Remember Ninja Gaiden for the Xbox? Throw in playing as Rachel and a few more missions, and you have this. And 1080p.
Short synopsis of the story. You are Ryu Hayabusu of the Hayabusa Ninja Clan. You are protectors of the Dragon Blade. An evil samurai by the name of Doku is searching for the Dark Dragon Blade (a sword of evil) and has murdered your entire ninja clan. You are out for revenge, heads are cut off, ninja stars stuck in eye, and a lot of yelling and screaming from the inundation of constant attacks will leave you hoarse. Err... I just broke the 4th wall there huh?
Anyways, let's just get into it.
Gameplay : The gameplay is like Mario 64, but with ninja, swords, and lots of violence. Ryu can run, jump, run on walls, jump off walls and anything you think a ninja can do, he can do it. Combat involves using a combination of heavy and light attacks for different combinations. There are many weapons, ranging from the Dragon Sword (a simple Katana) to a dual Katana, nunchuks, a giant hammer and more. The more powerful the weapon (I.E. it's powerlevel from paying the blacksmith Muramasa), the more combinations and deadly attacks you can unleash.
In addition to melee weapons, you get throwing shurikens, smoke bombs, arrows and more. These are necessary to pick off certain enemies or at least distract them to get close enough. Also, you can use ninjutsu (Ninpo) to devastate your enemies by pressing the activation button and shaking your SixAxis (TM) controller around to power it up. Not really necessary, but it's slightly more interesting than just pressing the buttons. Enemies come at you often and fierce. Many times there is at least one enemy who is stronger than the others and has a strong ranged weapon (not to mention is potent at close range combat). So you have to dodge and jump and roll to make it to an enemy and attack them. But they don't politely stop, they all keep attacking, so you must be swift like a ninja, lest you get irritated like a badger getting kicked in the rump.
Put it this way... you will die... a lot. After 3 or so deaths, the game will allow you to restart on a lower level (Which I have to stay is still pretty hard). Granted, it is a nice challenge, but I want to be able to at least enjoy my cool ninja swordsmanship and watch as I lop off heads and impale people, not have to worry how fast I can hit the L1 button and dodge out of the way before I can blink... This is the only reason I give the game a non perfect Gameplay score. It's not just intense, it's aggravating to the point you can't take it all in, that's what I'm saying. The weapons all have different strengths against different enemies and everything is very slick and smooth in terms of gameplay... but you don't get a second to breath at all in the middle of combat. And even no matter how fast you move, someone always manages to jump out of the shadows or from around the corner, or just simply walks up to you and instantly hops to your back and slits your throat. That my friends, is annoying, not clever challenging gameplay.
One last thing is that you get many potions of life, magic and items that increase your overall life total (these often require a great deal of exploring or a difficult trial to overcome). Other things are amulets that power your attacks or decrease damage. I guarantee you will use your potions very often as a new player. Thankfully on the "Ninja Dog" mode, your helpers will give you new healing items and bonuses (which with even that may not be enough for the more casual or less experienced player).
Graphics : I don't know what people were smoking when they said this game was lightyears ahead of the Xbox version, but it I assure you is not.
Where to start...
1.) The cutscenes are horrendous. Not the ingame engine, the "FMV" versions. They are extraordinarily pixelated and I guarantee don't come in at 1080p resolution. They are also very shiny and plastic looking, I'd much rather prefer to watch the in game cutscenes. Really, I swear they just took what they had from the SD Xbox version and put it on the disc.
2.) I'm running my PS3 through an HDMI cable at 1080p and I can STILL see massive amounts of jaggies and sharp polygons everywhere. Like just looking at buildings or trees or just anything you can see it.
3.) This is a minor detail, but the blood is literally applied to this game like a sticker. Yes, a sticker... which floats a good 6 inches off the surface it is applied to. More than once I saw the sticker applied a door, and half of it was sticking out into space like nothing was there to hold it up, yet it as just sitting there happy as can be as a 2d object.
I was expecting some major polishing in every aspect. There was none beyond the new additions, which some are very nice, but anything in the previous Xbox version was not upgraded at all.
In the 2nd mission, you have to rush to a temple which is on fire. This was an intense scene where everything was burning and exploding into hot embers. This scene DID show the 1080p resolution graphics to the fullest and utilized a good graphics engine. Unfortunately, this awesome set of graphics did not carry over to other scenes as of mission 7. Too bad, because if they put that much care into retouching the game, this would have not had such glaring flaws.
Ryu looks great, but much the same as he did in the Xbox version. The game does run at a very smooth 60 FPS though, which lends itself to the fluid motions of a ninja engaged in battle. But again, this isn't very hard when the graphics aren't that superior to the Xbox version.
Rachel on the other hand got a tremendous amount of attention. She has 5 or 6 unlockable hairstyles and the sheer amount of time put into her hair and um... "Chest" physics is boggling. She moves very gracefully, in a different, feminine, but distinctly non ninja way. This does not make her any less deadly. In fact I think she kills human opponents better than Ryu, but he is better against fiends... considering she's the fiend hunter and all.
Anyways, there are a few other nice touches like individual falling leaves and reflecting marble floors, but there is no battle damage to walls or bullet holes or sword marks.
Good graphics, but not great, nothing like people promised that would redefine graphics.
Sound : The soundtrack is pretty good. It ranges from traditional Japanese Koto and Shamisen filled tracks to thumping guitar riffs in the middle of combat.
Sound effects (especially the thunder) really boom, the crackle of fire pops and hisses with pockets of sap in the wood. Footfalls change depending on what surface they are on and, mercifully, are not as ever present and annoying as in other games. Well Rachel with her high heel boots on does make more sound, but Ryu as a stealthy ninja does not (although you can't sneak up on people in this game for some strange reason...)
Sword slashes make tearing noises when cutting enemies and sword on sword or rock make a distinctive clang of steel. Guns pop, shurikens woosh, everything just fits into place properly. The voice overs aren't bad, but the accents are a little weird, and to be honest, I don't know why it is isn't in Japanese with subtitles, at least for Ryu. Whatever, it's just some of the voices seem a little over the top or cliched, but not necessarily bad in any way.
Value : 60$ for a little more content of a game I played years ago doesn't scream value to me. Perhaps to a first timer, yea, but for those jaded Xbox owners, this isn't a prime game to get. I bought it because it simply was the best game on the PS3 in my opinion, but like I said, I've played this before. Knock the points up a bit higher for those uninitiated.
Tilt : This game is great though, if not a bit aggravating and already well traveled in the past. The graphics are in no way bad at all, but they are not all they are promised to be, and there are glaring imperfections that aren't hard to notice. Still, you won't have more fun (or frustration) at being a ninja anywhere else.