Article by deniz
akatsuki Field Report
summary With more than 100 playable characters to choose from and an enhanced fighting system, the new Naruto game is more addictive and diverse than ever. An absolute must have for every Naruto fan to wage epic battles against friends bringing to life dream battles that were never before possible.
Art style
Naruto ultimate ninja storm’s art style almost flawlessly transitions the anime’s smooth colourful appearance into a 3d cell shaded masterpiece. Each representation of even minor characters such as the mizukage has been represented perfectly in both the overall appearance and there unique and intense fighting style visuals.The cell shading is very bright accurate to the manga and anime, which is a convention of anime based games such as dragonball tenchaichi and the one piece series, all of which feature a high contrast artstyle. which shows us its almost a trend to convey originally 2d based concepts and recreating them in a refined , sleak streamline artstyle. “Ultimate Ninja Storm Revolution” has a gorgeous paintbrush aesthetic: it’s reminiscent of famous Edo Period art. And it’s not just the menus that get this look -- the characters look hand-drawn, even during hectic battle animations. The game often switches between this anime-inspired aesthetic and scenes from the actual “Naruto” anime. 40%
Gameplay
boasting the biggest roster of characters in a fighting game ever at 118, you would probably think that the balancing between characters is fairly out of hand, however you would be wrong. Surprisingly every character is an almost perfect representation of the power they possess in the anime, so for example characters like madara, and Naruto are evidently stronger than people like choji HOWEVER, people like choji ( as seen in the anime) can use their ultimate jutsu’s and make a comeback if the player is skilled enough, which really does portray the way in which fights play out in the anime. A fight is never truly lost until you have completely shattered your characters resources. Now the characters jutsu’s are for most fans the core of the game, each unique to their respective owner and highly capable of turning the tide of battle if timed right. However to restrain the use of jutsu’s being spammed at the beginning of the match and having an unfair advantage because of it , much like in the anime the players character must charge up enough chakra or take a certain amount of damage to charge up here gorges and unleash hell upon the opponent, which even then is dependant on the players skill as jutsu’s can be dodged or even blocked in various ways, making fights between people much more intense and encourages the player to keep focus, which really does bring some immersion from the Naruto series as you take on the powers and weaknesses of a powerful ninja fighting in a life and death battle with another ninja that rivals and challenges your skill. For the way in which the mechanics essentially work in fights, there are two characters placed on a circular battlefield of their choice, each character has a health bar, a chakra bar, and a jutsu meter. The health is essentially your characters life bar , chakra is the energy source in which you use to execute your jutsu’s, to do these jutsu’s you must charge your chakra bar by pausing and meditating with a hand sign over time, and your jutsu meter is what allows you to execute your most powerful jutsu’s and are usually the most iconic signature moves for each character, such as sasuke’s kirin, or naruto’s
to’s rassengan. This bar can be charged by taking a certain amount of damage throughout the battle and often lets you change the tide of battle. The size of the meters is dependent on the characters which makes each of there weaknesses and strengths more accurate to the series and gives the player reasons to want to play each character. Battles are ridiculous and fast-paced. There’s always an explosion happening or someone getting punched into the atmosphere -- it’s completely over the top, but the close-quarters fighting is entertaining, in a juvenile, basic way. There’s a lot of button mashing because your main attack is channeled through just one button, but you unleash a flurry of hits that happen too fast for you to recognize. Then you can follow with a “Chakra Attack” or “Ultimate Jutsu.” There’s another crazy animation, and you go right back to the action.
Story because naruto revolution is essentially the ultimate fan service (in the sense that all the fans favourite and most wanted characters,stories and costumes are included) this allows for revolution to stray from the manga’s story and take a completely differant path. an example of this is the new “mecha naruto”storyline in which naruto and mecha naruto fight over hinata, which is something that is a clear tribute to the fans and to please them. There is essebtially a main story in this game -- the Ninja World Tournament mode -- and it’s centered on four-player “orb battles,” which focus on stealing other characters’ stuff instead of straight-up fights. These quickly devolve into “kill the man with the most.” While that does make logical sense, it also means the computer characters will actually ignore each other if you have a lead. For devoted fans of the series, Bandai has also included a few original episodic stories, complete with new full-motion videos.
Verdict Should you play this? If you’re already a “Naruto” fan, absolutely. And if you’re into fighting games, this is worth playing, although it’s not worth a full-price purchase. But if you’re anybody else? No. You’ll just be confused.Naruto revolution is essentially a game for fans, inspired by fans.which essentially makes it clear that most of the audience for this game will be die hard naruto infusiasts , or possible anime fans.