Ninja Gaiden 2

[bishopcruz]

According to 1up.com Microsoft has just announced that they will be publishing Ninja Gaiden 2, which pretty much makes the game a 360 exclusive. I released a few shots in the TGS thread, as the game is set to be revealed at MS's pre-TGS conference tonight. I have some newer screens put up on this 1up.com preview.

 

 

More as I find it. This game is looking like it is going to kick all kinds of ass!!

[Maldron]

I played most of NG2's first chapter on a SDTV before horror movie night started the other day. And really, it was the same fucking game, played the same fucking way, in new places. I'm somewhat disturbed by the fact that there are TWO divine staffs bearing the name "lunar" in this world of his.

 

But seriously, all the stuff that worked in the first game was working in the second. The camera was still being a little bitch, the moves were full of flash and not much else, but the guts, the guts was fucking awesome. My friend took off somebody's entire upper body with the Lunar staff. Not through slicing, but by stabbing. And it was kickass to watch.

 

But seriously... I hate Itagaki. He runs his mouth and delivers a difficult game with a number of flaws in execution. I don't ever see him taking a number two position to anybody after filling his ego so much, and I feel he'd bring the same lack of polish to any other game he works on. So... no. No to him joining Platinum Games. I want Bayonetta to not be made by him whatsoever.

[Newtype]

I played most of NG2's first chapter on a SDTV before horror movie night started the other day. And really, it was the same fucking game, played the same fucking way, in new places. I'm somewhat disturbed by the fact that there are TWO divine staffs bearing the name "lunar" in this world of his.

 

But seriously, all the stuff that worked in the first game was working in the second. The camera was still being a little bitch, the moves were full of flash and not much else, but the guts, the guts was fucking awesome. My friend took off somebody's entire upper body with the Lunar staff. Not through slicing, but by stabbing. And it was kickass to watch.

 

But seriously... I hate Itagaki. He runs his mouth and delivers a difficult game with a number of flaws in execution. I don't ever see him taking a number two position to anybody after filling his ego so much, and I feel he'd bring the same lack of polish to any other game he works on. So... no. No to him joining Platinum Games. I want Bayonetta to not be made by him whatsoever.

 

I agree with everything you said.

[The NZA]

on a related note, when are we getting the NG2 demo over here again? i keep hearing its on other regions.

[bishopcruz]

Well, the game is finally out, and seriously, if you like action games AT ALL, you need to at least give this one a try. Holy CRAP is it ever awesome, the combat is actually better than part 1!!!!!!!

 

I've gone through up to act 10 in Path of the Warrior (Hard Mode), and it is amazing, I definitely did not expect the game to increase the number of enemies you fight simultaneously by this much. It makes you feel like even MORE of a badass when you clear a room of like 20 spider ninja. Incredible!

 

Also watched Gunsmith play through a bit of Path of the Acolyte (Normal) and it does a great job of easing you into the game (much better than the first one did), and while it still makes you learn the mechanics, it throws easier enemies, and in smaller numbers at you. I love how the game is actually different at diferent difficulties.

 

So yeah, a hearty recommendation for this game.

 

Edit:

US Demo is out!!!!!!!!!!

[bishopcruz]

No clue on the demo.

 

As for the other stuff, I'm kinda curious as to what Maldron means with all flash and not much else? In an action game of this type that's pretty much what you would be going for no? I mean DMC, and God of War have NOTHING in the level of combat that is going on here (and I do love those games). Itagaki runs his mouth, true, but a lot of that is pretty much his invented persona (look at him from the DoA days) it's pretty much publicit. OTOH, if Tecmo hasn't paid him what he is due, then he has every right to complain, and sue.

 

It's a shame because I think that his shit talking effects how people view his games. DoA4 is an amazing fighter that gets looked down on, even though it is the only fighter that has done online right so far (VF5 didn't do online as well as it could have) along with being a great fighter. VF is still king in my book, but DoA stands up there with it, along wit SC.

 

Say what you like Itagaki is a damn amazing developer. He's right up there with Kojima, Mikami and the like.

 

But seriously... I hate Itagaki. He runs his mouth and delivers a difficult game with a number of flaws in execution. I don't ever see him taking a number two position to anybody after filling his ego so much, and I feel he'd bring the same lack of polish to any other game he works on. So... no. No to him joining Platinum Games. I want Bayonetta to not be made by him whatsoever.

 

If NG2 was the only game that he had ever made and you were bitching about lack of polis, I could see an argument there. HOWEVER NG1 and NG:Black were two of the most polished games of the last generation, period. DoA4, like the previous games in that series were also incredibly polished, and balanced fighters. In fact outside of the Volleyball games (which are meant to be pretty much time-wasters, low budget fluff, on purpose.) all of his games have been that way. He is a perfectionist.

 

So why did NG2 have the few problems that it did? Like I said before, I think it's likely he let the game go out the door because he KNEW he was leaving and he'd be damned if he let anyone else put their hands on his baby. Looking at his history, that's pretty much the only thing that makes sense.

 

So yeah, I think that Bayonetta could have TONS to gain from him, NG2 for all its flaws is still better than any other action game out there, save NG1.

[Maldron]

I disagree completely with you on your opinion of the first Ninja Gaiden game. The camera is horrendous, and don't you come back to me with that "you can press a button to center it" crap, the camera automatically shifts from where you SET IT as you MOVE, and on boss fights you can't even move it off the boss no matter what. It's practically unforgivable to have a camera as an enemy in any game these days - I've never been as frustrated with a camera in any other game in memory as I have been with Ninja Gaiden. That alone speaks to an unforgivable lack of polish, especially considering nobody bothered to fix it in either Black, Sigma, or the fucking sequel.

 

Seriously. I played Sigma through Master Ninja Mode. I'm ranked 82nd in the world there. I'm holding thirty-somethingth on Normal. I know this game well enough. I know that there are enemies who dodge out of the middle of your combos unless they're launchers, I know how many times you're forced to fight those retarded fucking tanks. His games had a whole lot of a lack of polish, they just chose to be shiny and hoped that it distracted you long enough from the fact that you weren't allowed to play the game through on any terms but theirs. I don't enjoy fighting Alma Awakened when she dodges all but some random choice of my attacks, meaning that I can't dish out damage. I don't like the fact that the time limit for boss fights stopped increasing after Hard Mode meaning you had to use Unlabored Flawlessness in order to kill the bosses within the time limit for maximum karma. I know that if you wanted to survive most fights you hold block and move around, countering then killing then chaining together UTs until the cows come home. I know this is the only way to get points, the only way to survive, and I find it concerning that this lackluster system of combat is garnering praise as being the height of the action genre. It screams lack of polish all over the damn place.

 

Meh. Whatever. I'm getting tired of ranting at this game all the goddamn time.

[Maldron]

I'll go further on the flash thing, as I realize I didn't.

 

I press Y next to a de-armed foe, and I watch Ryu stab him through the heart then dramatically decapitate him. I charge a UT with the dragon sword, and watch twelve strokes of the blade go by too fast to be seen. I do the same on the lunar, and I watch several camera angles go by of me sweeping the area, followed by an explosion of fire.

 

I watch all this happen, in a series of flashes that I'm not controlling, that are in no way difficult to pull off, but my survival hinges on their repetition, so I see them again, and again, and I realize I'm watching more than I'm playing. I call that flash over substance.

[bishopcruz]

I'll go further on the flash thing, as I realize I didn't.

 

I press Y next to a de-armed foe, and I watch Ryu stab him through the heart then dramatically decapitate him. I charge a UT with the dragon sword, and watch twelve strokes of the blade go by too fast to be seen. I do the same on the lunar, and I watch several camera angles go by of me sweeping the area, followed by an explosion of fire.

 

I watch all this happen, in a series of flashes that I'm not controlling, that are in no way difficult to pull off, but my survival hinges on their repetition, so I see them again, and again, and I realize I'm watching more than I'm playing. I call that flash over substance.

 

However those actually aren't the bulk of the mechanics, the UTs ARE important, but they tend to be the periods on a fighting sentence so to speak. Most of the time you are in constant motion blocking attacks, countering, inputting actual combos and the like. I've played through the whole game on Path of the Warrior and I have yet to find an action game with more substance. Seriously.

 

You have 8 weapons that are all considerably different from each other. The enemies are relentless, and if you try to constantly chain UTs you are going to get owned. You need to know how best to use the weapons, against which foes, and constantly strategize over which enemies to take out first, and how best to manage the crowd. NG2 does that better than anyone.

 

Now if you just played the demo, which is automatically set to Path of the Acolyte (Easy/Normal) then it will probably take a little longer to see all of that, but it is there.

[The NZA]

downloading demo tonight, does anyone mind i split this topic into the ninja gaiden 2 thread?

[bishopcruz]

Cool by me.

[Maldron]

However those actually aren't the bulk of the mechanics, the UTs ARE important, but they tend to be the periods on a fighting sentence so to speak. Most of the time you are in constant motion blocking attacks, countering, inputting actual combos and the like. I've played through the whole game on Path of the Warrior and I have yet to find an action game with more substance. Seriously.

 

You have 8 weapons that are all considerably different from each other. The enemies are relentless, and if you try to constantly chain UTs you are going to get owned. You need to know how best to use the weapons, against which foes, and constantly strategize over which enemies to take out first, and how best to manage the crowd. NG2 does that better than anyone.

 

Now if you just played the demo, which is automatically set to Path of the Acolyte (Easy/Normal) then it will probably take a little longer to see all of that, but it is there.

 

I'd hardly call them periods. :/ Once a body was killed, it became the entire story. Block-rolljump-on landing UT - kill for the souls repeat. The first sentence of one person's death becomes a giant run-on sentence for the rest of the enemies. UTs are ESSENTIAL in the normal fights. And my NG1 Master Ninja trumps your NG2 Hard Mode, if you ask me.

 

I didn't play the demo, but I played through most of the first level, never was at risk for dying once. My friend MAY have been a bitch and put it on Acolyte ((considering he started DMC4 with "human," the retarded monkey)), but it was ridiculously easy ((which didn't keep him from dying twice. Thinking back, it probably was on acolyte, considering how quickly he obtained a life of the thousand gods...)). And the same formula of kill an enemy, hold block and roam to position for UTs, repeat, was all I needed to get through it.

 

The different weapons, save for Dabilahro and Unlabored Flawlessness, were never needed by me, for anything. Dragon Sword was usable the entire time. I occasionally used the Dabilahro, mostly for the enemy challenges, sometimes just for fun, but never more than one or two combos of the ten that were listed. All the other weapons in the game: nunckaku, vigoorian flail, Plasma Saber ((omg a sword recolor)), Rachel's Scythe, the Twin Swords, Kitetsu, Lunar, the Dark Dragon Blade ((for the like... two minutes it was usable, but whatever)) - never was used. Most I used them for was dicking around. I think I eventually switched to the twin swords instead of the dragon sword because it looked cooler, but for not much other reason.

 

I really didn't see depth. If I dismember a foe ((which is easy)) I get the ability to kill them instantly ((which is retarded.)) UTs sweep the area and are still the bastions of karma points they were in the first game, so they become the most important thing to do. If the enemies still worm themselves out of combos, air launchers will have to be used to obtain the first kill, same as before. I'd imagine that there's another Alma Awakened type of fight, which you still haven't addressed, that randomly dodges all but a select few of your attacks ((which comes down to luck, not any timing on your part)).

 

Seriously, I will never see deep depth in a game that forces you to fight like Ninja Gaiden does, my options became limited as all hell the further in I got. The system they create doesn't allow you freedom within its confines, it asks you to use something specific to ensure maximum points and maximum survival. And hell, they might've fixed that a bit in Ninja Gaiden 2, from where you're talking about things, and considering some of the achievements it seems like you might keep your weapons for subsequent playthroughs, you'd have to get back to me on that. But still, my opinion of the first Ninja Gaiden won't change. I think it was a decent fighting game, but hardly the "pinnacle of the genre" that people keep touting it to be.

[HypnotizinChikns]

got the demo. it's allright, a lot like the first one from what i can tell.

[bishopcruz]

I'd hardly call them periods. :/ Once a body was killed, it became the entire story. Block-rolljump-on landing UT - kill for the souls repeat. The first sentence of one person's death becomes a giant run-on sentence for the rest of the enemies. UTs are ESSENTIAL in the normal fights. And my NG1 Master Ninja trumps your NG2 Hard Mode, if you ask me.

 

Props on beating the game on Master Ninja, I would have given it more of a shot but in NG1 my saves got corrupted, and in Sigma I had to return it to gamefly. (I refused to buy the same game thrice for full price.) I'm now working on NG2 path of the mentor which from what I am told is between very hard and Master Ninja from part 1. It's fucking brutal.

 

I'm not saying that UTs aren't important, and that in NG1 they could be spammed rather well, but I think calling the game nothing but an endless string of UTs is a gross over-simplification.

 

 

 

I didn't play the demo, but I played through most of the first level, never was at risk for dying once. My friend MAY have been a bitch and put it on Acolyte ((considering he started DMC4 with "human," the retarded monkey)), but it was ridiculously easy ((which didn't keep him from dying twice. Thinking back, it probably was on acolyte, considering how quickly he obtained a life of the thousand gods...)). And the same formula of kill an enemy, hold block and roam to position for UTs, repeat, was all I needed to get through it.

 

LOTGs are a little more common even on Warrior than they were, however healing items as a whole are a little rarer, as well as not as effective (LOTG is the only thing that completly heals you). You can't stock 10 light heals an 5 full heals easily any more. You do heal after each fight, but that is compensated for by the increased number of enemies. Path of the Acolyte is pretty easy for the first couple of levels, and Path of the Warrior is as well, from Chapter 3 on path of the Warrior gets pretty tough at times, and brutal at others.

 

The different weapons, save for Dabilahro and Unlabored Flawlessness, were never needed by me, for anything. Dragon Sword was usable the entire time. I occasionally used the Dabilahro, mostly for the enemy challenges, sometimes just for fun, but never more than one or two combos of the ten that were listed. All the other weapons in the game: nunckaku, vigoorian flail, Plasma Saber ((omg a sword recolor)), Rachel's Scythe, the Twin Swords, Kitetsu, Lunar, the Dark Dragon Blade ((for the like... two minutes it was usable, but whatever)) - never was used. Most I used them for was dicking around. I think I eventually switched to the twin swords instead of the dragon sword because it looked cooler, but for not much other reason.

 

Vig flails were pretty sweet btw, and the Lunar had its strengths as well, but I agree that the weapon variety, while LOADS better than other games in the genre especially at the time wasn't all it could be, the Dragon sword was generally the best. The War Hammer was downright AWFUL.

 

This is greatly remedied in NG2, the weapons feel very different and there is a reason to NOT just use the DS all the time. The Kusuri-gama is badass, as is the scythe, the Lunar gets some more love compared to last game, and even the flails and tonfa are great.

 

I really didn't see depth. If I dismember a foe ((which is easy)) I get the ability to kill them instantly ((which is retarded.)) UTs sweep the area and are still the bastions of karma points they were in the first game, so they become the most important thing to do. If the enemies still worm themselves out of combos, air launchers will have to be used to obtain the first kill, same as before. I'd imagine that there's another Alma Awakened type of fight, which you still haven't addressed, that randomly dodges all but a select few of your attacks ((which comes down to luck, not any timing on your part)).

 

I guess you just don't see it, or aren't wanting to. UTs are good for essence but spamming them isn't the best way to survive, the enemies are relentless, much more so than in part 1. There is a much better balance of offense and defense in the game. The OTs are a great mechanic that is less useful as the game continues, first because as you upgrade the weapons there is a greater chance of killing your foes outright, and secondly because they leave you open as motherfucker, and if you miss with one it can be your ass.

 

 

 

Seriously, I will never see deep depth in a game that forces you to fight like Ninja Gaiden does, my options became limited as all hell the further in I got. The system they create doesn't allow you freedom within its confines, it asks you to use something specific to ensure maximum points and maximum survival. And hell, they might've fixed that a bit in Ninja Gaiden 2, from where you're talking about things, and considering some of the achievements it seems like you might keep your weapons for subsequent playthroughs, you'd have to get back to me on that. But still, my opinion of the first Ninja Gaiden won't change. I think it was a decent fighting game, but hardly the "pinnacle of the genre" that people keep touting it to be.

 

You do keep weapons for subsequent playthroughs, and I cannot disagree with you more on the freedom that the system allows, you have tons and tons of moves with each weapon, far more than any of its competitors, and the combat is fast, fluid and strategic. The enemies set the pace of encounters. It just feels different to me than in say, DMC where, at least as much as I played, the enemies were basically punching bags until I got to a boss.

 

Again, I can't disagree with you more on NG1, it feels like you are seriously oversimplifying the game to a pretty ridiculous degree. It was pretty groundbreaking at the time it was released, predated DMC3 by a year IIRC, and Black refined the game to a sheen.

 

I understand that some people prefer the style and pace of DMC to NG, the why gets to me. But I think that calling NG1 shallow or unpolished is pretty much not being fair to the game in the least.

[Maldron]

Why Nick moved discussion of NG1 to a NG2 thread is a little weird to me. That kid'll never learn, eh? Also, before I get into ranty mode again, I am so, SO very sorry that your saves got corrupted. That is the shittiest thing that can happen to ANY gamer, let alone somebody trying to tackle this game's hardest modes. If it happened to me I'd probably have given up, as I wouldn't want to play through Normal Hard and Very Hard again just for a chance at the top. Only time I ever got a corrupted save was on Guilty Gear X2, and that was right after beating an incredibly hard mission in mission mode. Had to go back and do them all over, get all the character and story endings again. Pissed me the fuck off, and I had nobody to blame but myself on that one. So uncool.

 

It's true I prefer DMC to NG, though admittedly the bosses are the only real threat, and even they aren't that threatening if you're playing right. I've found videos of some of DMC4's bosses being killed on DMD mode in under a minute, which I've more or less been able to emulate myself. Still, I've always felt more freedom in DMC. It's a completely different system than NG, which isn't to say that NG's is bad, I just found it lackluster.

 

My lack of polish argument comes largely from Alma. That fight, more than any other, shows why I think NG could've used work. A boss fight that revolves around knocking the boss down, where the boss dodges your attacks at random. There is no timing of a flying swallow or ninpo you can use to insure a knockdown, there is no way to combo her in the air with basic attacks because she dodges them all and then does that... eating you move. There is absolutely no reason in my mind to have a fight like that with NG's karma system. Masters of the game have had to restart that fight over and over again in order to finish it within the time limit for karma score simply because of the fact that their attacks have been dodged and they missed the right timing. It's ridiculous.

 

Further, it illustrated on higher difficulties the idiocy of removing camera control on boss fights by introducing the allied enemies. Two enemies spawned at particular intervals, somewhere in the room, and you have no choice or option to look for them. The camera could tighten up and focus only on Alma when I had her in a corner, but there were two enemies closing in on me that would combo me until alma could hit me that I couldn't know the positions of because control was removed.

 

It always, ALWAYS felt to me that the bosses in NG were given artificially inflated difficulty. Remove the extra enemies, and they're cake, remove the shitty camera, and they're cake. Their patterns were always incredibly easy to follow and exploit as long as you had half a brain. And where I came from in DMC, Bosses were the most important aspect. Even with their patterns, there was a chance to slip up, and on higher difficulties that meant your ass. DMC1 was probably the best on that front - Phantom and Nightmare, though done ad nauseum, were bitches to begin with and made increasingly more difficult as time went on. The only DMC game where enemies stood a chance of being a real threat was DMC1, which is something they really need to fix in these latest installments, but I think NG's bosses weren't made more difficult as time went on with anything other than extra enemies.

 

Now, I ask you - on the higher difficulties in NG, did you feel more threatened by the bosses, or more threatened by the enemies that spawned? Because honestly, my pressure came from those enemies, off camera and waiting, than it did the boss with the same attack patterns that caused them to be defeated the first time I met them. I keep coming back enemies, and I keep seeing that as a lack of polish.

 

The flails, while awesome, were never useful. Best way to kill ghost fish was with the dragon sword, sadly, so they never really got used. REALLY cool to hear that in NG2 you get to keep your weapons when you go through the game again, that was always annoying in the first.

 

I may be oversimplifying a bit, yes. It's been a while since I played, but I remember how I survived. I remember the karma system all too well, however. If you didn't use a UT on an enemy, you were out 5000 points. If you didn't finish within the time limit, you were out 10,000 - 30,000 points. The fastest way to kill an enemy is to use an UT, the best way to get points from an encounter is to use UT and finish within the time limit. Doing big combos with the flails could net you 1,500 points tops and usually took too long to kill. I know that the best way I had to kill berserkers was to use the lunar's counterattack ((not that that saved me from the sigma versions which could attack you from offscreen, ended up giving up on that 300-kill challenge. I know that the best way to get karma from that true form of the giant boss was to stand in the lava and perform level one thunder ninpos again and again to artificially inflate my kill count. But these are rare exceptions to the realities of the karma system - counters aren't rewarded, leaving the battle with lots of health isn't rewarded. The only things that are rewarded are timeliness and UTs, and so those things become essential. I'll admit it's an oversimplification of how to play the game, but I don't believe it's an oversimplification of how the game works.

 

I'm not saying it's a bad game, I'll never think that. But I will never understand anybody who touts it as the pinnacle of the genre; and as the mouthpiece that speaks such, Itagaki annoys me to no end. It seems he may have learned SOMETHING from NG1 in allowing weapons to carry over to subsequent playthroughs, but finding that he didn't change the camera, perhaps the first game's biggest flaw, speaks to an unforgivable quality in a game designer. I don't want somebody so self-assured of their vision to do anything but their own work - that kind of influence can be corrosive. Bayonetta, in particular, considering that it's gonna be designed by the guy who did DMC1, is something I would much, MUCH rather see done outside Itagaki's creative vision. 2-4 never caught up to the offerings of 1, and to think that the creator of that game is finally returning to head the creation of a new game in the genre makes me giddy. It's why I don't want Itagaki anywhere near it.

[The NZA]

quick short by the guys from Metal Gear Awesome 1 & 2 (i just learned of/saw 2 as well recently, so glad i did - thanks Los!), though bish & others might dig it.

 

Awesome Gaiden

[Jables]

Man, it makes Crim so damned sad that I still haven't picked this one up. It's on the list, just not high up next to SC4 at the end of the month.

 

PS- Dunno of your EBs are doing it over there, but here they're throwing in a razor as some kind of weird promotional tool. I get the link, I just figure the people playing this are either not growing facial hair or simply don't give a fuck about the personal appearance.