Ninja Gaiden II (2008)

I played this game on loan from my cousin on 2 separate occasions separated by a few years. The first time, I played on Warrior difficulty (normal) and got as far as chapter 9. I got the achievement for dying 100 times and my controller has split and has a brown stain from being repeatedly slammed into my coffee table. That does not even begin to describe the frustration that is this game; in fact a new word beyond frustration must be created just for this game. I did not get any further than that because my cousin took the game back.

Years later I got a loan of the game again and was no longer using the xbox account I had before. Why not play the game again? This time I did Acolyte (easy). I did beat the game. I did not get the 100 deaths achievement again. The game was still frustrating but not as difficult. I had tried out all of the weapons on the first playthough but this time I focused on the dragon sword and sometimes used the dual blades. There are multiple problems with this game though it boils down to the game being deliberately designed to be unfair and user unfriendly, which is not the good kind of difficulty. The camera is obnoxious, the controls are awkward, and many enemies have unavoidable attacks. I looked up online how to play this game and had to roll my eyes at the ridiculousness of it; the best way to play the game is to ignore many of the moves and focus on spamming the charge up ultimate technique. What kind of game is so unbalanced so as not to have every move and style of combat be viable? And how is it fun to sit there charging up attacks?

The only part of this game that I liked was the violence and gore, though I did appreciate the auto saves for boss fights. Overall I believe this game was a waste of time for me. It is hard to believe that so much could change for the worse from Ninja Gaiden Black to this.