Ninja Five-0 -- Calling All Ninja.

I have played through three of the game's six missions. You play as ninja cop Joe Osugi. What do you know? That now makes two Japanese ninja named Joe. The other being Joe Musashi of Shinobi fame. Joe must be a really common ninja name. The name isn't the only thing Hudson has borrowed from the arcade games Shinobi and Shadow Dancer. In each mission you're out to rescue hostages, wipe out all the badguys, and take out a boss. Each mission covers multiple stages. Each boss gets his own data sheet just like in SEGA's Shinobi arcade games. Level themes are also shared between the two. As is the use of ninja magic. Hudson did add in a few things to make the game their own though. You'll need to collect colored keys off enemies and chests to be able to open the corresponding doors and advance through the levels. They've also added the Bionic Commando like grappling hook to Shinobi's basic formula. You control Joe via the D-pad. He'll move left and right accordingly. Pressing down will make him kneel. Pressing up will allow him to enter the doors in the stages. The B button allows you to throw your shurikens. You can throw them while kneeling of course. Pressing the R button allows you to use your sword. The L button will allow you to use your binoculars and essentially let you scroll the screen in four directions to see what's there waiting for you off screen. You can't move or attack while doing this so you'll be using it at your own risk. Pressing the A button allows for you to jump. Joe can jump up and grab the edges of a ledge and then pull himself up. Pressing A in mid air after a jump allows Joe to use his grappling hook. It's in the use of the grappling hook and the nature of the enemies and the level design that the game becomes tough. In Shinobi and other games at the time, pressing up and jump would allow you to jump up onto another level within the stage. The grappling hook in Ninja Five-0 doesn't allow for that. You can't go through any platforms. So you have to hook the underside and then swing out, around, and finally up onto whatever ledge it is your trying to reach. Pressing left or right while hanging from the grappling hook causes you to swing and gives you the momentum needed for a jump or whatever it is you need to do. Pressing up or down while hanging from the grappling hook will shorten or lengthen the grappling hook rope giving you more or less momentum. As you kill enemies, your ninja magic meter will fill up. If you press A+B while the meter is full, you'll perform a magic attack that will kill every non boss enemy on the screen. If you press A+B while the meter is anything but full, you'll become invincible for however much time it takes for the meter to deplete. You can power up your shurikens by finding an icon dropped by defeated enemies. Level one is the standard shuriken. Level two is a set of three flaming shurikens. Level three is a laser shuriken. Taking a hit lowers your shuriken level. So on your way to rescuing the hostages, which in itself isn't so easy, and collecting all the keys to access and defeat the boss you'll be going up against some very smart enemies. Enemies that hide behind cover and pop out to take their shots at you with a knack for doing so at the worst possible moment for you. Standard enemies that take more than one hit to take down. Enemies with great accuracy and shots that are tough to avoid. You can't take very many hits and finding items to raise your life becomes crucial. The enemies guarding the hostages take them as human shields. If you kill a hostage it takes a considerable amount of health from you. You have to have good timing to free a hostage from their captors. At the end of each mission awaits a tough boss. These are long boss battles with old school unforgiving patterns and large lifebars. These bosses aren't the kind you're going to luck through. They're almost assured to kill you on your first meeting. You'll have to learn them and raise to their challenges. The gameplay is tough but very fun. Hudson obviously made this game with the hard-core and longtime gamer in mind. I for one am loving it. Ninja Five-0 delivers the goods as far as gameplay is concerned.