It has some great moments to be sure, but Ninja Gaiden 3 is mostly an exercise in terrible game design.
In Ninja Gaiden 3, the game revolves around the fact that Ryu Hayabusa is a killer. The game wants you to feel what it is like to take a life and the incredible guilt and remorse that comes with it. An interesting idea to be sure, especially considering gamings usual focus on unrestricted violence. However, Ninja Gaiden was not the series to try such a task, and it fails miserably attempting to get it's point across. Again, in the series you cut down evil werewolves, demons, vampires, undead dragons, and a slew of over the top creatures that were simply hell-bent on destroying the planet. Ryu was a hero, and that was that.
So in order for Team Ninja to portray their new found ideal, the game has you face off against military personnel attacking London right off the bat. It begins in typical Ninja Gaiden fashion, with you slaying dozens upon dozens of enemies in stylized, quick action with poor camera work. After you take care of the enemies, the game slows down and focuses on one lone survivor begging for his life before you take it. This is contradictory to what just happened: you were playing an action game, and now it wants you to feel guilty for playing an action game? This stark contrast isn't only represented here either, as it happens several times throughout the game and even drives the main plot.
Early on in the game, Ryu's iconic Dragon Sword is absolved into his body and his right arm gets infected. You're told later on that the burden of so much death eventually falls onto the Dragon Ninja. The arm is actually the perfect symbol for the game. It is supposed to remind you that you're nearing death and you're in great danger, but when it glows during battle it allow unleashing an Ultimate Technique, which basically just kills everything on screen. Feel guilty, but use it to make progress.
Story line aside (and if you think that's ridiculous, just stick with the plot a little longer) the more disappointing aspect of Ninja Gaiden 3 lies in the actual gameplay. The tough-as-nails gameplay found in previous games has been exchanged for a more direct, simpler approach. You begin with the Dragon Sword, and well… that's it. You no longer upgrade weapons, or, weapon rather. You use a sword throughout the entire game, and while Ryu eventually drops one for another and gains a few new abilities, you basically do the same thing over and over. Your magic never upgrades, the Ultimate technique never changes, and when they upgrade your bow there's no notable difference in use. There's a free patch for the game that adds a scythe and claws, but they feel useless since the game was clearly designed around only using a sword.
The flaws in previous games haven't been addressed either. The camera is still bad and during the ultimate technique it is somehow worse. Of course you don't actually play Ryu kills everything on screen during that bit, but it's still annoying. Ninja Gaiden II was notorious for off screen attacks, and you'll likely only die when an enemy does an unblockable grab move that you didn't see coming. In fact, sometimes you will see the attack coming, but if you're in the middle of an attack yourself you can't interrupt the move and dodge out of the way, so sometimes you just have to watch as you take damage. Enemies have a tendency to talk a lot too, but not a one that grabs you makes mention beforehand. Instead, they just repeat the same annoying lines of dialog throughout the whole gaming (something that should be long dead in video gaming). "Let's see which one of us is stronger" says the Alchemist six times during a fight. "Well, considering I killed about 100 of you guys already and they all said the same thing, I'm guessing I am" Ryu should have responded.
The game also adds in some new mechanics that make things cool to look at, and then shoves them down your throat. You start the game off by performing a dive off a building, and then landing atop of enemy. Get used to it, as this happens about 3 times a level. The classic wall run and kick flip is still in the game, giving Ryu that supernatural look and ability, but they also added the Kunai climb. The Kunai climb is where Ryu uses his kunai to scale a vertical wall, in a very loud, very dull looking manner. It feels strange to add something like this when there was already a much better way to do the same thing, and it isn't really fun to do. The game also adds mechanics that disappear after the first stage, such as stealth. You can sneak up on an enemy, and then opportunities to do so again disappear, even though the game taught you how to do it.
The middle of the game has some memorable moments, however. The recurring Ninja Gaiden antagonist, the Black Spider Clan, shows up and the ninjas in the clan are still a lot of fun to fight. Of course, they show up for no reason. Someone mentions that the Black Spider Clan is up to something, but it never amounts to anything and it feels like they were just added because there were no ideas left. There are also a few fun boss fights, such as Cyborg T. Rex. Unfortunately, that fight mostly amounts to Quick Time Events, which somehow worked their way into this series and made a lot of encounters boring to play. Still though, there were a few set pieces and fights that really gave it that vibe the overall experience was completely void of.
What it boils down to, is that Ninja Gaiden 3 is simply a disappointment. There's one weapon (with the option for 2 additional, useless ones), a lackluster enemy variety, and a bad, unfitting story line. There are a few brief moments of awesomeness that harkens back to what the series became famous for in the first place, but there's little reason to play this game over just playing through Ninja Gaiden Sigma again.