Time to review another video game, this time, it will be...

Ninja Gaiden!


How to play: You play as a ninja named Ryu (not the Street Fighter Ryu character) who is bound to find out who somehow killed his dad. Ryu, the ninja gets very mad and sets out to find out who did it, who would it be? You get 3 lives, there isn't a possible to way to find a 1-up unless you are lucky enough to find some very hidden 1-up places. When you lose all of your lives, it is Game Over, and to continue, you just have to press the start button. I am not kidding, it is just like Astanyax on the NES, it is the same thing, you press the start button on the game over screen. Every time you lose a life, you lose half of your ammo that you had, and your weapon you had goes "Bye bye". If you Game Over, you lose ALL of your ammo. You can get many weapons and powerups that can help you on your quest. You have infinite continues, but there is NO stage select code, not even Game Genie has a helpful code, or a password system. Unfortuantly, there is a password system, but only on the japanese version of the game. NINTENDO OF AMERICA, what have you done to the difficulty!?

Graphics - 8
It is average for the NES, but then they add 2.5D (?) floors and walls, you can only move 2D, so what was the point of putting in 2.5D floors and walls? I don't know, you will have to find out. What was so surprising was the cutscenes, this was probably the first ever video game to have cutscenes. Anyways, the graphics are rated as a 8.

Sounds - 7
Nintendo tried as good as they could with the sounds due to the NES having like OVER 9000 limits on everything in the system. But alas, some music is good, although the NES had a lot of limits, it was nice to hear music that seemed good. I rate the sounds a 7.

Addictiveness - 6
You will find this game annoying due to it's difficulty, but you might end up getting to the point where you probably will never play the game again. So I give the addictiveness a 6.

Story - 6
The story seemed kind of nice, it says that Ryu, the ninja finds out that his dad had died from a unknown solution, it is up to the ninja to help track down who tried to and killed his dad. Seemed kind of nice. Ninjas are crazy mad, which fits with the story. I give the story a 6.

Depth - 7 (this part contains roman numbers)
Counting every possible stage shown here, I will check how many sections there in total, act I has 2 sections, Act II has 3 sections, Act III, IV, and V have maybe 4 sections, and then Act VII has 5 sections, so that is around 22 sections counting every boss. Also, there are 6 Acts! Wow! I give the depth a 7.

Difficulty - 10
I finally get to talk about the difficulty! What makes the game nearly impossible to beat? Well, I will explain every reason that "I" know of:

• Tough pits, there are a lot when you get to Act II and higher, but that is one reason.

• Getting knocked back, that I'd exactly like every castlevania game, every time you get hit, you fly back, so if you are near a pit and it happens, depending on either what side the opponent hits you in, or where you face before you get hit, you can end up flying back into a pit, that is reason 2.

• Insane levels / portions, thank god there is individual sections, so if you would Game Over like on the second section of the act, you will restart on section 2 of the act that you played. Reason 3.

• Reason #4, hard bosses. Each boss has a random pattern, but the patterns take so long to get used to and you won't know what attack that the boss does.

• The 5th and final reason, control. If you try to move the opposite direction that you are facing when you are jumping, you go backwards slowly, maybe slower than the Slowpoke pokemon, I don't know.



Overall - 5
I will let this game off the hook, but it is really hard, although the game has good sounds and music, everything else is maybe "downhill". If you ever find this game, play at your OWN risk! If you play this game, you may start going into a possible rage / ragequit.

That wraps up this review of Ninja Gaiden I on the NES. Thanks for reading this review, and I hope you stay tuned for future game reviews from yours truly, the "Stevie 764".

    I think this game is deserving of at least an 8. But i agree that this game is hard as hell. Over all i thing this was a good review.

Cjjjj : Yeah, I have gotten all the way to Stage 5-3 where I couldn't even get to the boss. WAY too many projectiles on the screen at once!

It is true that this game was hard. It was also annoying because the enemies reappear after you kill them. This is a good review

I played this game a long time ago when I was like 5 years old.

I don't know why I didn't posted here before...

However, awesome review!
I never played this game, but, I felt some curiosity about it... Of course, because of the difficulty. I must give it a try.

Let's see If I manage to play it some day... 

Stevie 764 : YOU ARE A PIKACHU HATER!!! :'(    LOL jk.

Seriously, your review is very long, and has a lot of things to read, is very interesting. I like your review! Thanks again!

Ninja Gaiden is one of the toughest games I've played that isn't a hack. Yeah, its not the toughest, but its pretty good. Fun. Gives you a challenge.

Yes Ninja Gaiden was always a hard game for me. I haven't played for this system, but it was always difficult for me when I played it on an Xbox (hack) or any other console/ system.

Very detailed review, you definetly went over all of Ninja Gaiden's (HAI!) aspects in great detail. I hope to see more of these top quality reviews out of you in the Future, Steve!