I still vividly remember Ninja Gaiden 2’s launch in 2008 even though I never played it. It may be hard to imagine now, but back in the 2000s, Team Ninja’s hack-and-slash series was briefly on the Mount Rushmore of action games (depending on who you talked to). It was praised for its stylish hyperviolence and its extreme challenge, earning Team Ninja the kind of loyal following from action aficionados that FromSoftware would begin to amass as the 2010s rolled around. Its star quickly faded in 2012 after the divisive Ninja Gaiden 3, but I still remember the series as a pillar of the early Xbox age.
It was those decades of memories that buzzed around me as I downloaded Ninja Gaiden 2 Black, a surprise remake revealed and released during this week’s Xbox Developer Direct. After admiring the series from afar for such a long time, I’d finally get to see what made Ninja Gaiden such a foundation action series. Instead, I spent my first hour with it scratching my head. This is the game people made such a big fuss about?
It was a knee jerk reaction that faded the more I understood what I was playing, but one that begged to be unpacked. Ninja Gaiden 2 Black may look like a 2025 video game thanks to its Unreal Engine 5 visuals, but it’s a relic from another era. Underneath all the glitz is a 2008 time capsule that’s ancient in game development years, one that reveals how homogenized video games have become in the series’ absence.
Time capsule
Ninja Gaiden 2 Black isn’t exactly a faithful recreation of the 2008 classic. It’s more so built from the bones of Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, a 2009 PS3 port that made significant changes to the original. You can currently find angry Steam reviewers lamenting that fact, showing the purist love that still exists for what seemed like a forgotten franchise for a decade.
I was none the wiser when I started playing, though. I quickly got a sense of Team Ninja’s formula as I sliced enemies up as Ryu Hayabusa. While I expected the extreme gore and combo-heavy slashing, I was hit with some shockers right out the gate. The unwieldy camera seemed to have a mind of its own, nauseously pivoting around as I moved. Where I expected smooth, fluid combat, I instead found myself stiffly cutting through foes with no lock-on to ground me. I tried to block incoming enemy attacks as a tutorial instructed me, but a lack of feedback left me feeling like it was a useless tool. Everything about it felt just a bit off in ways I couldn’t quite place.
As my frustration mounted, I had to stop for a moment and remind myself of something very important: This is not, in fact, a modern action game. It sure looks like one, but the Unreal Engine glow-up is as double-edged as Ryu’s katana. It creates an illusion of modernity that makes Ninja Gaiden 2’s design choices feel dissonant rather than intentional. All of the pain points I mentioned only felt like “flaws” because I was comparing Black to other action games that look like it – and all of those games have started to feel increasingly similar.
If you think 2008 wasn’t that long ago, consider what games didn’t exist yet. Bayonetta, Batman: Arkham Asylum, and Demons Souls all wouldn’t launch until 2009, one year after the original Ninja Gaiden 2. You could make an argument that those three games alone created the foundation for what today’s action games look like. Bayonetta redefined combo-heavy fighting, Arkham Asylum cracked fluidity, and Demons Souls needs little explanation considering that most of today’s action games carry a piece of its DNA. Ninja Gaiden 2 was the last of a dying breed in some ways: a genre game with its own distinct voice rather than an amalgamation of unwritten design laws.
Let’s go back to what I initially wrote off as “useless” blocking. In Ninja Gaiden 2, defense is paramount. Ryu is constantly flanked by enemies from every angle and he only has a flimsy block to help weather attacks. It’s modest compared to what you’d expect from today’s games. There’s hardly any feedback. Enemies don’t signpost their devastating moves with flashing red lights. There isn’t an automatic parry that rewards players for timing their block just write. Instead, it’s a maneuver that requires thought, attention, and skill. It’s a counter-attack tool, but one that doesn’t do the work for me. To master it, I need to throw everything I know about blocking out the window and learn to work blocks into my combos.
That’s difficult to unlearn, because almost every video game with a block nowadays is a variation on the same design theme. Block at the right moment and you’ll parry your enemy. It’s in Elden Ring, Final Fantasy 16, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, Rise of the Ronin, Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn – heck, even Doom: The Dark Ages is adopting the system. There are nuances to blocking in each of these games, but they’re all taking calls from the same playbook.
I can feel just how normalized those laws have become the longer I played Ninja Gaiden 2 Black. For instance, I execute a fiery special attack that eats a circle of energy by pressing B and Y at the same time. It feels clumsy as I keep accidentally triggering it when I don’t mean to. As I fiddle with it, I begin to understand how developers eventually arrived at skill wheels as a solution for specials. Everything from Ghost of Tsushima to Dynasty Warriors: Origins will have me holding a button and then pressing a face button to trigger a special attack. That ensures that I never waste a precious skill, whether it’s fueled by energy or a cooldown, when I don’t mean to. It’s a friction point that’s long been solved.
But “solve” isn’t the right word. It implies that there was a problem that needed fixing, and that’s not the case with Ninja Gaiden 2. Sure, its confused camera could be identified as a flaw, but the combat system works exactly as intended. It strikes a balance between fluidity and power. Ryu can hack up bodies with little effort, but he’s not invincible. Survival still requires players to master an art. You can’t simply pick up the controller and start slicing through waves of enemies with little thought. That’s what makes it such a challenging game, as its learning demands ramp up quickly.
The more I play, the more I begin to wonder why no recent big budget game feels quite like it. Is it just a healthy sign that video games are evolving? After all, who would want to play the exact same game for two decades? Perhaps, but I can’t shake the feeling that today’s AAA games feel bound to the same set of rules, all of which were forged in the interest of mass appeal. A block needs to act a certain way because that’s what feels best. I’m sure there’s extensive playtest data that backs that idea up or else it wouldn’t be such an industry standard. Video games are more expensive to make than ever, whether that’s because of scope creep or mismanagement, so targeting a niche has become an increasingly risky move that so few are willing to take. There is safety in uniformity.
I’ll be honest: Ninja Gaiden 2 Black doesn’t click with me. Ryu’s stiff strikes lack precision, which feels entirely at odds with the super ninja I see in cutscenes. But at the same time, I’m almost relieved to play a game that I can confidently say just “isn’t for me.” So many games I play these days feel like they’re built to win me over by recycling the same reliable ideas. Dynasty Warriors used to be a niche action franchise with a loyal fanbase, but its latest installment is mechanically indistinguishable from any action game you’d pull off a Walmart shelf. Is it better for that change, or just more bankable? It’s a game designed to ensure it gets close to an 80 aggregate score on Metacritic, a feat the series has long struggled to pull off because it was confident in its niche.
I fear that we’re losing the inventive spirit of video games the more risk averse the industry has become. Is there still room for big budget action games with distinct voices that aren’t afraid to alienate some players in favor of those who really get what it’s doing? Will Ninja Gaiden 4 follow the trends and have players parrying glowing attacks? What will be the Ninja Gaiden 2’s of tomorrow?
Ninja Gaiden 2 Black is available now on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC.
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