Ninja Gaiden [NES] + R2RKMF: Scrolling Action Monogatari

Anything from run & guns to modern RPGs, what else do you play?
Bassa-Bassa
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Bassa-Bassa »

Those complaining about the PC engine remake of Ryukenden please don't click here:

https://videogame-stage-remaker.itch.io ... age-remake
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BIL
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BIL »

I don't begrudge fan remakes like that, tbh. Looks weaksauce compared to the real thing - although NG1's first stage is unremarkable, difficulty-wise, it demonstrates plenty of quality via the infamously noob-confounding Boxers and aggressively pincering dogs... the former look nerfed here, and the latter seem AWOL. Movement looks sluggish compared to the original's razor-sharp handling, too. But it's a fan tribute (in an all-purpose engine, if I understand correctly?). The darker, slummier take on the setting looks neat, at least.

If the PCE version was a doujin of some sort I'd be more forgiving. As a professional production it's one of the most glaring examples of a remake missing everything that made the original notable.

Granted, even Tecmo themselves had a hard time following NG1 up. NG2's tiny swordbox was a mistake, and NG3 arguably sidesteps the first two games' high-velocity twitch/method with slower, more calculating action, nearer NG's inspiration Castlevania. Those games contributed tons of quality in their own right, though (NGII's screen-raking firepower and smoothed-out wallclimbing, NGIII's bridging of the first game's spartan intensity with the second's bigger guns and friendlier climbing). PCE's just a waste of time, other than as a curio.
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BrianC
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BrianC »

Ninja Ryukenden GB actually got a lot right that the PCE and GG Ninja Gaiden got wrong, despite being a retooling of a Kage/Shadow of the Ninja related game. Even made good use of music from both NG and Shadow of the Ninja.

SNES NG makes me sad. I wanted to like it since it got the gameplay right in ways the PCE got it wrong, but the terrible remixes of the music and badly "updated" graphics make me want to stay away.
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Bassa-Bassa »

With a fan tribute, I'd indeed expect the fan to really understand at least what he's paying tribute. Otherwise, not much of a fan, nor a tribute.

I wonder how the PCE game would be seen if it weren't called Ninja Ryukenden and had the Tecmo license. And then, there's the Master System version too.
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Herr Schatten
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Herr Schatten »

Bassa-Bassa wrote:And then, there's the Master System version too.
To be fair, it makes little sense to group this one with the NES/SNES/PCE games, as the only things it shares with them are the title and the player sprite, making it some kind of Ninja Gaiden Gaiden.

It's actually a pretty nice, slightly easy ninja-themed platformer in its own right, but the emphasis is clearly on platforming rather than running right killing motherfuckers, and it's obvious that none of the original creators were involved. Still, the production values are high (that forest in the first stage is just gorgeous) and the game does have its merits, even though I feel that everything it tries to achieve, the GG Shinobis achieve much better.

Speaking of the GG. I think that it also got its own "NG" that‘s unlike any other game that bears the same name (including the SMS one). Anyone familiar with it? Is it worth playing? Now that I've got that GG adaptor fir my Mega SG I'm always on the lookout for stuff to play beyond Popils.
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CIT
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by CIT »

I picked up GG Ninja Gaiden as kid to get my ninja fix after finishing and loving both GG Shinobis. I was rather disappointed, as it's extremely short and easy and I cleared it on the first try. This confused the hell out of me, as it was the first Ninja Gaiden I'd ever played, but I had heard about how difficult the NES games were supposed to be. I naturally drew the conclusion that I'm just a natural born expert player. 8)
Anyway, it's still pretty fun for the 20 minutes or so it lasts, and kind of an interesting take on the formula, with the huge character sprite and goofy cutscenes that look more like something from Ninja Cop Saizou/Wrath of the Black Manta.

As for SMS Ninja Gaiden I wrote down my thoughts here.
Overall I think it's legit. It basically uses the NGIII controls and has a huge-ass sword hitbox which is super nice, and there's a cool wall jump that you get to use a lot. I'd agree that platforming plays a more important role here. Ninpo becomes infinite once maxed out and I'm not sure if that's a bug or a feature, but it does reduce the challenge. Stylistically it's kind of all over the place, I definitely feel the Famicom games have a more unified artistic vision.
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BIL »

Bassa-Bassa wrote:With a fan tribute, I'd indeed expect the fan to really understand at least what he's paying tribute. Otherwise, not much of a fan, nor a tribute.
There's different kinds of fan, though. Plenty of gamers love their Contra, Castlevania and Ninja Gaiden, even if they aren't particularly skilled or insightful at them. Maybe they enjoy the heroic aesthetic, the stern difficulty (relative to most modern games), and the immediacy of hardcore 2D action. Nostalgia inevitably has some influence, too, for those who grew up with them. These are the fans I'd expect to produce an affectionate, but not especially great tribute. The one linked above has some lovingly-rendered urban decay, and some very 80s gore, but it doesn't seem to capture Tecmo's airtight mechanics.

Diehards, who not only love the game but also challenge it, refining their skill to breakneck 1LC standard, will almost certainly produce better. Even if they don't consciously appreciate why the game works, they'll at least know how it does. It's like an amateur covers band, who celebrate their favourite music RAWKIN' down the pub, VS world-class professionals who produce tribute albums and concerts for those same beloved musicians. They're all fans, ultimately.

In gaming terms, I could easily see a team made up of both camps producing something brilliant - but since games are interactive, unlike music, the mechanics are critical. If PCE NG played exactly like the FC game, or better, with less appealing aesthetics, I'd have little to criticise. I don't think the PCE staff knew how or why NG works. At any rate, it's a professional production - I expect a mechanically accurate conversion, at the very least. Its best purpose is perhaps raising awareness of the series, and hopefully attracting players to the FC (those who aren't turned off by the PCE game, at least :mrgreen:).
I wonder how the PCE game would be seen if it weren't called Ninja Ryukenden and had the Tecmo license. And then, there's the Master System version too.
If you changed the name while leaving everything else intact, wouldn't it just be the same mediocre game? Even if it were sprite-swapped ala Kunio/Renegade, no diehard fan of the FC game would enjoy the massively downgraded enemies and sword mechanic.

As Brian mentioned, Tecmo published Natsume's well-liked Ninja Ryukenden GB, which is clearly Kage II starring Ryu Hayabusa - the name on the box is neither here nor there, if you ask me. :wink:
BrianC wrote:SNES NG makes me sad. I wanted to like it since it got the gameplay right in ways the PCE got it wrong, but the terrible remixes of the music and badly "updated" graphics make me want to stay away.
One of the most unique games in my library - I have to mute it while playing. Image I can just about stomach the drab graphics, but the anemic OST is flat-out depressing. Its hybrid NGIII (NES level layouts, JP damage scale) is arguably the best-balanced version of the game, though at Pyrrhic cost. Vivid late-gen artistry, meet MSpaint and Babby's First MIDI Keyboard. Image
Herr Schatten wrote:running right killing motherfuckers
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CIT wrote:This confused the hell out of me, as it was the first Ninja Gaiden I'd ever played, but I had heard about how difficult the NES games were supposed to be. I naturally drew the conclusion that I'm just a natural born expert player. 8)
:lol:
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by cj iwakura »

Finished PCE NG last night.

Unlikely I'd ever want to play it again, but I'd be lying if I said it didn't have some nice touches.

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heli wrote:Why is milestone director in prison ?, are his game to difficult ?
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BIL
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BIL »

Congrats! It's not at all easy, from what I recall, especially with the stilted sword mechanics. I got bummed by the Boss Rush Knockback™ at least once, and felt a fleeting kinship with not only dear ol' Edmond but also my ten year-old self. Image

I wonder if those faces of torment to either side of Jaquio's cloak were deliberate? I see things a lot. :oops: Nice turbo lazor eyes on the right-hand one. :lol:
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by cj iwakura »

BIL wrote:Congrats! It's not at all easy, from what I recall, especially with the stilted sword mechanics. I got bummed by the Boss Rush Knockback™ at least once, and felt a fleeting kinship with not only dear ol' Edmond but also my ten year-old self. Image

I wonder if those faces of torment to either side of Jaquio's cloak were deliberate? I see things a lot. :oops: Nice turbo lazor eyes on the right-hand one. :lol:
I noticed that too.

I'm morbidly curious how they'd do NG2(my favorite, especially Ashtar), but I'd rather they not ruin perfection.

Jaquio always looked especially evil in 2:
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heli wrote:Why is milestone director in prison ?, are his game to difficult ?
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kitten
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by kitten »

i've actually been stepping out of my ANIMAL CROSSING CAVE occasionally, lately! god damn that game has me hooked :[ but i've been streaming here and there and playing a few things in-between.

i've got runs uploaded for 5 games i've not yet posted on here, still need to write up descriptions. jumpin' kid (fc), cocoron (fc - i'll probably just link my old article again), ganbare! daiku no gen-san (sfc), mystic formula (pce cd), and metal stoker (pce).

i managed to get a clear on metal stoker's "HARD" mode, which was surprisingly no easy task once i felt myself resting on the laurels of a normal clear. it tacked about ten to fifteen entire minutes onto the roughly 45m long normal mode, which is in part to both needing more careful & planned shooting and also just general increase of enemy resilience. there's also a "MASTER" mode (both in a hidden options screen i discovered while searching this forum - thanks younger BIL!), but enemy HP gets so beefed in it that despite definitely being a heftier challenge in how much faster stuff fires, it becomes outright tedious.

it's a pretty good game! not without its problems, but i wouldn't have expected quality like this from the team that did cross wiber, a game i think no one cares i cleared but spent quite a few agonizing days on going for the nomiss. obviously comparable to granada, was also reminded of the firemen (again, beaten to the punch by BIL, here, in that comparison - though i did come to it before searching things up, honest! lol). my hard mode clear is actually going to be my *very first* attempt at the difficulty. while there's places i think i could mop up to get more efficient or better routed (the fourth weapon's bomb is completely ridiculous and could be way more optimally used, the third weapon is seemingly good but i only ever really use it for a few seconds, i don't even know what the first weapon's bomb does), i'm still pretty happy with this run and feel it's going to show some honest-to-goodness moron mistakes along with a few genuinely nice recoveries. there's also the unpleasant surprise of not getting to gun power 4 in stage 2 because the spawn got overwritten running from those damn skulls. ach!

the game features a really weird stock increasing mechanic - you take 4 hits before you die, but if you pick up a health canister at full health, you get an extra stock. this sometimes encourages you to just leave a health canister sitting there in the middle of a midboss, since if you get roasted, you basically recover 4 effective points of damage versus a max of 3 (frequently only one or two) prior to the death. on normal difficulty, you wind up getting way too many of these after just one honest go at the game, but hard mode makes them much more difficult to earn and adds this kind of extreme tension to building stock up for the harder, later levels by acing the early ones. i still think this system probably could have been better done, somehow, but despite it being inelegant, it is surprisingly effective.

shooting's tight, but i wish they had included other locking options of some kind. that, or they could have added a little visual indicator for when you're locked or not - there are so many times that i struggled to understand when i was locked and wound up flailing about like a dipshit because there's no way to know without turning, which you sometimes don't want to do unless you're certain you can lock back in the other direction. weird pacing that kinda dips in the middle, some fat that could be cut, but make no mistake, this is a good game. i'd struggle to call it 'essential,' but it's considerably overlooked for what it is.
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Jeneki »

I'd agree Metal Stoker is worth a run. It's one that I play through every couple of years, as it seems to be a good "play again after I forget everything" game. As long as I pay attention and take my time it's not too hard to figure out the enemies and get through.
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CIT
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by CIT »

Finally got the New Zero Team 1cc today after a fair bit of frustration, but Spin-chan and I persevered and sent demonic samurai dude to his rocky grave.
I'm quite proud, because I find most beltscrollers hard as hell and so far I've only been able to clear two others.

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My observations:

- I'll start by saying that I think this game is truly great. It's varied, fast-paced, doesn't outstay its welcome, and the presentation is top-notch, with Seibu Kaihatsu's trademark detailed graphics.

- The game's central conceit, if you will, is that any punch will register as a flurry of punches, so it really feels like you're bitch slapping every enemy. Together with the hefty and loud sound effects this really gives the feeling of being a one-man (or woman) wrecking ball.

- What the game lacks in sprite size it makes up for in on-screen enemies. By the final stage you'll be routing seven or eight dudes into one corner and launching them into the air simultaneously.

- There's a decent amount of moves and in addition to the pre-set combos, there are some moves that chainable into a combo, so it's fun to experiment around with what's possible.

- Another fun aspect to the game is the plethora of junk you can pick up and throw at the hapless schmucks the game send towards you. Similarly plentiful are the bonus items you can pick up along the way.

- The game is definitely manageable and there are some good strats to get around the toughest parts, e.g. bring a bazooka to the stage 5 bosses, and with the final boss, make sure to never floor him, to prevent him from calling his goons to back him up.

- One criticism would be, that there could have been a bit more enemy variety. By stage 2 you've seen all there is on offer.

- Also, apparently Spin has a wall-jump, but I could never figure out how it works.

- Favorite part in the game is the cut-scene where you hop on your jet-ski to ride to the main villain's island. What a great 1993 moment!

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Overall I give this game a 9 out of 10!
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BIL
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BIL »

Nicely done, and a nice writeup too - bookmarked for the index! Game sounds superb, much as I'd expect from Seibu. I know what you mean about beltscrollers, I like the genre but I'm a chronic novice at it.
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by brokenhalo »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7u1tVD7UEqw

Just figured you guys would like this if you haven't seen it already. A nice history of the WR progression for Ninja Gaiden speedruns.
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Stevens »

I think I might be getting my copy of TNWOA back today. Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeet!
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by M.Knight »

Man, that was a cool video. I am not sure about Ninja Gaiden being the hardest NES game but it sure is a challenging one, and seeing all the risky strats necessary for the speedrun was pretty fascinating.
It's also interesting how in the end it was just the efforts of one single guy, rather than a small group of players motivated by competition as it's often the case.

After watching the video, I had to get back to the game. On one credit I've been able to go up to 5-2, and up to 6-2 with credit feeding. Thanks to the video I also got a better understanding of the jump+slash technique. I thought it was like Kid Icarus where you alternate down and slash mid-air, but here you actually press both simultaneously.

Ninja Gaiden is a pretty neat game, very fast and promoting aggressiveness most of the time, I like that. But there are still a few things I am not fond of. Nothing game-breaking but just little nitpicks in the level-design and stuff :
-The bats spawning at the exact location that nearly ensure you hitting them mid air and being knocked in a pit. It's not very difficult when you know what jumps are booby-trapped like this, it's just silly and too obvious. The first time you die, and then you memorize it so the next time you wait a second or two to make them spawn and move closer before you can jump. It's weird because you are usually encouraged to play fast and effectively but here the safest strat' is to wait. You can possibly jump slash I suppose but my aim is still very unreliable so it's not worth it given how massive the penalty is. Birds that pass by you if you keep moving and machine gun guys that become really dangerous if you let them live long enough to fire their volleys are better examples of hard but fun obstacles IMO. The bats are boring.
-The one cheetah in Stage 5-3 that spawns at the exact timing to knock you over the pit after you land. So you have to land very close to the edge to have enough time to jump again. Not hard, just annoying memo.
-The 5-2 section where you have to climb down a wall. It's just janky. I haven't mastered the alternate technique where I think you jump over the right side wall instead but I'll probably have to in order to avoid this weird downwards jump entirely.
-5-4 fight is a dumb damage race where the boss regularly throws a seemingly undodgeable projectile. Thankfully it's not too bad once you know not to care about the dodging but compared to earlier bosses it doesn't feel as intelligently designed.
-Auto grabbing walls is annoying, especially if it's due to enemy knockback (except the one time it saves you from dying I guess :mrgreen: ). This is one aspect where the console's button limitations kinda show. Maybe a specific button to toggle wall grabbing or not would have been better.
-The perspective in the platforms' sprites make it trickier to see where the edges actually are, and some otherwise simple jumps are easy to fuck up when not purposefully jumping at the last moment, such as the last jump in the "moving right" part of 2-1
-No way to slash in the air without spinning if you have said spin item AFAIK
-Dying when jumping down a screen instead of going to the same exact screen with the ladder. No big issue since you just learn it but very inconsistent.

I also came across this behavior once when playing. Is this a well known bug? Instead of dying I went through the pit and came back on top Bubble Bobble-style.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrGBVv06Ki4

Anyway, I hope to be able to 1CC it sometime in the future, but with no extends it's not going to be easy at all! The final stages look like they are loaded with traps everywhere too.
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BIL
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BIL »

M.Knight wrote:-The bats spawning at the exact location that nearly ensure you hitting them mid air and being knocked in a pit. It's not very difficult when you know what jumps are booby-trapped like this, it's just silly and too obvious. The first time you die, and then you memorize it so the next time you wait a second or two to make them spawn and move closer before you can jump. It's weird because you are usually encouraged to play fast and effectively but here the safest strat' is to wait.
In all but one instance of this, the bat will spawn as you approach the pit. If you're expecting them, you can indeed keep going and jump straight over them, with one exception in 5-1 where you need to wait. What you can't do is approach the pit, spawning the bat, then pause and jump - you'll land on the bat and die.

Basically, if you've no idea what's on the other side of a pit, approach it and wait. If you know, jump straight over. It's not a booby trap, per se. Here's the 5-1 example where you need to wait.

Spoiler
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And here's the aforementioned one bat who spawns after you've taken a jump, but as with that 5-3 leopard, it's timed so you can land and kill it. Just incredibly dickishly. :wink: You can technically spawn him by jumping and pulling back, as shown, but it's still dickish AF. The last two stages, the last especially, are full of borderline cheap shots that a new player can quite possibly survive, but almost certainly won't see coming.

Spoiler
Image

-No way to slash in the air without spinning if you have said spin item AFAIK
Hold [down] on the pad while slashing - this'll cancel the JS. Just like when hitting [up] for projectile subweapons, diagonals won't suffice - this means you can't jump forward while JS cancelling. I suspect this was a deliberate handicap, since otherwise the JS would blow away the other subweapons even more than it already does.

Interestingly, the subweapon input is a rare instance of NG handling more strictly than its template Castlevania.
-Dying when jumping down a screen instead of going to the same exact screen with the ladder. No big issue since you just learn it but very inconsistent.
You mean like the first ladder in 2-2? Just walk straight off the ledge onto it, you'll grab it every time. That's the only instance of climbing downward I can think of in the game.
I also came across this behavior once when playing. Is this a well known bug? Instead of dying I went through the pit and came back on top Bubble Bobble-style.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrGBVv06Ki4
Haha, yeah. That one's been mentioned a few times over the years, though I can't recall the last time I had it happen to me.
Anyway, I hope to be able to 1CC it sometime in the future, but with no extends it's not going to be easy at all! The final stages look like they are loaded with traps everywhere too.
Just in case you don't know, there actually are 1UP items - one apiece in 4-1 & 4-2, and another in 5-3. Maybe more, I never checked. :mrgreen:
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by M.Knight »

Thanks for the tips!

Yeah for bats I tend to do like you show in the first .gif, waiting just enough for them to be desynced with my own jumping path and then jump safely. Killing them just makes another one instantly respawn so it's sorta pointless. For the 6-2 bat I jump and retreat to spawn it and be able to jump over it, but on one occasion I've been able to air slash it too. I simply have some consistency issues in getting the timings correctly for all the air slashes even if they are cool to pull off.

The ladder I was referring to is indeed in 2-2. I wasn't sure if they weren't any other like that later on, but at least this one had me dying there a few times when I was first learning that stage. I tend to jump on the left platform and then again on the ladder, but I'll have to try your technique. It's not hard either way, but it just kinda goes against the "go fast" mentality when jumping/falling straight through the bottom of the screen to get to the next part is punished while slowly climbing down the ladder is a-okay.

Wait, there are actually some 1UPs in this game? Neat! I'll go on StrategyWiki to check and memorize their locations like I did for Nazo no Murasame-jo's items. Knowledge is power! 8)
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Leandro »

CIT wrote:Finally got the New Zero Team 1cc today after a fair bit of frustration, but Spin-chan and I persevered and sent demonic samurai dude to his rocky grave.
I'm quite proud, because I find most beltscrollers hard as hell and so far I've only been able to clear two others.

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That seems like a cool game, congrats on the 1cc. I would also select the chick, I like her outfit a lot, she has nice skin.

I never played any Ninja Gaiden but I'm currently playing Nioh, which I presume is NG grandchild. The game just never ends, I'm exhausted lol.
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Ed Oscuro »

Man, having some difficulty finding games that click.

Bloodstained (PC) - I hate the wonky interface but the game has its moments. Not so keen on the boss fights, though.

Adventure Island 2 - ehh, seems a bit unfocused compared to the series origins

Rocky Rodent / Nitropunks - will have to give it a try soon.

Actraiser: a big lol and boo at Yuzo for the credits and other obvious music "borrowings." Dude is the Bobby Prince of Japan but with less shame. Game seems unbalanced and the ending stages are buh whoh :/ Was fun to experience it again, though. I'm hoping for better things from the sequel...

Nosferatu by Seta: Now here's an interesting game straight out of development hell. Slickest presentation on the SNES for a horror-style game, but the actual game is a watered-down Prince of Persia with melee only?! Boo! Seta is the poor company that always seemed to have fifty things going on in every game, some of them brilliant, nothing ever tied together properly (or at least only rarely so).

Kendo Rage: Hmm.
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I don't see what's so wrong with it? 3D rendering goodness and more A-Team references than the original game!
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BIL »

Ed Oscuro wrote:Actraiser: a big lol and boo at Yuzo for the credits and other obvious music "borrowings." Dude is the Bobby Prince of Japan but with less shame. Game seems unbalanced and the ending stages are buh whoh :/ Was fun to experience it again, though. I'm hoping for better things from the sequel...
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ARII is excellent, imo, and very different from AR1's rough simplicity - it's one of those hyper-idiosyncratic 2010 Street Fighter/Alien Soldier cases. Powerful but decidedly unorthodox character, who gets into trouble fast if you don't learn to exploit his quirks. In ARII's case, the jump attacks' i-frames are vital. You can get a decent idea of how critical they are in PJ Dicesare's superbly-commentated live speedrun, here:

All About ARII i-frames

As PJ notes, learned ARII play and its precision i-framing will have the noobs saying FALSIFICARE / "MUH UNCLE SED U B CHEATIN," guaranteed! Image

The doublejump dive sword is, despite its extravagant looks, actually a precision poke you can bust out in a snap, nailing the target with the edge before pulling away to safe ground. It also cancels the "skidding stop" of a normal landing, meaning it's great for precision platforming, too. Slam the sword into even the tiniest foothold and you'll nail the landing every time. The regular downstrike is your ticket for getting in close (straight through zako/projectiles) and nailing large enemies with a fatal sword flurry (enemies freeze up and lose their hurtboxes while in hitflash).

Quality game with necessary caveats, being fairly odd.

I cannot give up (but nor can I revisit) Nosferatu just yet, simply for that rad inter-stage scene where the camera pans across an elegantly ruined courtyard, to a torchlit pavilion, where a malevolently grinning ghoul beckons the player on. That's the kinda mood I wish Dracula IV had gone for, instead of ditching the overgrown outskirts of Dracula's estate for ROTATION STATION.

Also that Game Over pic, oh hell yeah digitised niceness! Wait, fuck, I gotta boot up my ATTRACT MODE thread. :o
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Ed Oscuro
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Ed Oscuro »

There's a fun post at rateyourmusic alleging that Yuzo also was "insipid by" Conan the Barbarian and Star Wars soundtracks. Oh well.

Yeah I keep meaning to get to ARII, it's gonna brutalize me for sure (:

ALSO: This new thing could be a bit good, maybe. Coming soon to Steam as well, not sure of any differences:

https://www.epicgames.com/store/en-US/p ... tdown/home
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BIL
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BIL »

Ed Oscuro wrote:ALSO: This new thing could be a bit good, maybe. Coming soon to Steam as well, not sure of any differences:

https://www.epicgames.com/store/en-US/p ... tdown/home
Looks cool. :o I was thinking Blackthorne from the earlier cuts, but in motion it reminds me of Elevator Action Returns' mildly cinematic but categorically fast-paced "dollhouse-view" carnage.

Seems from vague memory (I'm bad at keeping up with newer stuff, currently battling perilously circa 1986) like there's a good half-dozen pretty upcoming sidescrollers with avowed oldschool stylings ITT. Cyber Shadow, and... nope, goddamn, brain's conking out. They're in here though!
Last edited by BIL on Tue May 19, 2020 2:50 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Ed Oscuro
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Ed Oscuro »

Blackthorne / PoP / Nosferatu sound so good in theory, but then I remember that you can't cancel any animations. :idea:
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BIL
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BIL »

Yeah, and POP has that blasted flipscreening making certain stages (at least late in the SFC version) total trial/error memorisers. Why sure, I'll take a running jump over this gap into the next OH FUUUUUU (this would be the end, typically, but POP will of course flipscreen Princey all the way down several stories, to his Ragu-spewing demise on cold stone and/or sharp spikes! unless you're playing one of the versions where he just kinda peaces out, like SFC!)

I'll get you next time, game! What? Why sure, I'll take a standing leap into the next OH FUUUUUU

There's a game I'd happily remake with EAR-cam while chortling at the purists. Show me the whole goddamn stage, or at least a nice practical chunk of it. Actually, throw in (viable) multi-enemy combat too. I don't particularly mind nailing down a route (kinda de rigeur with any tough action game), but outright blindfolding's not nice.
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BrianC »

Just received Namco Museum vol 4 (JP version). Solid lineup of games including Pac-Land, Assault/Plus, and Genpei Tōma Den. Genpei Toma Den seems to have influenced many similar titles. It has a sword slash similar to Getsu Fuuma Den, complete with similar sound effects and map screen similar to the one used in Kenseiden on SMS. The use of multiple perspectives is interesting.

I was curious whether Assault supported the NeGcon, but, as far as I can tell, the answer is sort of. It shows a picture of the controller and uses a different control scheme, but as far as I could tell, has no twist support. However, the control scheme that simulates tank controls on the standard PS1 controller works great.
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by BIL »

Six great discs (including Encore), and Vol.4's probably my favourite for including Assault & Assault Plus. FWIW, they support the old official PS1 Twin Sticks, though I've never tried it myself. The stock pad is surprisingly comfy.
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Bassa-Bassa »

After seeing how they altered Rolling Thunder I've been skeptical about this collection's accuracy.
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Re: Ninja Gaiden [NES] + Scrolling Action Monogatari

Post by Immryr »

that video on arcus speed running ninja gaiden is quite heart warming. i used to watch him on twitch from time to time and his dedication and composure is insane. great to see the moment when he broke that first, unbeatable, world record.
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