Ninja Gaiden 3 also joins the backward compatibility list

It's wild to think about where Trials started and how far the series has gone. For better or worse, it's an institution at this point. If you're ever feeling wistful about the care-free Xbox Live Arcade days, it's not too late to revisit Trials Evolution and rekindle ??your dormant leaderboard feuds. The challenging time-trial platformer is playable on Xbox One through the backward compatibility program.

Trials HD is also compatible, in case you missed that news, but Evolution is arguably the fan favorite. While I still enjoy the series to t??his day, most of my fond memories are tied up with these two titles.

NINJA GAIDEN 3: Razor's Edge and Trials Evolution are coming to Xbox One Backward Compatibility today //t.co/qPMRNrLoTQ pic.twitter.com/tBeZTGSQoy

— Larry Hryb (@majornelson) May 2, 2019

And that's not all for Xbox 360 fans. Not long ago, Microsoft added support for Ninja Gaiden II on Xbox One, and as of today, it's possible to continue Ryu's crimson-soaked saga on the same console. Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge is backward compatible. Ayane, Momiji, and Kasumi – the gang's all here.

I have zero interest in Ninja Gaiden 3, if I'm be?ing blunt, but it's good to see all thr??ee games represented.

The post Improve your old times in Trials Evolution now that it’s Xbox One compatible appeared first on Destructoid.

Sure, why not

The PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 ports of Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge are due out on April 2, but before full release, Team Ninja has put out a demo for this updated take on the action title. The demo itself features gameplay sections for Ryu and Ayane, and any Karma and Ninja Skills earned will be transferable t??o the full game.

Despite passing on anything and everything Ninja Gaiden following Ninja Gaiden II, I feel oddly comp?elled to grab this demo in order to get a better perspective on Ryu's latest exploits. And even if it goes unused, the save transfer feature is reassuring.

The post Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge demo out now for 360/PS3 appeared first on Destructoid.

You finally did it, Australia

It was a good day when Australia's R18+ rating was passed for videogames, paving the way for adults to purchase games that might have previously either been edited for content or refused classification. Of all the games that could have been first to receive this rating, it ended up being the Wii U's Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge.

The action title received the R18+ rating for "violence that is high in impact because of its frequency, high definition graphics, and emphasis on blood effects," according to director of the classification board Lesley O'Brien. This has been a long time coming, to put it lightly. Now, what's the bloodiest image of Razor's Edge I can find? Why yes, that'll do.

The post Ninja Gaiden 3: RE is Australia’s first game rated R18+ appeared first on Destructoid.

Disposable razors

Ninja Gaiden 3 was remarkable in its lack of remarkability. Team Ninja's ability to drop the ball with its franchise so spectacularly was damn near impressive, even if the result was a monotonou?s and exhausting slog through one of the most soul-crushingly dull adventures released this year. 

With the Wii U on the horizon, Tecmo Koei has another chance to disappoint audiences with Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge, an overhauled version that seeks to address complaints found in the original release, and provide a deeper, more nuanced ??experience. 

In essence, it ai??ms to do what the proverbs say is impossible, and polish a turd. 

Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge (Wii U)
Developer: Team Ninja
Publisher: Tecmo Koei
Release: November 18, 2012
MSRP: $59.99

To its credit, Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge demonstrates how aware Team Ninja is of the original game's faults, since the studio really has done its best to fix those areas that let it down so badly in March of 2012. Variety has been ramped up, along with greater intensity from enemies, and a decent offering of fresh content. At face value, Razor's Edge goes out of its way to be the game Ninja Gaiden 3 should have been.

For a start, combat is granted a higher degree of challenge with more aggressive opposition. While they're still not quite the smartest cats in the cradle, NG3's perpetually angry soldiers at least spend a little less time queuing up to receive their blood-drenched retribution from Ryu's hungry blade. Guarding and dodging now have a greater emphasis, evoking memories of older Ninja Gaiden titles, and ma?king the game?? slightly more challenging. 

Downloadable weapons from the original release, plus two new ones in th?e form of the Dual Katanas and Lunar Staff, are available during the course of the campaign without having to wait for them to appear on a digital marketplace, meaning Ryu will not be stuck with his sword for the majority of the experie??nce. The added weapon variety is also accompanied by an all-new upgrade system, where Ryu can spend karma to gain new combo moves, special abilities, and enhance Ninpo magic attacks. By spending Karma, players can gain more health, the ability to self-heal, and cool (if useless) moves such as combat throws and head stomps. 

Ryu's magic red arm, which allowed him to instantly kill opponents in the original release, has been given a few alterations as well. Although he can still use it to absorb souls and slaughter folk, he can't execute quite so many at a time, and the "cinematic" camera angles accompanying each kill have been toned down somewhat. In addition, those slow moments where Ryu would be overcome? by his curse and trudge through a room one-hit killing everything have been removed entirely, replaced by dream-sequence arenas where Ryu basically just f?ights even more opponents in a gray, blurry, nightmare realm. 

In addition t??o the orig??inal game, Ayane boasts two playable chapters of her own. As one might expect, she's nimble and unconventional in her attacks, wielding a pair of blades and tossing explosive kunai at her enemies. That said, her opponents are all made up of those found in Ryu's story, so while her moveset can provide a bit of a break, it's ultimately just more of the same. 

More of the same, unfortunately, is what holds the whole package back. For all its genuine (and appreciated) attempts at evolution, Razor's Edge is still, at heart, the same messy soup of repetitious carnage. It might be a bit more difficult, but combat is still impossible to follow onscreen, as enemies surround Ryu and the button-mashing frenzy renders everything a blur. Level structure remains the same -- our hero walks down a corridor, hacks his way through an arena of predictable foes, and then walks down another corridor, from the beginning of ?the game to its dreary end.

Rather than provide dramatic changes in any way, the Wii U iteration instead attempts to take several small steps forward. A lot has been improved, by a tiny amount. You can see e??volution in almost every aspect of the game, but the evolution is only slight enough to be vaguely detected, rather than openly and instantly appreciated. This is not what the game required, as it was in dire need of significant fixing on a grand scale, not a microcosmic plethora of amendments. 

Ninja Gaiden 3 is fundamentally mediocre, and Razor's Edge can only do so much to solve that. The new weapons and playable character help, but when combat remains a sloppy serving of soulless anarchy and level structure is as trite and unimaginative as its always been, the changes mean very little. In fact, given how boring the combat gets, one could make a fair argument that giving us more of it is somethin?g of a bad idea. The ultimate result of the changes is that the game simply drags on longer than it used to, which largely equates to the same amount of tir??ed contempt per game. 

Ninja Gaiden 3's online mode makes its return, though I must add that, at the time of writing, the Wii U is unable to go online. Looking through its solo challenges and offerings, however, it's all pretty much the same as last time, and last time was absolutely awful. You can read our original review to see what I thought of the pointless disaster that was NG3's attempts at versus play.

When using the GamePad, Razor's Edge keeps it subtle, using the screen to display attack combos at a glance, and providing virtual buttons at the edges for players to touch and access such things as the inventory, upgrade menu, Ninpo attacks, and Ninja Sense. Pleasantly, all these items can also be accessed using the Pad's buttons, allowing players to use whatever feels more comfortable to them. If you're stuck in a level, you can press the Ninja Sense icon on the touchscreen or hold in the right stick. It's up to you, and I wish more developers wo?uld use these new input ideas to encourage versatility rather than force something on the user. 

The GamePad is surprisingly comfortable and convenient to wield in one's button mashing endeavors. The wider play surface is appreciated for a game that encourages thumb cramps so enthusiastically, moreso than the optional Pro Controller input. While many may feel that Nintendo's optional peripheral is the preferred way to play Ninja Gaiden, the cramped design of that particular controller is nowhere near as usable as the spacious layout on the Pad. I'd recommend sticking w??ith the Wii U's prime controller if you insist on playing this at all. 

Like its first incarnation, Razor's Edge is visually unimpressive, and actually looks worse due to its capitulation on a fan-requested addition -- extra gore. While the power to dismember enemies has returned, it's clear fro?m the outset that this feature was implemented with no elegance whatsoever. Limbs awkwardly fly off in a manner that suggests they were copied and pasted over the screen rather than ever belonging to the soldier they're falling from.  As enemies are reduced to kibble and torsos, they land awkwardly on the floor, frozen in peculiar angles and often wedged through solid surfaces. In all honestly, I'd rather the dismemberment remain out of the equation if the alternative is this laughable cut-and-shut job where gore reminds me of fake props found in 80's slasher movies. 

Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge tried. It definitely did try, and nobody can take that away from it. However, nothing this Wii U release does can improve upon the core gameplay, which remains as dry, disaffected, and banausic as ever before. Razor's Edge gives us more, but when the ori??ginal serving exceeded that which the player could stomach, "more" isn't a very tasty prospect. There are extra weapons, another playable character, and ultimately a greater level of content, but it all serves, in the end, to drag out what was already far too much of the same, vapid waste of time. 

As it stands, Razor's Edge ?is a slight improvement of something that needed to be thrown a??way and started again from scratch. A turd, Team Ninja demonstrates, can indeed be polished -- but it still stinks.

The post Review: Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge appeared first on Destructoid.

Exclusive features detailed

Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge will be released alongside the Wii U on November 18. This version of the game contains several Wii U exclusive features, including a new battle system and online multiplayer modes. Here's what you can expect in Razor's Edge:

• Ayane is a playable character
• Both Ryu and Ayane are playable in co-op mode
• More playable characters coming as DLC
• Test of Valor battle areas -- hidden battles in each chapter
• Enemies can fight while severely wounded 
• Wii U GamePad controls -- change weapons, reference combos, etc.

This is definitely on my launch day list.?? What about you?

The post Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge Wii U dated Nov. 18 appeared first on Destructoid.

Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge is looking like it'll be the best version of the game, thanks largely to the refocus on violence. Look at those body parts fly off! It also helps that Ayane is now a playable character for the Wii ??U version of the game.

I need to point out that the English voice acting sounds hilariously bad h??ere. "What the hell's a girl flying in here for?!" Really?

The post Ayane is a bloody mess in Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge appeared first on Destructoid.

Team Ninja's hype train has just left the station, as they are hard at work convincing us that Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge for the Wii U will actually be good this time.

"We left out some of the things the series was well-known for. We did leave some of our fans out," said Team Ninja head-honcho Yosuke Hayashi. "We had this opportunity to put those hardcore aspects back in. It's kind of the hardcore fan package of Ninja Gaiden 3." Well, thanks for leaving t??hat hardcore stuff out of a primarily hardcore series, guys!

Forgive me if I'm hesitant to get on the hype train here. The primary problem wit?h the third game isn't that it? "wasn't hardcore enough" -- the Ultimate Ninja difficulty was pretty hard -- it's that the game hardly had any heart to it, had tacked-on multiplayer, tried to sell droves of paid DLC that was cut from the game just weeks after launch (weapons?!), all compounded onto a myriad of other technical issues.

Additionally, this Molyneux-ian tactic of hyping up a game, then saying post-mortem "yeah actually our game sucked, wait until you see the next big thing!" is really grating -- like nails to a digital chalkboard. In any case, stay tuned this Holiday season to see how it turns out! Same Destructoid time, same Destructoid channel.

Ninja Gaiden 3 on Wii U is the "hardcore package" [Eurogamer]

The post Team Ninja: Ninja Gaiden 3 for the Wii U is ‘hardcore’ appeared first on Destructoid.

Among the list of upcoming titles for the new Wii U console shown at today's Nintendo E3 press conference was Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge. And, just below the title, th?e video lists Nintendo as the publisher.

I don't really know what that means, as I don't understand why Tecmo Koei wouldn't just publish it themselves -- as they did with the original version's release in March for?? PS3 and Xbox 360. Unless, of course, Nintendo decided they needed more har??dcore games on their platforms and the only way it was going to wind up there was if Nintendo threw money at the problem.

Perish the thought.

The post E3: Ninja Gaiden 3 coming to Wii U,? published by Nin?tendo appeared first on Destructoid.