When a global war nearly decimated humankind, an evil military organization called Oniken takes advantage of the situation to dominate and oppress the few remaining survivors. Even though any resistance to this organization seemed hopeless, a small rebel movement organizes strikes against Oniken. One day, a ninja mercenary named Zaku offers his services to the resistance for unknown reasons. His moves are lethal and now he is the resistance's only hope. Oniken is an action platform game highly inspired by the 1980's, its games and its movies. You can see this not only in the graphics and sound design, but also in Oniken's story and difficulty. Don't Worry, You Will Die A Lot Of Times. Every copy of Oniken comes with digital versions of the game manual and the original soundtrack.Features Graphics, sounds and difficulty from the 8-bit era Cinematic cutscenes Over 18 boss fights Six missions, three stages each An extra mission after you beat the game Boss rush mode Not difficult enough? Try the new HARDCORE MODE Global Leaderboards Full pixelated violence
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For being made by the same team behind the fantastic Blazing Chrome, a game that might as well be Contra with the serial numbers filed off, Oniken very much feels like them trying to get their feet in the door.
It manages to simultaneously manages to be one of the absolute best, and absolute worst NES throwbacks I've played from the indie scene. It's bursting with style, between its flashy visuals, pretty alright chiptune soundtrack, and to top it off? The core gameplay is pretty damn fun! It's a really cool throwback to stuff like Ninja Gaiden and the sort, even down to the emphasis on story delivered via cutscenes that made the original NG such an iconic staple of the NES library. The game's tough as nails, and I can't lie, when I managed to clear a no death run of a level, there was always that feeling of "Fuck yeah, I did that shit! Me!"
But Oniken unfortunately doesn't stop at just trying to be a cool throwback to stuff like Ninja Gaiden. It brings a lot of the bullshit of the game's final levels, and a lot of less positive quirks of other NES titles from the time. Between losing power-ups upon getting hit enough, a pretty strict focus on the more bullshit kind of trial and error that marries with a life system, and a checkpoint allergy in its overly long levels that I haven't seen since Jak 2, it's unfortunate that I can't look at the game as positively as I wish I could.
It's not that the game is hard; I loved Blazing Chrome, and I'm no stranger to tougher NES platformers like the Mega Man titles or, well, the first Ninja Gaiden. But Oniken doesn't know when to let up so it often swims into the deep end of "Bullshit hard NES game that the devs didn't want you beating over the weekend rental period", and that kinda bites. I can definitely appreciate it for getting a dev team who'd go on to make a banger shooter into the industry, and who knows? If you're into getting your balls really crushed, you might find something to like here more than I did! But as it stands? I really wish I liked it more than I do.
It manages to simultaneously manages to be one of the absolute best, and absolute worst NES throwbacks I've played from the indie scene. It's bursting with style, between its flashy visuals, pretty alright chiptune soundtrack, and to top it off? The core gameplay is pretty damn fun! It's a really cool throwback to stuff like Ninja Gaiden and the sort, even down to the emphasis on story delivered via cutscenes that made the original NG such an iconic staple of the NES library. The game's tough as nails, and I can't lie, when I managed to clear a no death run of a level, there was always that feeling of "Fuck yeah, I did that shit! Me!"
But Oniken unfortunately doesn't stop at just trying to be a cool throwback to stuff like Ninja Gaiden. It brings a lot of the bullshit of the game's final levels, and a lot of less positive quirks of other NES titles from the time. Between losing power-ups upon getting hit enough, a pretty strict focus on the more bullshit kind of trial and error that marries with a life system, and a checkpoint allergy in its overly long levels that I haven't seen since Jak 2, it's unfortunate that I can't look at the game as positively as I wish I could.
It's not that the game is hard; I loved Blazing Chrome, and I'm no stranger to tougher NES platformers like the Mega Man titles or, well, the first Ninja Gaiden. But Oniken doesn't know when to let up so it often swims into the deep end of "Bullshit hard NES game that the devs didn't want you beating over the weekend rental period", and that kinda bites. I can definitely appreciate it for getting a dev team who'd go on to make a banger shooter into the industry, and who knows? If you're into getting your balls really crushed, you might find something to like here more than I did! But as it stands? I really wish I liked it more than I do.
A game that perfectly recreates the experience of playing a crappy NES game. Modestly fun and clearly made out of passion, but its sloppy execution and cheap difficulty prevent it from being anything great.
Of course, the team went on to make much better things, so I can appreciate Oniken as the formative title it was.
Of course, the team went on to make much better things, so I can appreciate Oniken as the formative title it was.
Pretty solid game, this is the first release of Brazilian JoyMasher, and they started with an awesome game, its difficult is balanced in a way you are able to get better on every failure, there are no checkpoints so you have to re-start from the beginning of each level, but there is no game over on standard mode, and levels aren't that long, so I found it fair enough.
Had some little problems with control responses sometimes that annoyed me a little bit, and that damn knockback, geez! Music team did also a pretty good job here and the graphics took me back to the NES era entirely. Overall, pretty good game and a great first entry by the team.
Had some little problems with control responses sometimes that annoyed me a little bit, and that damn knockback, geez! Music team did also a pretty good job here and the graphics took me back to the NES era entirely. Overall, pretty good game and a great first entry by the team.
Begging developers of NES styled action-platformers to put checkpoints in their levels. It's ok to do it, I promise you it's not illegal.
I think there is this prevailing sentiment in some circles that any game fashioned after a 8 or 16-bit classic is inherently good and worthy of praise. I've seen it as far back as Pier Solar and even more recently with the (also WaterMelon published) Paprium. While I don't share the same rapid-fire acceptance of these sorts of games, I am consistently intrigued by them, and it doesn't take much convincing to get me to try one. Unlike those games, Oniken - a Joymasher developed send up to Ninja Gaiden - is not so slavishly dedicated to being able to run on the hardware it is ostensibly made for, but holy hell is it faithful in terms of design.
That's not to say it's this merciless, ultra-difficult game with enemies flooding the screen haphazardly, but there is a strong expectation placed on the player to learn level layouts and enemy patterns through rote memorization. You'll probably be replaying levels almost in their entirety once you hit level 4, and most of my deaths came from being under-prepared for boss encounters than outright dying to stage hazards. This is all very typical of this sort of game, and if anything Oniken is a little too by-the-numbers. Outside of the obvious aesthetic nods to Fist of the North Star, there's not a whole lot here to give it its own identity. Vice: Project D.O.O.M. came out in 1991 and feels more ambitious.
Some of the later levels also drag, and dying to a boss will send you all the way back to the start of the stage. I love Castlevania so this shouldn't really annoy me as much as it does, but the difference here is that Oniken fails to create a satisfying loop, and so it starts to feel like you're just having your time wasted. Once you get the hang of a level, it feels good enough, but by that point my sense of satisfaction from overcoming the odds was diminished by how irritated I was having to redo the same long barrier-filled corridor or lengthy conveyor belt sequence. Many of the bosses are designed around you having less health than necessary to tank them, so their patterns aren't particularly challenging, and I just feel that with the length of some of these levels, Oniken might've been better off with a few checkpoints and some more thoughtful boss encounters.
It's still a perfectly fine game, I just wasn't all that impressed with it. Decent enough given how cheap it is, not a bad way to fill a couple hours on a Sunday morning, but I wouldn't say you should rush out and get this thing ASAP. I finished its six levels and... wait a second, there's a seventh level? Ah damnit...
I think there is this prevailing sentiment in some circles that any game fashioned after a 8 or 16-bit classic is inherently good and worthy of praise. I've seen it as far back as Pier Solar and even more recently with the (also WaterMelon published) Paprium. While I don't share the same rapid-fire acceptance of these sorts of games, I am consistently intrigued by them, and it doesn't take much convincing to get me to try one. Unlike those games, Oniken - a Joymasher developed send up to Ninja Gaiden - is not so slavishly dedicated to being able to run on the hardware it is ostensibly made for, but holy hell is it faithful in terms of design.
That's not to say it's this merciless, ultra-difficult game with enemies flooding the screen haphazardly, but there is a strong expectation placed on the player to learn level layouts and enemy patterns through rote memorization. You'll probably be replaying levels almost in their entirety once you hit level 4, and most of my deaths came from being under-prepared for boss encounters than outright dying to stage hazards. This is all very typical of this sort of game, and if anything Oniken is a little too by-the-numbers. Outside of the obvious aesthetic nods to Fist of the North Star, there's not a whole lot here to give it its own identity. Vice: Project D.O.O.M. came out in 1991 and feels more ambitious.
Some of the later levels also drag, and dying to a boss will send you all the way back to the start of the stage. I love Castlevania so this shouldn't really annoy me as much as it does, but the difference here is that Oniken fails to create a satisfying loop, and so it starts to feel like you're just having your time wasted. Once you get the hang of a level, it feels good enough, but by that point my sense of satisfaction from overcoming the odds was diminished by how irritated I was having to redo the same long barrier-filled corridor or lengthy conveyor belt sequence. Many of the bosses are designed around you having less health than necessary to tank them, so their patterns aren't particularly challenging, and I just feel that with the length of some of these levels, Oniken might've been better off with a few checkpoints and some more thoughtful boss encounters.
It's still a perfectly fine game, I just wasn't all that impressed with it. Decent enough given how cheap it is, not a bad way to fill a couple hours on a Sunday morning, but I wouldn't say you should rush out and get this thing ASAP. I finished its six levels and... wait a second, there's a seventh level? Ah damnit...
A really though sidecroller that draws inspiration from NES games such as Ninja Gaiden and hyper-masculine anime like Hokuto no Ken. The graphics are good for what it tries to accomplish, gameplay is solid and the difficulty is high as God commands. Very good.
Les salió tan bien el homenaje a Hokuto no Ken que el juego es igual de malo que ese manga de mierda.