Game Review: Ninja (ZX Spectrum, Entertainment USA)

Ninja: The Game

The object of Ninja is to rescue Princess Di-Di, pearl of the Orient which is a prisoner in the palace of pearls.

There are various fighters that you will come across and, on some screens, you could be fighting up-to four others.  The inlay card does say that as you reach higher levels, the opponents multiply.  Although that sounds a lot, the most you really fight at each time is two at a time.  When you defeat one of them, one of the remaining ones comes into action.

Opponents are Thug, Ninja and Karateka and they all look different but tend to fight exactly the same.

Playability and Slow Action

What I’d say about any game is that it should playable.  Sadly, Ninja just it isn’t a very good example of good game play. Although you can walk through the screens fairly easily, it’s when it comes to the fighting sections, this is where the game really disappoints.  It’s very much hit and miss (excuse the pun) and in most cases tends to come down to luck if you win or lose a fight in some instances.

Using the controls are cumbersome as they don’t tend to respond as you’d like.  If you jump upwards, it can take a few seconds to come back down and if you didn’t press the fire button (when you honestly believe you did), to punch or kick, it can get all a bit frustrating to say the least. You can even leave the screen for ages and the enemies just seem to wander back and forth pointlessly.  There just isn’t much entertainment here.

Don’t Judge A Book By Its Cover

Ninja officially sold 49,691 copies on the ZX Spectrum.  I think the reason is probably down to its punchy title, budget price and great artwork on the front cassette cover.

Graphics

The characters and backdrops in Ninja are good.  Animation I’d say is average.  What I did like though is when you retreat backwards, Ninja will defensively continue looking at the opponent and then turnaround facing the other way after a few steps.  Its not just a matter of face left or right, quite neat.

The backdrop scenery does tend to have that Ninja temple feeling to it and I feel are well drawn.  Each has also plenty of colour here too, so no bland monochrome here, I’m pleased to say.  The sword waving motion looks reasonable alright too.

Sound Effects

There is no music in Ninja.  It is purely a tapping noise when you punch, kick or throw an object across the screen.  If you choose to re-define the keys, there is a beep after pressing each one.

During gameplay, as you go from screen to screen, it’ll tell you where you are approaching.  As it does this, you’ll hear a short whirring noise that ramps up a few octaves.  It gets repetitive.

Wandering Around

As you go from screen to screen, you will see a short display of text showing where you are approaching.  Essentially this is a form of room naming before you see the next screen area.

Your Ninja can either walk to the left or right of the screen, giving a slight variety on where you want to go from the start.  In some rooms, you will see a gap at the top or bottom of the screen and here you can press the up or down to magically appear to float through the air into the next screen!  A bit like an elevator but without seeing an elevator, oddly.  Must be some kind of magic.

At any time, you can walk and off the screen should you wish too without having to face your opponent.  If you get a weapon throw at you, just walk of the screen and back in again.

This Will Bug You

Unfortunately, it was clear that at times, that there was some screen display corruption.  Occasionally, you’d see yellow text appearing at the bottom of the screen and black blocks randomly appear too.

There is also some flickering, especially when picking up either a death star shuriken shown as an X or dagger objects from the ground.  They tended to corrupt, and some even float didn’t land on the ground and stayed on each screen.  At one point, the whole game blank screened on me too.

I’m sure this could have been sorted out before even considering releasing the game to the general public to play.

Point of Interest

Although this is an Entertainment USA release, the loading screen has MAD on it and the spine has a standard Mastertronic catalogue number IS 0149.  Almost like three rolled into one.

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