I-Ninja

Having accidentally cut off his Sensei's head, I-Ninja is not the most competent of heroes. Yet, in this platform adventure he must fight the massed ranks of Ranx henchmen and return the Rage Stones. But is this diminutive martial artist up to the task? Read on...

The console platform game market is one that, while tried and true, is also a vicious, competitive field, sown with the fallen corpses of many a failed marketing ploy and poorly implemented mascot. This is not an army of underdogs and heroes, but one of catchphrase-spewing walking billboards, manufactured and socially awkward. Regardless, everyone's got a favourite. And in my own way, I too, found a small section of my cold, dark heart that had love for today's study in planned obsolescence, I-Ninja.

The plot of the title is a stunted and rushed one, put forth in the opening of the game, with a basic precept that the armies of O-Dor have kidnapped your Sensei, and you, Ninja, accidentally decapitated him during the rescue attempt while under the influence of a rage stone. This leaves the sensei in a ghostly Yoda form, spewing mismatched catchphrases and sub-par humour. Hilarity ensues. That aside, the player's task is to beat back the hordes of Ranx henchmen, robotic boss goons, retrieve more rage stones, and finally take on the big bad himself. It is this overall path of this process, perhaps, that is I-Ninja's greatest weakness.

That being, the entire game is comprised of five worlds, with three to four levels each. The only thing preventing the player from blasting through the game in a few short hours is that in addition to completing each mission, they must also upgrade their belt and sword by repeat visits to formerly vanquished levels. Belts are upgraded with grades, swords with kill counts, and both with repeated tedium. Any given level can be revisited one or two times after the original mission, with bonus mission goals ranging from collecting ten red coins, killing all enemies, or completing the level within a set time limit.

The only bonus unlocked by achieving all belt grades is the Battle Arena, where the player may duke it out with the various minions from the game. Not especially tantalizing, particularly in light of how difficult it is to attain some of the grades. The aforementioned difficulty, however, is largely induced by the engine and camera perspective, which do not appear to get along very well at certain points in the game. Particularly during precision jumps over bottomless pits of eternal fire and agony, as luck would have it. Overall gameplay doesn't suffer from this affliction, but when you're one coin or five seconds away from beating a secondary mission goal, the frustration can quickly mount up.

Regardless, I-Ninja is rarely stopped, much less slowed, by whatever obstacles lie in his way. In addition to the standard sword, he can also acquire shuriken, explosive darts, and bowling ball like spheres of death. The latter is often used as a gameplay style quite reminiscent of Marble Madness or Monkey Ball. In fact, many of I-Ninja's tricks seem to pay homage to different gameplay styles of various popular games, with wall-running, rail-sliding, half-pipes and handplants. Additionally, the player can launch remote-control explosives from a missile's-eye-view, swing from hooks in the ceiling or on speed ramps, and slow their decent by whirling a sword overhead like a helicopter blade. To further complement, this arsenal of moves and instruments of death, over the course of collecting the rage stones, Ninja acquires certain power-ups, which are charged by slaughtering enemies or hacking up terrain. These are Berserker, which allows the player to dish out enhanced damage, Revive, which heals a good chunk of health, Shuriken, which has Ninja skating about on a half-ton ninja star, and I-Ninja. The latter is the ultimate power-up, damage-wise, causing even the toughest enemies to explode in a shower of greenish gore once Ninja is within ten feet of them.

Graphics are colourful and cartoony, and the jokes are either puns or juvenile at best, presenting a somewhat youth-orientated package to the player. However, the aforementioned showers of green blood, decapitations, and cleaving of enemies from brow to buttocks shows the other side of the game's personality, though even at its most gore-soaked display, the game would likely not be considered inappropriate by any but the most conservative soccer mom. Music and sounds are reasonably well done, though somewhat unremarkable, and with Ninja spewing a catchphrase every few moments, these quickly become repetitive.

I-Ninja seems to be one of those platformers that fits the definition of the term a little too well for its own good. It's enjoyable but short, easy to learn but difficult to master, with a character who isn't quite compelling enough for the title to stand out in a genre that has too long been crowded and cutthroat. Overall, the game well deserves a shot by most any platform enthusiast, but with little to no replay value and not quite enough length, slapping down the cash for a full-blown purchase may be farther than most are willing to go.