It feels like we’re in the Year of the Ninja right now. We’ve had Ninja Gaiden 2 Black and we’re about to get Ninja Gaiden 4, a new Shinobi game, and Ghost of Yotei. That’s not even mentioning the announcement of a new Onimusha, a new Mortal Kombat movie with the likes of Sub Zero and Scorpion, and, I dunno, maybe some other IP that I’m missing from my list.
And we’ve also had Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound, the new game from The Game Kitchen, the developers behind the Blasphemous series. But Ragebound is not a creepy metroidvania with religious overtones and grotesque boss fights. No, no, no. Ragebound is a more traditional side-scrolling action platformer with tight movement, grandiose demonic enemies, and ninjas, of course.
Will this new entry in the iconic franchise be worthy of its name and stealthily sneak into our hearts? Or will it fall flat on its face like that one ninja from the Snickers ad? Let’s find out.
Kenji is an apprentice ninja from Hayabusa Village, learning how to wield a badass katana. Everything is going quite nicely until a horde of demons attacks his home, and he has to scramble to stop them. Kumori is a kunoichi (female ninja) from the Black Spider Clan. Everything is going quite nicely until her home is attacked by demons, and she has to fight them off. Both Kenji and Kumori fail in their efforts and are dragged to hell as prisoners. Oh no!
However, while they’re trapped together, they hatch a plan. Kumori and Kenji merge their auras to escape from hell, then they resolve to stop the demon problem for good. Using Kenji’s physical form and Kimura’s astral form, they embark on a quest to close the portal to hell once and for all. You know, by slashing, skewering, and throwing kunai weapons right into the face of the enemy.
But, like, who actually cares about the narrative in this game? It’s not really about the story. It’s about looking and feeling cool while slaying demons and asshole CIA guys. Nobody is buying this game looking for a cinematic masterpiece, am I right?
At its core, Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound is a retro-inspired 2D action platformer. Think of it like a modern-day Shinobi. You’re a ninja with a sword and/or a kunai, and your goal is to get to the end of each level, scything down swaths of enemies in your path. There are 18 main stages across four acts to get through, and the difficulty ramps up as you progress – either in the form of platforming challenges or more difficult enemies.
You are given a ranking D to S (S++ if you finagle by equipping a nerf in your two item slots) at the end of each level, and those ranks can unlock new items or weapons to buy in the store. The rank is determined by your performance in the level, measure time to beat, max combo, enemies slain, successful challenges and the collectibles you picked up along the way. I became annoyed when I saw that I was locked out of a challenge at the beginning of a level by some bs out of nowhere, and it was an obsession of mine to pass as many challenges as possible.
There are three types of collectibles in the levels: crystal skulls, golden scarabs, and scrolls. Scrolls unlock a new, harder challenge called a Secret Ops level. Golden scarabs are your currency to use at the shop, where you can unlock new items, weapons, or rage arts. Crystal skulls were usually the hardest to find or most difficult to retrieve. In Secret Ops levels, at least one of the skulls is found at the end of a timed platforming section with Kumori, and they were rage-inducing. I often spent more than thirty minutes on these challenges.
I’m afraid to say that there was nothing in the unlockable skills or items save for the first couple of buffs that actually drew me to experimentation with my build. One of the first things you can unlock is an item that gives you health after you string together a combo of 5 kills. Awesome. I kept that for the whole time. Other unlockables included different rage arts, which are ultimate attacks that you need to build up over time. Problem is, the default rage art is so rad and effective that I was never drawn to try anything else out. I was just unlocking things because I could unlock them, not because I wanted to use them. It was kinda disappointing.
Okay, so we need to talk about combat. Most enemies can be killed with one swing of your katana or one kunai to the face, but there are larger or shielded enemies that take a bit more. That’s where a Hypercharge attack can help you. Some enemies carry a Hypercharge within them, and you can extract it by matching the attack to the aura around the enemy (blue for sword, pink for throwing knife). Once you have that, any non-boss sprite is toast in one shot. It’s often a dance to try to kill the dude flashing blue with the sword, to then go back and kill the other elite dude blocking you.
As much as I liked the mechanic, it can interrupt the flow of the level slightly while you’re waiting around for a powered-up foe to slay. You can, however, create your own Hypercharge by sacrificing your own health bar, but I’m going to be honest, in the 20 hours I put into this game, I only did that in the tutorial and for one specific trophy. I needed all the life I could get!
Movement is where I think the game was a little lacking. I’ve played a bunch of these types of side-scrolling action games before, and this one didn’t feel the best. When comparing it to games like The Messenger, it just doesn’t stack up. You can only run, jump, roll, and do a guillotine strike, which acts like a downslash. It’s fairly standard, but it didn’t feel as fluid as it should have done. The goals for each level include a time to complete, and I didn’t think the movement mechanics allowed me to get through the level as fast as I thought I could, and that was a shame. In ways, Blasphemous felt much smoother, and you’re an armor-clad knight in that and not a FREAKING NINJA!
Now for some “controversy.” Ragebound has an accessibility option called “assist mode.” This will allow you to essentially turn off enemy damage, making you invincible. You can still fall into the abyss in tough platforming sections, so you’re not completely indestructible, but near as dammit. So, of course, there are gatekeeping sickos who are trashing the game because it caters for “babies.” Let me tell you something real quick: if your enjoyment of a game is affected by the way other people play the game, you’ve got problems. It’s absolutely a great option to have with a game that may have people nope out early otherwise.
Man, I love this style of pixel art goodness. The 16-bit aesthetic reminds me of those SEGA Genesis games of old, yet the animations, the fidelity, and the detail are so much greater than its ancestors. It’s so impressive, especially in the boss fights, which are really fluid.
The music is also fantastic. Sergio de Prado has created a fitting soundtrack with traditional Japanese influences, but it still gets your heart pumping while trying to traverse these obstacle courses of doom. Sometimes the volume and bpm of the songs in the game caused me to make mistakes when precision platforming, though, so I did have to turn the music volume down to 30%.
The sound effects were equally satisfying, with every swipe of the sword sounding crunchy each time you hit an enemy. The feedback is very much needed because, unless they die, they don’t even flinch at your attacks. The best feeling was chaining together Hypercharge attacks because they felt extra meaty. You can feel the weight behind every strike.
I’m also happy to report that I had literally no bugs or performance issues in over 20 hours of playtime on PS5 (mainlining the story should only take you up to 6 hours, though, so don’t worry. It doesn’t outstay its welcome). It ran perfectly.
I had never played a Ninja Gaiden game before I booted up Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound. I know this isn’t a typical Ninja Gaiden installment, but I’m counting it. This throwback retro-inspired 2D action platformer brought me back to a simpler time, a time when you could hop onto a game, complete a level, and then hop off, perhaps trying to improve your high score or ranking along the way.
Last year, RetroRealms attempted to do something similar, bringing cult horror IPs back from their video game graves, and they were fairly successful. But Ninja Gaiden feels much smoother, more polished and, altogether, more enjoyable.
Its limited movement mechanics, Hypercharge farming, and ho-hum items and skills you unlock mean that this title definitely isn’t perfect, but it didn’t need to be. Ragebound needed to be a fun, short experience with kickass ninjas looking cool and killing demons. And it succeeded in that regard.
Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound is out now on PC, PS4 and PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series S/X, and Nintendo Switch for around $25.
Soup Rating 8.5/10
