Shadow of the Ninja – Reborn PC review – Prettier but worse than the original in every other way

I’ve been on a stage-based 2D action-platformer kick lately, so I absolutely needed to play Shadow of the Ninja – Reborn. While I love the Castlevania and Ninja Gaiden games, the original Shadow of the Ninja isn’t up to their level for me. That being said, it’s still a solid little NES game. Therefore, a remake seemed like a great chance to improve upon that game to a notable degree. I can’t argue against this version’s excellent spritework, as all the characters and enemies are as chunky as they are detailed, even if the original game’s art direction is completely disregarded. But the sad thing is that the gameplay and general design here is considerably worse than it was in the original game, leaving me even more disappointed by it.

Shadow of the Ninja – Reborn lets you pick between a male and female ninja at the start, as well as purchase some items to take into battle with you. You’ll unlock more items and the cash with which to buy them by playing through the game. Just like the original, there are six stages filled with fighting, platforming, and boss battles. The game visually reminds me of 90s arcade games, as it’s really bright, energetic, and full of detail, a stark contrast to the moody, muted NES game. Levels loosely follow the NES game’s stages. They’re in similar places with matching enemies and have the same general events.

However, the gameplay is completely different and the actual details and enemy placements have been nearly entirely reimagined. If you’re thinking of picking the game up because you want to play Shadow of the Ninja with better graphics, this isn’t going to provide that. Player characters now constantly have access to their sword and kusarigama attacks, as they’re mapped to separate buttons. I liked this, as having constant access to a semi-ranged attack boosts your effectiveness and options considerably. That said, the sword attack’s range feels low to me, plus the attack itself is unsatisfactory. Using the kusarigama, on the other hand, feels kind of sluggish and often locks you in its animations so long that you’ll find yourself taking damage frequently after using it.

But that’s not all that’s sluggish. The jumping, climbing, and general movement just don’t at all feel right. For the most part, it all feels unresponsive, but the way mechanics work also hurt the gameplay. You can cling to certain bars and pull yourself up, but you do this by pressing up. Hitting the jump button will dislodge you and you can also cling to ledges and run up walls by pressing the jump button. These two should let you pull yourself up with the same button, so it feels wonky to have them be two different things. With that said, these all feel far too rigid to the point that I’d end up mashing the jump button solely in the hopes that my character would pull themselves up.

The wallrunning in particular just feels awful. It almost reminds me of a 2D version of Shinobido, a ninja game from the mid 00s with terrible controls. Levels are absolutely packed with enemies trying to kill you. Honestly, there are usually too many and they’re placed haphazardly, so Shadow of the Ninja – Reborn often doesn’t feel balanced or fair. It’s just a bunch of crap going on at once that you can’t really respond to because the controls and the mechanics are subpar. At least cutting enemies down can feel satisfying, but even then the sword attack feels so light and powerless that even this doesn’t live up to its promise.

Your character can always take eight hits and stages are usually divided into three or four sections. Oddly, one way that Shadow of the Ninja – Reborn sticks very closely to the original is in one of the worst. If you die, you get a game over and can choose to continue or exit. Continuing will let you try again from the start of whichever section you were on, whilst exiting will take you back to the main menu. However, exiting is the only way to save the game. If you play without dying or simply decide to return to the menu, any progress will be lost. This is such a baffling, backward decision that I almost couldn’t believe it.

You’ll find plenty of items from weapons to health throughout the levels (or you can buy them at the game’s start,) but you lose everything when you do. Therefore, if you die even a single time, your purchases will be gone. Once again, this was a horrible idea, but it gets worse. To swap to an item, you press the right shoulder button, which will cycle you to the very first item in your inventory. To swap to others, you have to hold the button and then use the d-pad or control stick to cycle through them manually. They’re used by pressing the sword attach button, meaning that you can’t use your sword while one is equipped. There are multiple unused buttons, so there’s absolutely no excuse for this.

It sure would be useful to just fire a shot or have heals queued up without having to stop what you’re doing, but no, Shadow of the Ninja – Reborn needed convoluted, awful item management. If you die (and you will,) the game will throw you a bone by always giving you an energy drink that lets you use a projectile slash with your sword. You find a powerup that does just that with great frequency, so this isn’t really all that helpful. After a few more deaths the game will then give you a rice ball. On the positive side, falling into a pit just removes a hit instead of giving you a game over, but you’ll still lose an entire quarter of your life if you’re knocked into that pit. I fell so much due to both terrible enemy placement and the game’s clumsy controls.

The game does let you restart from the beginning of boss battles usually, at least, which is great because the boss battles are just as clumsy and tedious as everything else, although they do look quite appealing. You have a little dodge move you can do too, but it grants no i-frames and is about as responsive as the rest of your moves, so it’s not as helpful as you might think. It’s just wild to me that, aside from visually, Shadow of the Ninja – Reborn gets almost everything wrong. As I said, I’m not a big fan of the original game, but it didn’t have these problems when it debuted 3.5 decades ago.

From the movement to the combat to the way enemies work, absolutely none of this bears much resemblance to the original game. The devs decided to remake everything from scratch and it all came out worse than an NES game. It’s almost impressive. Not since the XIII remake have I seen a remake that not only failed to recreate the game it was remaking, but managed to make it worse in nearly every way.

Shadow of the Ninja – Reborn is not just a bad game, but it’s a terrible remake that fails to really resemble the original, while destroying it in the process. Fans of that game should absolutely stay far away from this, as there just isn’t much to like beyond the pixel art. Gluttons for punishment can try out the game’s hard mode or do time trials, but I don’t see many people willingly subjecting themselves to this remake.

Check out our previous review:

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