Team Ninja certainly has a lot in the works, what with Ninja Gaiden 3, Ninja Gaiden Razor’s Edge and the PS Vita version of Ninja Gaiden Sigma all currently in development at the studio. The studio’s former figurehead and some say the ‘rockstar-like,’ Tomonobu Itagaki may now have left Team Ninja, however this is a developer going from strength to strength.
During our visit to this year’s Eurogamer Expo we managed to catch up with the studio’s localization producer, Peter Garza, to talk all about Ninja Gaiden 3 and the other titles that the studio has in the works, while we also took some time to shoot a brief off-screen video of the game to give you an idea of just how this title is shaping up.
Anyone who has played a Ninja Gaiden game before will know just how tough they can be, therefore this time around the team have decided to focus, not only on finding a way to bring outsiders into the series, but also to bring the story to the forefront by taking the emphasis away from less realistic combat and the results of that. What this means is that less realistic moves such as be-headings, etc, have been sacrificed and instead players are given a chance to experience just what it’s like to really cut someone down and the consequences that this will bring. One of the ways the team has done this is by introducing a new Hero Mode, which helps ease players into the game, meaning that even if you have no idea what this series is about, you should now be able to jump straight in.
“Ninja Gaiden has a long history and it has gotten a reputation for being a very difficult game,” Garza told us. “We were trying to think of a way to get people who have lapsed from the series or people who haven’t played before into the series, so this is how we came up with the different play styles. Hero Mode is there as a different entry into the same content, as within Hero Mode you will find computer assists for guards and evades, so we want people to concentrate more on the story and get a feeling for Ninja Gaiden and what it’s like to play.”
As explained by Garza, Ninja Gaiden 3 is definitely trying to put more emphasis on the story and humanize Ryu as the main character. What this means is that you’ll see this working in both the story elements as well as gameplay elements as enemies beg for their lives.
“In Japanese there are two words for cutting,” said Garza, “one is for cutting fruit and one is for cutting and killing someone with a sword; in English in Ninja Gaiden 3 we are trying to focus on the latter and the feeling of what it’s actually like to cut someone down. This is something that Team Ninja knows, it knows swordplay and we are trying to bring it into a more mature take on visceral action swordplay.”
Previous games in the series have generally been a case of hack and slash, with the focus mainly on blood and be-headings, however as explained by Garza, although the team is still happy to stick to the roots of the game, there is now a different agenda as far as this next title in the series is concerned. “We are trying to make Ninja Gaiden 3 into a modern action game in order to make it more immersive,” he said. “We don’t have essence which are the orbs from the past titles, that functionality has been worked into other gameplay aspects that make it more seamless; so when you have a in-game event you are free to go cut someone down or let them suffer on their way,” which we are sure you agree is slightly different from just killing everything that moves.
Given that you now have a choice as to whether you kill someone or spare their lives, we were curious to know, that if you did decided to kill someone, if there would be consequences; it seems that this will be the case, although as explained by Garza, killing does have it’s advantages.
“The story starts off in London and a little way into the story Ryu has a curse played on him, [if you have seen the latest trailer he has red stuff on his arm - that’s a curse] and it sort of feeds off all of the lives that he takes, so the more people he kills, the more it progresses, gameplay wise this translates into a bad-ass special move, but you have to kill people to power that up. You’ll see the curse progress throughout the course of the story as he takes more lives. So without trying to make this heart-felt, tender story about Ryu, he kills things and he kills people and he has done that for several titles, but we wanted to use that history and tell a more mature, modern tale of what that means.”
Action games these days generally come in at around the eight hour mark to complete and this will be the case with Ninja Gaiden 3. The developer also tells us that, as you would expect, the story of Ryu the Dark Hero is pretty linear, “The events of the story will string you along, there’s no branching paths or good or bad morality systems or anything like that, we really want to try and focus on telling the story and have people concentrate on that,” Garza confirmed.
As for multiplayer, we have been told that this will be split into two major divisions, the co-op mode and the versus mode; within the co-op mode there will be team battle co-op mode and regular versus battles and within the versus mode there will be team battles and the regular death match battles. Garza confirmed that “maps will probably be taken from the campaign,” although he also added that the team are still working on what they will be including into online in terms of maps.
Finally we were also curious to know about both the Wii U and PS Vita titles which the team are working on. Garza explained that as far as the Wii U is concerned, which incidentally he called “graphically on par” with Xbox 360 and PS3, that currently “it’s just a case of experimenting and finding out what works,” although he also added that the team “do have a base for touch controls from Ninja Gaiden Dragon Sword on the DS, so can use that experience to figure out what touch controls feel right and what might not work.”
As for the PS Vita version, Ninja Gaiden Sigma, Garza says that the the team will be looking to update it for the Vita, “adding in the play style such as the Hero Mode and the Hero, Ninja play style,” although he also mentioned that the team will be “using the touch screen for some controls.”
So it seems that Team Ninja, while doing all it can to bring a new Ninja Gaiden experience to consoles, also has its mind firmly on future hardware too. Given the passion and positive nature of Peter Garza all we can see for the studio is success, which in all honesty is something that it deserves.
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great interview man! you got good stuff info!
gamers these days are all spoil brats. All they care about is their games and absolutely do not care about the people who constantly shed blood,sweat, frustration when making games. They are all bunch of kids who complain about everything!
The Legend of Megaman fanboys are the worst examples so far!