Ninja Gaiden (xbox)

There was this magical time a few years ago, when after having Devil May Cry as the only even remotely playable 3d action game, everyone, almost at once, got it.

The result was Prince of Persia: the Sands of Time, which I've only seen people play, God of War, which I already wrote about, and Ninja Gaiden.

PoP got platforming down way better, GoW was a good balance but fell into the Devil May Cry arena of hundreds of easy to kill dudes. Then there was Ninja Gaiden.

It took me two days to beat the first level.

Every new level seemed impossibly harder than the last one (except for the annoying swimming one), every new boss was barely beaten. Heck, even the regular enemies were an accomplishment to pass. Black Ninjas throwing exploding shurikens? Hello death upon death.

Then you get army dudes with rocket launchers, cumulating with you taking out two tanks and an attack helicopter in a row (WITH YOUR BOW!).

It's a game that never lets up, has no interest in helping you to the end. In short, it's the old game.

The NES game. While the two sequels got easier (though the NES NG3 in the US apparently was extra hard, i've only played the SNES 'port' and that one is easier), none ever got easy. If you die on the last boss, you go back to 6-1. Any kid who played that game likely can play though 6-1, 6-2 and 6-3 with their eyes closed.

The tradition of abuse continues, but unlike the old version which relied on glitch spawn points and arbitrary obstacles, the new one beats you down with skilled enemies.

After beating the game, I played through again. The one thing I noticed right away was how much better at it I was. Not even the rocket launching army men were giving me trouble.

Ninja Gaiden is a game that will teach you how to play it and force you to get good at it. In a time where you can fall asleep in front of the controller and accomplish tasks, it's nice to see.

4 stars.