Review #685: Guilty Gear 20th Anniversary Edition

 This one being the guiltiest one of them all.

 I've liked Guilty Gear ever since I first saw an ad for it on a Gamepro magazine. I wouldn't get to play it until much later, and it'd be the sequel Guilty Gear X, when I managed to get my hands on the PC port. Which wouldn't run well on my PC, since apparently it couldn't deal with GG's giant sprites, so I'd get invisible character sprites and/or flickering. Regardless, it was love at first sight and I'd eventually make my way back to the very first game as well as play most of the sequels that came out. Guilty Gear 20th Anniversary Edition reunites both the very first game, as well as the final iteration of the XX series(I guess Xrd was too much for the Switch to handle?) in one small and disappointing package.

 Let's start with the extras, first of all, the game's cover is terrible. An odd complaint, maybe, but Guilty Gear has always had brilliant hand-drawn cover art by the creator himself. This cover is as generic anime as it can get. Then there's the artbook, which contains mostly black-and-white background art as well as some early designs for Bedman and Ephelt. Lame. It's hard not feel as if ArkSys didn't much care about this game, they were probably too busy scamming people with Blazblue Cross Tag. That said, even if they didn't care about it, Guilty Gear is still a fantastic fighting game series, and the games speak for themselves, window-dressing be damned.

 I've been on the lookout for Guilty Gear since I really wanted to own the game again, so I'm glad that Guilty Gear finally saw a rerelease. As far as fighting games go, even for its era,  Guilty Gear is pretty barebones. There's Arcade Mode, VS Player and Training mode, and that's that, there isn't even a difficulty setting option. Unlocking Testament and Justice isn't too bad, since it simply requires beating the game once, but Baiken is a whole 'nother story, requiring beating the game using no continues. And it's harsh, man! The CPU loves to abuse the Instakill mechanic, which was in a very early infancy for this game.

 The game is a bit rough, but I like the gritty sprites and subdued color palette. The core of what makes anime fighters tick was set in place with this game, with dashing, air-dashing and even air-combos being in vogue. Which Capcom did first, true, but Guilty Gear is much faster than anything they had done at the time. All in all, it's a good game, but every iteration that came afterwards would improve upon it. That said, no other game in the franchise looks like this one, so it's worth a look or two.

 Accent Core Plus R is a much better package, and easily worth the price of admission alone. It's got modes up the wazzoo(Arcade, Story, Survival, M.O.M, Mission, Training, VS Player and CPU as well as Team VS). It's also got way more characters than the original release, and you can pretty much double the roster with the unlockable EX versions of every character, which changes a few of their moves and properties. For instance, when I first played Accent Core on the PS2, after a few years of abstinence from the franchise, I was surprised to see my boy's, Ky Kiske, forward+HS changed. Using his EX version restores that move(At the cost of losing the Shoryuken's follow-up, but then again, my Ky never had that in the first place!).

 While it's true that the series got very complex by the time of Accent Core, with a lot of different mechanics I don't even dare get into, there's still a lot of fun to be had by mashing buttons, honestly! The games are so fast paced that it's very easy to make simple combos just by mashing, so I'm pretty sure anyone can have fun with the game. On another note, and this holds true for both games, playing with the joycons doesn't feel very good, the buttons don't work as well as a digital pad, and I've never been a fan of Nintendo's analog sticks, although I settled with the latter since I had no other choice, so it'd be better if you invested in other joysticks if you want to take the game seriously.

 I liked Guilty Gear 20th Anniversary Edition, but that's because I've always like the franchise. For a anniversary rerelease, this package leaves a lot to be desired, with a very underwhelming presentation and extras. ArkSys could and should've done better.
 8.0 out of 10

Review #684: Fire Emblem - Three Houses

 Four routes, one cart. Nintendo has learned.

 I was not planning on purchasing Fire Emblem - Three Houses this early, heck, while I own Awakening I never got to play it, and after the three routes-two(threeish) games shenanigans with Fates, I lost pretty much any interest I had in delving into the series. And then the timeskip trailer hit E3, and boy, oh, boy, Nintendo had me by the wallet. This latest installment in the long running strategy-RPG franchise has made a bunch of changes to its tried and true formula, adding various social mechanics, similar to the ones in Persona, as well as ditching the rock-paper-scissors weapon triangle.

 You take the role of the resident mute hero Byleth, male or female, a mercenary of few emotions that fights alongside his father. As luck would have it, he comes across the three future leaders of the divided country they live in. One thing leads to another and Byleth ends up becoming the professor of one of the three houses, and what follows is a story of warfare and political intrigue. If there's one complaint to be made it's that you are forced to pick your route pretty early in the game, before you get to know any of the characters that make up each house. As for me, I picked the Blue Lions and I was enamored with seeing how Nintendo played with their Heroic Lord tropes, and watching him turn into the psycho the trailer showed us. Afterwards I read TVTropes to get details on the characters I didn't get to interact with as well as the story revealed in the other three routes. Let me tell you, the story and characters are fantastic, the game does a fantastic job of portraying grey vs gray vs a pretty light shade of grey morality, while you can argue that one of the three Lords is much less morally ambiguous than the other two, I found myself surprised at playing a Nintendo game that had these many morally questionable characters. That said, whichever side of the battle you pick will eventually get redeemed, probably thanks to Byleth's influence on the Lord. On another note, the game is quite effective at making you get attached to the entire cast of characters, making it all the more tragic when you have to face them in battle, maybe even murdering them, after the timeskip. Regardless of whichever route you pick, the story is tragic and there's no "good ending" route, so steel yourself for the ride. On another note, most routes are 22 chapters long(For whichever reason the Black Eagles route is only 18) and it should take you about 40 hours on your first playthrough, probably less if you picked the Eagles. Since a single playthrough won't give you the whole picture, it's highly recommended that you play the other routes or read about them, because the plot can be quite interesting.

 Each chapter in the game takes place throughout an in.game month. At the start of each weak you'll be able to instruct your students(Basically, train their skills) and at the end of each week you'll get a day off, in which you can set out into a free battle, explore the academy in order to interact with other characters or take a few students into a seminar to increase their skills. You could also skip the day if you're boring and would rather just try to progress through the story.

 But you shouldn't skip those days. As for me, I'd usually set out to battle on two days, and explore the academy on the other two, alternating between them. Exploring the Academy lets you spend a set amount of time by partaking in activities(such as eating with a few of your allies, or joining together for choir singing). Talking with characters or giving them gifts won't reduce your activity time, but will let you increase Byleth's affinity with said characters. Byleth isn't the only character that can increase his affinity with the other character, which is why Choir and Dinner lets you pick two characters, so that you can raise affinity between those pairs as well. Raising affinity between characters is important because it'll unlock support conversations between them, giving the player more information about their personalities and motivations, as well as giving small stat boosts to the paired characters. Pretty much every character in a house has support conversations with each other, but if you play your cards right you can actually recruit characters from the other houses into your own, at least before the timeskip. And believe it or not, while they won't appear in the story cutscenes, they get unique support conversations with characters outside their house as well as unique dialogue during the timeskip to justify why they are with you and not their original house. Pretty neat!

 That said, recruiting characters from other houses is a bit tough, since they require Byleth having a pair of decent levels on specific weapons, skills or a stat. While having extra characters is nice, and not having to murder them after the timeskip feels great, it's better if you stick to the characters of your chosen house since they are the ones you'll be seeing the most of. On another note, Byleth is the only character capable of S-Ranking a relationship, which means Byleth 'marries' that character, which I bet is great news for shipping fanatics. Previous games let you marry other characters with, well, other characters, but Byleth is the only casanova(Casanovo in the female's case?) in this one.

 As for free battles, they are simple battles you can play in order to grind for levels or money. Every now and then, provided the right characters have joined your house, you'll be able to play 'Paralogue' missions, which are free battles that come with a few story tidbits pertaining a few specific characters. Usually they have some great rewards, so it's best you do them. Heck, a character in the Blue Lions route can die if you don't clear his Paralogue Mission before you hit the time limit. Usually you've got plenty of months before the paralogue mission goes away, so don't fret too much if you find yourself swamped with other priorities on a given month. That said, there's a limit to how many times you can fight Free Battles on your day off, although Normal Mode usually has a few maps that don't consume activity points, in case you really need to grind some levels. But you shouldn't. I played in Normal, with the Casual setting on, since I'm not a fan of having characters die permanently, and I didn't have much trouble with the game. Byleth just tanked(Or rather, avoided) everything and anything that came his way and pretty much killed any unit in a single turn.

 Battling is pretty simple, you pick any 12 or so units to form a team, and then take turns with the enemy to move your characters around and do battle. Characters don't take turns, rather, it's between you and the CPU, so you can move your characters in any order and do everything you can during yours. Each turn you can move every unit once, and only once, unless you have a Dancer, a special class that can only be unlocked through a special event that can dance to give a unit another turn. Unlike other strategy RPGs you don't get to move after attacking, which means that if you attack with a unit, without moving, its turn ends just like that, so positioning is a bit more strict and important. Seems that after Breath of the Wild Nintendo took a liking to Weapon durability, so every attack will reduce your weapons' durability by one, and special moves will consume more durability, as opposed to mana. Broken weapons can still be used, but they'll deal negligible damage, luckily every character can carry a bunch of items, so just carry multiple weapons with each character and you'll be good to go. On another note, visiting the Marketplace, which can be done at pretty much any time, lets you fix your weapons or buy new ones. Considering the items used to repair weapons can also be used to upgrade weapons you just might find more value into buying new weapons altogether.

 Class progression is done through skills, skills are passive traits, such as "Bow", "Horse Riding", "Heavy Armor" and characters raise these stats by studying during the week(You set goals, which translate to either one or two stats you want them to train) and/or by giving them personal lessons at the start of the week and, lastly, by fighting. For instance, if a character class has them riding a horse, every time they attack an enemy they will get points on the proficiency skill of the weapon they used and Horseriding. As characters increase in levels and train their skills they'll get the chance to take a certification and change classes. Classes are divided into tiers(Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced, Master) and every tier but Beginner also require using a Seal to attempt. And yes, characters may fail the exam, but you can save before taking the exam and try again another week(The result of the exam is set before the week starts, so no save scumming!).

 Honestly, Fire Emblem - Three Houses is amazing. The story is great, and the gameplay is fun, the developers managed to create a simple gameplay loop(Teaching, Socializing, Battling week by week) that's fun and rewarding while helping you grow attached to the characters. I enjoyed how dark the story and the lead characters could get, which really threw me for a loop since I wasn't expecting this amount of moral ambiguity from a flippin' Nintendo game. This is the first Fire Emblem game I ever got to play, and I must say, I'm impressed. Also, slightly scared since I know the other games are quite different from this one. Regardless, Nintendo managed to score another hit on their hybrid console.
 9.5 out of 10

Review #683: 64 Memories - Mortal Kombat Trilogy

 2 years later I still hate classic Mortal Kombat.

 Part I: The Flashback
 It's no secret that I think Mortal Kombat didn't get 'good' until its ninth iteration. That said, I played Mortal Kombat 2, Trilogy and 4 a bunch o' times with my father and friends, so back then quality never really mattered. As far as Mortal Kombat Trilogy goes, while it wasn't among my very first games, I'm sure I got it pretty early on. Y'know how kids are dumb and irrational? One time I got mad at my parents, for whatever silly reason, and started peeling off the cart's sticker. Sure, that'll show'em

 Part II: The Review
 Basically, I feel exactly like I did back when I played the PS1 version. The gameplay is simply too barebones to be any fun. There are only two things that set apart every character: Their special moves and their dial-a-combos. Back when I reviewed the PS1 version I actually found Dial-a-combos somewhat fun, even if you'd eventually just default to learning a few of those. This time around? I think the N64 pad just isn't suited for fighting games, and I dropped my dial-a-combos pretty frequently which wasn't much fun.

 The difficulty setting is high up to the point of unfairness and mitigating any fun you could have on your own. 2 on 2 and 3 on 3 I remember being decent fun, but you need another player, lest you get stuck on the character select screen. Game design at its finest. The N64 version has ZERO load times, which works wonders in this version's favor, but its missing a few characters from the PS1 version(Unmasked Sub-Zero, Human Smoke, Retro Fighters, Goro, Kintaro) which is kinda lame. Instead of the female Chameleon, we get the male ninja Khameleon, who is much cooler since he ain't wearing a glorified thong bikini.

 I'm sorry I can't hide my contempt for the game, but I've never found classic Mortal Kombat much fun, at least after I grew up. The gameplay is pretty barebones and digitized graphics were dated since their inception. I'm glad I can revisit my childhood games, and I don't think Mortal Kombat Trilogy is terrible, but this is not what I look for in a fighting game. On another note, I wouldn't be able to tell you which version is better. The PS1 version has more characters and a joystick better suited for fighting games, while the N64 version lacks loading times which is a HUGE boon, and it's also got 3 on 3 fights.
 4.5 out of 10

Review #682: 64 Memories - Cruis'n World

 Bigger. Better. Faster. The framerate still tanks though.

 Part I: The Flashback
 Nothing to see here! I played the first Cruis'n earlier this year, so, if you wish, consider this the unofficial fifth part of 'Unfulfilled Dreams' or something.

 Part II: The Review
 Cruis'n USA but better, that's how I'd describe Cruis'n World. It follows the same formula of racing from checkpoint to checkpoint before time runs out, but instead of being confined to USA, you get to explore multiple countries.... although Cruise the World ends, fittingly, in USA, capping the whole ordeal with a track in New York and another one in Florida. Beating Cruise The World also unlocks a 14th track, the Moon. Needless to say, going outside USA worked wonders for the game, as there's a ton of variety in the tracks. For instance, I was particularly fond of Egypt and China, not to mention that Kenya's interweaving roads were fun to race through. The CPU feels tougher in this game, even on the easiest difficulty setting I found myself retrying a few tracks. The game is pretty fun, and I'm pretty terrible at racing games, so I didn't mind, and the fact that you can progress through the game as long as you make it at least to the third place made it pretty lenient.

 There's a new racing mode, 'Championship', in which you can play more traditional lap-based races, which simply loop the existing tracks. There's also a practice mode. The game can be played with up to four players, which is pretty neat. What's not so good is that the framerate is still pretty bad. It feels more stable than it was in USA, but if the screen gets too crowded you'll find yourself driving underwater. Colliding against other cars is pure jank, and it never works quite as you'd expect, so just try to avoid collisions. Lastly, you can now perform tricks by double tapping the A button and holding different direction on the analog stick before a jump. It adds a couple of seconds to the timer and it adds little of value to the game, but it's there if you're feeling fancy.

 It's good. It's really good. As a matter of fact, it's better than the first game, thanks to its expanded car roster and more varied racing tracks. The soundtrack isn't as good as the first game's and I think crashes worked a little bit better, if more inconsistent, in that one too, but as far as raw gameplay goes, this one is cruise you want to take.
 8.5 out of 10

Review #681: 64 Memories - Goemon's Great Adventure

 Goemon's final adventure... overseas.

 Part I: The Flashback
 The final entry in 'unfulfilled dreams' is Goemon's Great Adventure. As much as I loved Mystical Ninja back in the day, I'm quite sure that I didn't feel like I needed this game as much as the previous three. Although that's not giving it enough credit, as soon as I discovered that emulating the Nintendo 64 was a possibility, this was the very first N64 rom I downloaded. I think that finding out it was a 2-D sidescroller kinda tainted my perception of the game. While I'd learn to love 2-D games again, I grew up with a NES after all, a few years later, by this time I was enjoying 3-D adventures a whole lot more.

 Part II: The Review
 While this game is quite different from Mystical Ninja, if you had known anything about the series back then, you'd have known that this game went back to Goemon's 2-D roots. Heck, there're are a lot of returning characters in the game, sadly, only a handful could be recognized by western folk, considering this only the fourth Goemon game that made it outside Japan. And the final one. In a nutshell, this is a 2-D platforming/adventure game in which you play as Goemon and his friends as they try to stop the evil Bismaru and his evil ghost cohorts. The game is divided into five chapters, each one having a different map overworld, although you can return to previous maps, with a bunch of different stages as well as a town that you can visit and revisit at any time once unlocked. And you'll have to return to previously cleared stages since a few of them offer alternate paths that may open up other stages.

 A jumps and B attacks, while any of the C-buttons can be used for your yen-consuming proyectile attacks, for instance, Goemon can shoot Zenny while Sasuke shoots bomb. Z is used to crouch, and R varies depending on the character, Yae can use it to turn into a mermaid while underwater, while Goemon can use his hookshot-pipe. Each character has a few unique attributes, and you do a bit of research since there are a lot of different moves the game won't tell you about. Holding Z+A performs a stealthy run, B can be held to dash while in towns, Ebisumaru can perform a butt-stomp to jump higher while Goemon can double jump. Heck, you'd best learn how to correctly swing on poles too(Start rolling, and then hold the analog stick TOWARDS the place you want to jump to). Sometimes a specific character will be required to continue or go through an alternate path, in most cases you'll find a character-change platform nearby so that you can swap characters. The game can be played in multiplayer, and you gain access to even more moves, like piggybacking another character or being able to ride tanks.

 The game is quite fun, although sometimes I felt like the game was built around Goemon. Maybe I just got comfortable with Goemon's double jumps, but a few jumps felt a bit too tight when I had to use other characters. It's also kinda tough. Characters can only take up to three hits before going down, although you can go into town and purchase a reviving item or armor(Up to 3 more hitpoints). Killing enemies will reward you with Yen, Health or weapon upgrades. The latter increase the damage and range of your basic attack, up to three levels of power(Bronze, Silver, Gold), but getting hit not only takes up a health point, but your weapon also goes down one level! Money is fairly important since it will increase your chance of survival, as well as being required for a few sidequests. so most of the time I avoided using anything besides the basic attack, as its the only means of defeating an enemy that makes them drop anything.

 As you play through the game you'll learn to love towns. Not only can you purchase much needed supplies, but it's also one of the only two places where you can save your game, the other one being after defeating a boss. A few times throughout the adventure you'll find yourself talking with NPCs in order to unlock new skills for your characters or to engage in simple sidequests to earn Entry Passes. You need Entry Passes to unlock the gates that guard the final stage of each chapter. I don't think you have to do much sidequesting, while I was a bit of a completionist, seeking every NPC worth an Entry Pass I could, every single time I went to a gate I was able to open it up with a ton of passes to spare. That said, there are 44 Entry passes in all, and if you collect all of them you'll be able to wear alternate costumes with each character as well as unlock a 4 player mode. Pretty spiffy if you ask me. Plus, most Entry Passes are simply earned by clearing a stage, stages with multiple routes have one for each exit, so you don't have to stray far off the beaten path in order to get the bare minimum.

 Just like Mystical Ninja, the giant robot Impact returns, alongside his girlfriend, Ms. Impact. After every Castle stage you'll fight a boss, and after defeating the boss you'll have to fight a giant boss. They have been made simpler than in Mystical Ninja, the hook is gone, now you can throw a baton to Ms. Impact to switch to her(or vice versa). While you have a few different punches and kicks, you'll want to input the C-button combination for the rapid punch every time you can, and once the gauge fills, the C-button combination for the Beam super. Simple and repetitive, yes, but they are a nice way of capping each chapter. Impact's song, however, is gone.

 The game is a bit tough to be sure, three hits and you're out is kinda harsh, and the game is rather stingy with checkpoints, plus, it runs on a life system. However, it's pretty fun, and once you get the swing of things you'll be able to clear stages without getting hit too much. A few stages might take a few tries before you get used to its obstacles, but I never needed to 'take a break' or what have ya, since the game has snappy, quick gameplay and is quite entertaining,

 While I was reading how many people considered this game better than Mystical Ninja, at first, I was insulted. You couldn't top my childhood memories of the game, you simply couldn't. But after finishing the game? I sorta agree. I don't think it's THAT much better, I really enjoyed the open-worldish adventure aspect of the previous game, and the OST was brilliant, oozing a ton of personality and charm. This game has no theme song, and while the humor is still here, I didn't find it AS funny as the first game. But the gameplay aspect feels a bit better, it's reminiscent of an Arcade action-platform game, with fast-paced gameplay and various one-time gimmicks and obstacles that are fun to tackle. It's pretty good, but it's also got a different flavor from the previous game, but anyone up for an old-school 2-D platform game would do well to give it a look.
 7.5 out of 10

The DLC Report: Power Rangers - Battle for the Grid Season 1 Lord Zedd

 Season 1 is over, and what've we got?

 With Lord Zedd's release, Power Rangers - Battle for the Grid is finally what it should've been from the start. 15 characters, including a Blue ranger, a decent Story-Mode, voices(including actors from the original show) and even spark hit effects when getting hit. Now THIS is a release I can get behind, which will make Limited Game Run's release all the more worth it.

 Lord Zedd is a fun character to use, he has great reach, and is easy to combo with. His super involved a Putty running from behind an enemy's back which can be a great mind-game tool. And, for a change, he's actually got a pretty decent gold-colored alt, which makes my Gold Team(Jason, Trey and Zedd) complete.

 Whether you purchased the DLC or not, the game also got patched with a bevy of balance changes, a few involving comboing and magic-series, which gives the game a slightly different feel with a few characters, nothing us casuals should get concerned with, however. It also includes the conclusion to the Story Mode. It has brand new cutscenes, and the conclusion is satisfying even if it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. That said, the game pits you as and against Mighty Morphin' Pink Ranger and Lord Drakkon Evo II, y'know, paid DLC skins, which is rather lame of the developers. I'm a sucker and I pre-ordered the complete edition so I actually own those costumes, but I can't help but feeling like it's rather lame.

 All in all, Battle for the Grid is finally on the state it should've been released in. The game is fun, there's finally a decent amount of characters(Even if it panders WAY TOO MUCH to Mighty Morphin' fans) and you can get quite a bit of mileage out of the Story Mode. For future updates, I hope we get more Options(like a flippin' difficulty setting) and more color palettes for each character.

 8.0 out of 10

Review #680: The Ninja Saviors - Return of the Warriors

 At least the title makes sense this time around.

 Picture a young me. A very young young me. There I was, going through a newly found fountain of games via SNES emulation, and thus, I came across this thing called ' The Ninja Warriors Once again'. It was weird, man, a single-plane beat'em up in which you played as cyborg ninjas, well, only the red kunoichi looked anything like a Ninja. But it was loads of fun, yo! And now, Tengo Project decided to remaster the game for modern consoles. And it's glorious. The Ninja Saviors - Return of the Warriors is a brilliant remake that's ought to be played by anyone that loves retro games.

 As previously stated, this is a single-plane beat'em up game, which can get a while getting used to, as well as to how slow your basic movement speed is. It's not like most beat'em ups, that's for sure. In the original game you could play as three different Ninja robots, the blue Ninja, the Red Kunoichi or the grey scythes-for-arms thing. This remaster adds two new characters, the petite, large-breasted Yaksha and the massive metal mountain, that can change into a gun-on-legs mode, Raiden. Using these two new characters is a bit of a bummer since you need to clear the game twice, but they are completely different from the other three, so they are quite worth it. As a matter of fact, all five characters are incredibly different from each other, and each one has their own learning curve and strategies. Like, I got the hang of the blue guy pretty easily, and I can clear the game just fine with him, while I still struggle with the other four. Thankfully we get infinite continues, limited only by a checkpoint system, and you can change characters on death.

 The game is tough but fair. Well, for the most part. 90% of the game is a blast, but the final boss is incredibly cheap since he can't be harmed directly, but rather, you have to throw enemies against it. I died a couple of times with my blue guy until I learned that I could angle his up-throws by using diagonal-up-left and diagonal-up-right on the digital pad. And that brings me to another issue, while you only have a single attack button, character movesets are very large.. but there's no in-game moveset list. I swear, every time I picked up the game I learned a new move with my blue by. Or take Yaksha, if you jump and kick she'll perform a flying kick, but if you try to experiment you'll learn that if you press Down+Attack after landing the flying kick, she'll follow up with another kick. But only if you press down+kick. And I learned this by chance, since nowhere in the game can you find this stuff out, which is very disappointing considering how much potential each character has! Heck, I'm still not sure exactly how I'm making Raiden turn around or turn into his robot mode.

 But really, despite only having two buttons(Three if you count the super move) each character has a ton of tools to their disposal. For instance, let's talk about my boy, the blue ninja. The attack button performs a simple punch-into-nunchaku combo BUT if you have energy on your energy gauge, you can press up+attack before he takes out his nunchaku to deliver a powerful shockwave attack. You can also tap down+attack before the nunchaku comes out to perform a kick. Attacking while crouched performs a pretty different attack string that ends with a kick. Holding up on the direcional pad will let you use energy-consuming moves, this is true for every character, in the case of Ninja, he can use powerful nunchaku attacks until his gauge runs out. Down+Jump will make Ninja perform a downward elbow attack, but you can also tap Jump to dash forward, if you don't press anything, Ninja will attack with his elbow when he comes into contact with an enemy, or you can press Attack to deliver a kick. Dashing is a great way to close-in and grab the enemy. Up+Jump makes ninja hover, coupling this with Attack+any direction will make Ninja spin-attack in said direction. Then you've also got three different throws depending on where you hold when throwing a grabbed enemy. Lastly, when the energy gauge is full you can use a third button to perform a screen-covering super move. This is just a single character, but everyone else has a moveset comparable to his, and I'm not even mentioning how you can combo-into a few of his attacks. And there are probably moves that I haven't discovered yet. And this is exactly why the game NEEDS an in-game movelist.

 The game is incredibly fun because of just how much you can do. At times enemies can feel endless, but most of those can be offed in a single hit. Regardless, if you mean to beat the game you'll have to learn how to juggle fighting multiple enemies on a single lane at the same time. Honestly, it's a lot of fun. After finishing the game with my boy I immediately took out Yaksha for a spin, and had just as much fun discovering how she played, and I had to change my entire playstyle to fit hers! Kunoichi was pretty fun to use as well, while Kamaitachi didn't really gel with me, I'm usually not much of a fan of glass cannons. The game is 8 stages short, and they are pretty short, but the game is highly replayable.

 One area in which the developers deserve a ton of praise is on the sprites, as both new characters looked straight out of the original. In an era where 16-bit sprites are ignored in favor of 8-bit sprites or 3-D models, the new spritework is simply brilliant. A few of Yaksha's hook-attacks look a bit too fluid and modern, but I think it actually adds to her less-than-human movement. This game is a pleasure to look at, and it has been redesigned to look great in widescreen, with no screen-crunching or compromises, at least not as far as I could see. I'm not gonna lie, I wasn't gonna play this game right now, but I took it out for a spin, since I wanted to try it out, but it hooked me until its end!

 Besides the main single-player mode, beating the game unlocks a Hard mode, which I'll admit I didn't try since I really don't care about bragging rights. There's a new mode, which was one of the things I was looking forwards the most with this remaster: Multiplayer. But it sucks! Both the energy gauge as well as the health bar is shared, which, you know, kinda sucks when the game is rather tough since playing with a less skilled player means that you have to be extra careful as not to get hit to make up for their mistakes, and it also means that both players will be fighting for the energy gauge. I'm glad the main game is so much fun, because it made the disappointment of the multiplayer mode not hurt as much. As much. While hardly a long game, being able to save midway through a run would've been a welcome addition, as it stands, once you decide to play the game you are in it for the long-haul.

 Well, The Ninja Saviors - Return of the Warriors succeeds with flying colors as a remaster. It's the same game it used to be but with more content. And I love that they put effort into adding more stuff to a SNES game. It helps that the gameplay is SO good. That said, one has to admit that it falls short in a few areas, like the new multiplayer mode or the lack of a movelist. The game great, so it's not too hard to look past that, but it feels like a bit of wasted potential to make the game even greater. Regardless, I hope we get more SNES remasters done this way. The right way.
 8.0 out of 10