Shukuchi Ninja isn’t like every ninja we’ve encountered earlier than. Ryu Hayabusa or Shinobi wouldn’t stand for being fired like an indignant fowl at their enemies. We’d think about it’s towards their code and greater than a little bit demeaning.
Shukuchi Ninja doesn’t care. He’s very happy to be tossed at his enemies for a fast decapitation. He’s principally getting used like a human-sized shuriken.
One other analogy for a way Shukuchi Ninja performs is Celebration Golf and What the Golf? These video games are real-time, fast-paced video games of golf, the place ready for the ball to cease is positively frowned on. Shukuchi Ninja performs loads like these video games, simply swapping the crisp whites for some ninja blacks. You might be firing your ninja like a golf ball round an area, killing enemies as you go (it diverges from golf right here). Hopefully, that’s starting to offer you an thought of what’s on the inexperienced with Shukuchi Ninja.
Every stage is a 2D area stuffed with enemy ninjas. There’s a operating complete of those ninjas within the bottom-left of the display screen, and your job is to take this tally all the way down to zero. Kill each final one, and a portal will open at one finish of the extent. That’s your cue to hot-tail it out of there.
You kill the enemies by, as talked about, lobbing your ninja at them. You might be pulling again on the ninja in a selected path, which concurrently slows time and provides you the chance to tug off a killer shot. After getting the path and strength-of-shot that you simply’re after, you let go and watch your ninja fly. With luck, he’ll nick the sides of an enemy, reducing them in half and taking that tally down additional.
Every stage has a restrict to the variety of ninja-tosses that you simply get, so that you’re taking part in sensibly. Single photographs that kill a number of ninjas are inspired, as you get Unreal Event-style notifications once you chain deaths collectively. You might be handily given different strikes, too, to lift these combos up additional. Toss shurikens, that are restricted however picked up within the ranges, and pull off a single-shot teleport that brings you to the closest enemy for a fast stabby stabby.
Shukuchi Ninja isn’t invincible, nonetheless. Roll slowly at an enemy and so they’re prone to assault you again. Enemies quickly study to throw stuff at you or transfer. And traps litter the degrees, requiring you to anticipate them and discover a looping shot that avoids them. There’s a well being bar to soak up all this harm, nevertheless it’s obtained its limits. Attain zero and you’ve got the chance to restart the extent or use a restricted variety of continues. You’ll want them: it’s fairly widespread to die or run out of strikes, so a swift restart offers you the possibility of success.
All of it seems like jolly outdated enjoyable, however we didn’t prefer it a lot. Somebody has swapped Shukuchi Ninja’s smoke bombs for stink bombs, as there’s one thing that smells rotten at its core.
Somebody ought to have pushed a duplicate of Celebration Golf or What the Golf? into the builders’ palms, as a result of these video games obtained one thing proper that Shukuchi Ninja doesn’t. The ninja experiences momentum, and that momentum continues with every shot. Let’s provide an instance to make it a wee bit clearer: think about that you simply fireplace Shukuchi Ninja at an enemy however miss. You’d decelerate time and attempt to fireplace again on the enemy, proper? Effectively, your ninja continues to be experiencing the ahead momentum of the primary shot, so should you fireplace 180 levels backwards on the enemy you’ve missed, then all you might be doing is canceling the unique momentum. You drop to the ground as an alternative. Which is boring, and by no means what you need.
This fixed wrestling with momentum and physics is tiresome to the utmost. Most of your strikes can be spent correcting or righting your path, reasonably than firing at a baddy. We wished to be stabbing individuals within the intestine, however more often than not we have been making an attempt to show a damaged purchasing trolley.
These emotions of being cumbersome and unwieldy don’t cease there. For unfathomable causes, you possibly can fall off the sides of the display screen. Hearth into a spot within the ceiling and also you’ll lose a life. Overshoot an enemy and also you would possibly cross by a spot within the sides of the display screen. Why there aren’t partitions and ceilings all through the extent is past us. It definitely wouldn’t have made the sport any much less enjoyable.
There’s a continuing leap (fling?) of religion at play, too. You’ll be able to hardly ever see the place you’re firing: the degrees are too huge for that, and your trajectory can take you effectively offscreen. So, very immediately, you could be mendacity in a mattress of traps, or discovering your self offscreen. You’ll be able to’t survey the complete area, so it’s only a guessing sport. Generally dying, different instances a combo of enemy ninjas. It’s fairly the Russian roulette.
To finish the buffet of naffness, the target of killing all the pieces can also be on the garbage facet. You could be merrily transferring by the extent, killing everybody, solely to search out that you’ve got one or two enemies left. They’re approach again firstly of the extent, however you’ve solely obtained a couple of strikes left. You’ll be able to guess what occurs: it’s a restart or a proceed. One thing comparable occurs once you kill these final two stragglers. The portal can be on the opposite finish of the sector, however you received’t have sufficient strikes to get there. We are able to really feel our blood boiling over again.
Very, very hardly ever, the planets align and Shukuchi Ninja flings itself someplace near enjoyment. Whenever you pull off a killer shot that combos a number of enemies, with ‘Unbelievable!’ plastered over the display screen, it will possibly really feel reasonably good. Shukuchi Ninja can also be authentic, and positively not what we anticipated from the title.
However these are footnotes to the frustration. Shukuchi Ninja isn’t anyplace close to pretty much as good because the video games it’s closest to – specifically Celebration Golf and Offended Birds. As a substitute, it’s all the pieces {that a} ninja isn’t. It’s clumsy, awkward, and extra prone to damage you than the enemies you’re aiming for.
