "Master Ninja" — opens only after the first playthrough of the game. At this level, the player will face the most severe tests, unforgiving of mistakes and designed for the most ardent fans. Here, all opponents are replaced with enhanced versions with increased health and begin to kill you almost instantly.
In battle, players have access to a standard set of actions: strike, strong strike, dodge, block, several types of parrying, and the ability to throw a shuriken to slow down the enemy. There is also a rage mode that accumulates during the battle and can be used in two ways: either simply turn it on for a few seconds, increasing damage, or press a button to inflict a powerful area attack, destroying all weak enemies near you, or inflicting great damage to the boss's health bar.
Added to this is a unique feature of the game: the ability to enter a special mode — "Blood Raven Form". Yakumo covers his weapon with blood, modifying it and gaining the ability to break through enemy blocks or use special techniques. You can be in this mode for a limited time — there is a special scale for it, which is restored by itself or when inflicting ordinary blows on enemies.
Yakumo has a total of four types of weapons, which are unlocked as you progress through the game, and each of which can be upgraded:
- Takeminakata: paired blades / tachi — starting weapon, deals good damage to a small area around Yakumo;
- Yatousen: rapier / spear — received after removing the first seal, effective against single targets;
- Magatsuchi: staff / hammer — deals fast and sweeping blows with good damage;
- "Wrath of Hiruko": assassin's tools / robo-arms — long-range weapon: throws shurikens, bombs, and so on at enemies.
All this is polished on top with a large set of techniques and combos that you will have to adapt to use on the go. The downside is that some skills are tied to the need to hold down certain buttons or scroll the sticks, which is not always possible to do in the heat of battle. Enemies simply knock you off your feet while you concentrate and try to perform a combo.
When playing as Ryu, the combat system changes slightly — Hayabusa has no choice of weapons and "Blood Raven Form", but there is an alternative. "Flash Form", which has four uses, enhancing the hero and giving him additional skills: teleportation, mass strikes, and others. Each option spends a different amount of energy on techniques, and Ryu's base characteristics are much higher than Yakumo's.
To strengthen the heroes, in addition to skills and weapons, you can use accessories, after pre-pumping the number of slots for them — up to five pieces. They give various bonuses both for the characteristics of the characters and for farming resources, increasing the extraction of experience and money or changing their places.
Platinum Games' merit lies in the fact that playing Ninja Gaiden 4 is interesting regardless of the chosen difficulty — even on easy, where you still have to use all the charms of the combat system, albeit without much risk: combinations of techniques, breaking through enemy shields, changing weapons and styles, and so on. The exception is, perhaps, the auto-battle function turned on — with it, the game starts playing itself, which is not very interesting.
Visually, the battles are also magnificent: beautiful animations in the hurricane pace of battles create a sense of dance — especially if you have adapted to the techniques and skillfully use them — and the spectacular cutting of opponents in conjunction with liters of their virtual blood complement this atmosphere. And all this to incendiary music, under which you want to move even more actively!
Of the minuses, it is necessary to note the most inconvenient target capture — the protagonist often pays attention not to the opponents that are needed at all, because of which you have to either manually switch/disable the capture, or kill the enemies that the machine chose — and this is critical for high difficulties!
Empty Tokyo and Beyond
As a game world, we have several biomes available: a gloomy city filled with enemy samurai and demons, where it always rains and for some reason trains run; a canyon with various spirits; a sewer where you have to constantly move between the world of the living and the world of demons.
The design of the locations is simple, but interesting, although it has not moved far from the games of the Xbox 360 era: small levels with many branches, on which there are goals for additional tasks and various treasures — all this is easy to miss if you only run along the main plot. By the way, the game has a very convenient system of orientation on the ground: instead of the compasses and maps that everyone is tired of, you can simply hold down the button and the game will show you where to go.
Parkour is an important part of the gameplay. For exploring the world, Yakumo has a standard set of gadgets: the "Senokoser" grappling hook, the "Dragonfly" glider, and the "Water Strider" surfboard — often they have to be skillfully combined to run through a particular segment of the area. The hero can also run along walls, slide along the floor, and jump over obstacles.
NPCs are generously scattered around the locations, helping the protagonists: from one you can buy consumables for healing and buffs, and from the second you can learn new techniques — competent management of in-game currency is very important!
Moving through platform sections is fun and easy — even if you make a mistake, the hero will not fall, but will simply slow down a little. And even if he falls, you will be thrown back to the save point, of which there are plenty here.
Sometimes there are very long sections where Yakumo moves along the rails, dodging trains, which looks somewhat ridiculous — a couple of times I even felt like I was playing not Ninja Gaiden, but Subway Surfers.
The landscapes of the in-game world cannot be called very beautiful and creative, but you can't deny them atmosphere for sure: notes of cyberpunk, classic Japanese nature and a disco party — all this is skillfully combined and alternated, not letting the player get bored. It's a pity that the locations are repeated when playing for different characters.
Not by Dragon Alone
In addition to the main story, the game has many side activities.
The most basic here are side quests, of which there are plenty: from eliminating special targets to searching for any items — if you explore every corner of the map, then there will be something to occupy yourself with for 15-20 hours.
The game also has the ability to train: you can hone your skills as much as you want in battles with ordinary — and not only — dummies, both aiming at one specific technique and at a free pace.
There are also enough challenges in the game. Already in the first chapter, you can find the gates to "Purgatory", where there are several levels of difficulty — in fact, these are just battles with waves of enemies, for passing which you will be given virtual money to upgrade your character.
After completing the game, even more different difficult challenges open up, which can be completed as Yakumo, as well as Ryu. And after the first full playthrough, the plot can be replayed for Hayabusa completely.
There is also a special "Daredevil" mode, which can be turned on either when replaying the game, or in challenges: it reduces your health and attack stats to a basic minimum, while enemies remain enhanced — all for the sake of "challenge"!
Technical Shurikens
In technical terms, Ninja Gaiden 4 behaves strangely. On a PC with a GTX 1660 Super video card, the optimization is very uneven: sometimes everything "flies" and pleases the eye with its smoothness, and sometimes the frame counter drops to sad values. And this is regardless of the settings: both at minimum settings and a resolution of 1080p, and at medium settings and 1440p.
On the Xbox Series S, the project works stably — not a single bug or FPS drop. But the graphics on the younger Microsoft console leave much to be desired — a significant proportion of games on PlayStation 4 looked better.
The graphics themselves look technologically advanced, but dry: there is no "highlight" in them — just decorations of the city with lighting, or basic nature assets. Functional, but no more.
A few more words about the music: most of the compositions turned out to be good, but simple, while some of the soundtracks of bosses and characters deserve to settle in your playlist. The performer Viktor Borba, known for the composition Bury the Light for the game Devil May Cry 5, took part in the recording. Or the song Une vie à peindre for the game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 — his participation in the project makes the soundtrack of Ninja Gaiden 4 special!
Diagnosis
Ninja Gaiden 4 is a high-quality modern "slasher". The project has departed from the canons of the series and instead of hardcore for the sake of hardcore, in order to hurt the player, it is similar to Platinum Games games. Lots of enemies, abilities and combinations — fighting here is fun even at a low level of difficulty, and at high levels the player is given a serious challenge. The game is much closer to Metal Gear Rising and Devil May Cry than to the old parts of Ninja Gaiden — fans should be prepared for this.
It's a pity that the plot turned out to be disposable and not at all impressive: even despite the presence of a dramatic plot twist, it's definitely not worth replaying the game for the sake of the story — only if you increase the difficulty for yourself again and again!
And the game is available on Xbox Game Pass and it's better to evaluate it there — because it's not worth recommending Ninja Gaiden 4 for 70 dollars at all.
Pro
- Excellent combat system
- Good separation of difficulty levels
- Good location design and technological graphics
- Cool soundtrack
Contra
- Flat and disposable plot
- Problems with target capture
- High price tag
