Platform Played On: PC
Rating: 4.5/10
Verdict: Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z is not a good game. It's also not terrible. It's a generic, button mashing hack and slash game with an interesting artstyle. But if you play this, be prepared for some of the most cringeworthy dialogue ever recorded in a game.
Ninja Gaiden returns after an underwhelming but not entirely bad entry in Ninja Gaiden 3. In Ninja Gaiden 3 the combat was dumbed down for a wider audience, but I still would have rated it a 6 out of 10 because I'm not actually opposed to simplified, button-mashing combat. In Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z they go left-field with the series a bit in the sense that they employed a comic book art style and a zombie plague.
Before I go on, I have to make note of a few things. The first is that I'm not a huge Ninja Gaiden fan. I have enjoyed the series from the NES days and actually appreciate how rewarding the combat is. I said in my Cloudbuilt review that I don't get off on really hard games like some people do, but I can still appreciate them. I appreciate Ninja Gaiden.
I'm also not opposed to taking a series and going a different direction with it. Case in point: I'm a big Yakuza fan and even though Yakuza: Dead Souls wasn't nearly as good as the core series, I still didn't mind where they went with it.
The last point before I get on with it already is that a game getting a 4 or a 4.5 out of 10 does not mean it's terrible. It just means it's not especially good and I don't recommend playing it. This is important because while Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z is not a good game, or even decent, it is also not the worst game ever created like some people have been throwing out. It is pretty bad but not without a few moments of excitement.
You play as Yaiba Kamikaze, who ends up killing his own clan and then fighting Ryu Hayabusa. Surprised when Ryu almost kills him, he has his body reassembled by a group and agrees to help them stop the zombie outbreak while trying to get revenge on Ryu. Not that it matters really because the story isn't especially enthralling. I'm not against putting zombies in a game even though it's overdone because cutting up zombies is usually pretty fun.
What I learned from a crappy game like Rogue Warrior is that excessive swearing does not a good game make. Okay, I already knew this, but it's like Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z wanted me to relive the pain of Rogue Warrior. Ninja Gaiden Z was probably written on an elementary school playground because the kids aren't allowed to swear at home and wanted to feel edgy. It's almost embarrassing playing the game because if someone walked in and saw me they'd hear some of the most immature crap ever put in a video game. I can deal with potty mouth, but there are games that do it well and make it enjoyable. Hell, one of them -- South Park -- was just released this year.
Once you get past all that you get a game that takes the Dynasty Warriors approach. You have a couple different weapons you can use, and you can pick up zombies and throw them. Mostly though, you just chain together combos by button mashing and alternating between punching, slicing and using your flail. It's not complex, but I'm forgiving of it because I actually enjoy Dynasty Warriors and I am a Suda51 apologist (going so far as to claim Lollipop Chainsaw as a Top 25 game of all time). Even though this is Ninja Gaiden and smart combat should be expected, I don't mind how simple it is as much as fanboys do.
There's an elemental feature to the combat and solving the mild puzzles, but it's more of a hassle than anything else. It's just poorly designed and shouldn't have even been in the game. A for effort though, I guess.
You also gain life back by defeating enemies by using your execution technique. For the most part it works but it can be extremely unreliable at times, which adds to the difficulty in a bullshit way.
The visuals are actually a lot of fun, but I enjoy comic books. I enjoy the look and feel of the game. I like seeing the gore splatter, zombies get cut in half and I like Grindhouse-esque extremities of violence. However, I feel like they think it's cooler than it is. They bank way too much on the fact that people will think the excessive blood is cool.
You can also upgrade your abilities and combos, but the way it does it is so commonplace we've seen it a million times. This is more of an observation than a criticism, because it doesn't make the game any better or worse. It's just kind of there.
The worst part of the game is just how much the camera hates you. It is honestly never where you want it to be. Do you like fighting enemies you can't see? Well, now you don't just have to fight the demons in your head, because Ninja Gaiden Z's camera is so bad you'll often get hit by enemies that aren't even in your vision yet. Do you like a camera being oddly placed, making it hard to sometimes perform the most mundane of activities? Yaiba got yo back. It's a terrible fixed camera system and I don't know why, at this point, developers do something like this. It's not my fault you were shoved into this game camera, so why are you taking it out on me? I wanted to be friends.
Even though Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z isn't entirely functional in a bunch of ways, there are still moments to enjoy here. Sometimes the battles go on way too long, and the difficulty is more cheap than clever, but moments when you're platforming are fun and fast-paced. The grappling and running across walls is fluid but at this point a lot of games get things like that right. There are some interesting battles here and there as well, but most of the time it's just a mindless hack and slash.
I think anybody who thinks this is the worst game ever hasn't played a truly terrible game, but it's also not a game you need to bother with. It's generic in a lot of ways, and some elements are just downright awful, but if you just want to slaughter hordes upon hordes of zombies in a Dynasty Warrior manner, then there are worse out there than this. And hey, at least there is a girl with large breasts telling you what to do, and that's cool... right?
