Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound

[Dani.]

Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound celebrates a return to the series' roots. While the series' traditional hero, Ryu Hayabusa, is traveling in the USA to save the world from certain destruction, his ninja clan is attacked by demons.

From Shinobi Apprentice to World Savior​

The game begins with a story-integrated tutorial under the thumb of Ryu Hayabusa , who sends Kenji through an obstacle course in the dojo to test his ninja skills. You learn how to use the sword, climb walls and ceilings, the sword-twirling double jump, and the dive for low passages.

If Kenji kills a colored enemy, he charges the super punch that sweeps away even armored enemies.
Alternatively, Kenji can sacrifice a small portion of his health to unleash the charge.

Between levels, we can spend our collected beetles in the shop... for example, on a modifier that triples the damage taken.

A crazy alliance?​

Hayabusa and the Spider Clan are indeed sworn enemies, and this encounter would normally result in a duel. However, out of necessity, the two join forces spiritually, born in the titular Rage Alliance, to combine their abilities and defeat evil. In the context of the game, this means that Kenji, who has so far only been skilled in sword fighting, can add not only shurikens to his arsenal, but also magical abilities, which he desperately needs during his adventure.

Once Kenji's rage is fully charged by defeating enemies, we can cast powerful ninja magic.

Excursions into the spirit world​

The ultimate hope: an overpowered ninja magic that blasts away everything on the screen and deals significant damage to boss enemies. To maintain spiritual form, we must look for blue energy symbols – and some of them are so far apart that we can't afford to make any mistakes along the way.

At demonic altars, we can switch from Kenji to Kumori to remove obstacles via alternative paths.

Kumori's energy is constantly decreasing, so we need to keep an eye out for boosters while searching for switches.

A ninja jump in the spirit of the forefathers​

If you keep your eyes open, you'll repeatedly stumble across glowing beetles, skulls, or the occasional scroll in the most unlikely places. These can be used, for example, to buy skills and modifiers in the shop between levels, which you place in two slots . This way, you can replenish your energy upon reaching a shrine, for example. This is helpful.

Such automatically scrolling driving sequences are more reminiscent of Shinobi 3 than Ninja Gaiden, but they do provide some variety.

My Conclusion​

Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound is undoubtedly a pretty tough task. But anyone who gets into it is guaranteed to love the game and its mechanics. What's more, it looks simply magnificent with its 2D visuals and the highly diverse environments, ranging from temples and caves to urban construction sites and even a warship. I actually thought I'd be oversaturated by publishers' constant attempts to bring back the good old days with 2D pixel art games and offers a nice retro experience.

 

[RanmyakuIchi's icon RanmyakuIchi RanmyakuIchi]

Probably one of the best 2D Action games I've played in a good while. It's good to see NG coming back strong.

 

[Samatonic Samatonic]

@Dany28 get a look at the new Bubsy 4D. HE'S BACK BABY! Also a favorite game of mine, nice to see it still getting the attention. Wish other retros got the same attention.