You know what I haven’t done in a hot minute or so? Make fun of ADK, so let’s do that again! I mean, why not, it should be a fun thing to do, and besides, not doing so has been eating at my soul. I have been too nice to them recently, with me actually somehow liking World Heroes 2 Jet, so it only feels right to go to one of their older products, to examine how bland and uninspired it is, and then point out all of the other ridiculous elements present in said product along the way. But what other ground have they covered? They’ve done fighting games, they’ve done platformers, they’ve done run ‘n guns, so what else can they screw up at… looking at list... a beat-’em-up? Oh, that’s perfect! So now, for most of you at home, let’s go ahead and talk about a game that you all have never heard of in your life, Ninja Combat.
Like you, I had no clue that this game existed until I decided to look it up for myself, and based on what I did see about it, it looked extremely underwhelming. It was a launch title for the Neo Geo systems back in the day, so that is to be expected, but that doesn’t automatically spell out the quality of a game. I mean, Super Mario World was a launch title, and we still love that game, so who’s to say that this game wouldn’t be any better or worse? Well, unfortunately though, it isn’t quite on the same level as Super Mario World, and it wasn’t bad enough to where I could have fun ripping it to shreds, so the most I can say is that it is just… there. It does it’s job, and I bet you could have a good time with it with the right person to join you, but if you aren’t immediately on board with what the game gives you from the minute you press the start button, then you are gonna be in for a very mediocre time.
The story is just as generic as the game itself, where the evil Shadow Family starts to take over New York with the help of their Ninja Tower and all the baddies that dwell within it, so it is up to the brothers Joe and Hayabusa, along with a few other faces they run into along the way, to storm the tower and take the family down, which can only be an exciting plot if you have never played any other game in your life, which, let’s be honest, the chances of this being someone’s first game are VERY slim. The graphics are ok, looking on the same level as all of ADK’s other games I have played so far, meaning that it looks on par with other Neo Geo titles, but somehow feels cheap and artificial when you play it, the music is fine, having decent tracks for the levels and boss fights, but they are gonna leave your mind just as quickly as the game itself when you are done with it, and the gameplay/control is very generic and simple for the genre, but somehow it feels more soulless and generic then most of the other beat-’em-up games I have ever played… but it somehow isn’t as bad as Rushing Beat, so it gets a gold star!
The game is your typical hack and slash beat-’em-up, where you take control of Joe, Hayabusa, or any of the other characters you meet along the way, take on seven different stages through several different generic environments on your way to take on whatever lies in the Ninja Tower, slice down plenty of enemies using plenty of different attacks, including a special attack that you can pull off if you have enough health, gather plenty of weapons to help you out along the way, as well as scrolls that can grant you increased strength and speed, along with extra lives at points, and take on plenty of bosses that do look threatening enough, but is about as challenging as breathing air… or at least, if you have infinite credits like I do. You see it, you know it, you love it, you know what you are getting into with the game, but as I have mentioned several times already, aside from one or two admirable aspects of the game, there isn’t really anything here to make this anything more than a generic time waster for a half hour before you never touch it again.
I will say, despite how generic and soulless the game is as a whole, I did like some aspects about it, such as how it handles additional characters and power-ups. Like I mentioned before, there are those scrolls that upgrade your character as you keep going, which is pretty sweet to get and hang onto, and for the first couple of stages, whenever you beat them, you end up unlocking a new character that you can switch to in-between stages, and they can be fun to mess around with, especially Musashi, who became my go-to character for the remainder of the game. However, that’s really where all of my compliments end, as when you play the game for yourself, you can feel all the care and love that the developers DIDN’T put into this, especially when it comes to your main attack, which is so broken that you can pretty much just spam it and take care of whatever comes your way. Yeah, bosses require a bit more strategy, but most of the other enemies aren’t a threat whatsoever, and you can defeat them all with one hand while checking your phone, which I’m pretty sure I did at one point.
In addition to that, there are also the typical roadblocks that I ran into when it came to what I don’t enjoy in these kinds of games, such as arcade syndrome, where the game throws many enemies at you at once and expects you to deal with them all before they get the chance to take you down, and there are repeating bosses, which aren’t too bad most of the time, but there was at least one instance where a boss was repeated TWICE, because I guess the devs just loved fighting him so much, they wanted us to feel that same love as well. With all that said and done, again, I will say that the game as a whole isn’t really all that bad. It accomplishes what it sets out to do, and again, if you need some way to kill 30 minutes, it is a good way to do so, but with nothing here to not only stand out, but also make it seem like the devs had any kind of idea how to make an engaging product, why would you choose to play it over anything else?
Overall, despite the fun-at-times combat and some gameplay features that I did end up liking, this is one of the most “nothing” beat-’em-ups that I have ever played, doing the bare minimum and showing off what the Neo Geo is capable of, but not giving any reason for players to return to it, or even choose it over the many better games in the genre that came out before and since. I would recommend it for those who are obsessed with the genre, as well as those who want an idea of one of the earliest points in the Neo Geo’s lifespan, but aside from that, I would just stick to other titles if you want some great beat-’em-up action with your friends. But, I will say, there is one thing very appealing about this game that only this company and SNK can manage to pull off to make me want to check out every one of their games from this era: the voice acting. Like most of these games, it is so terrible, that if you don’t have any interest in playing this yourself, at least give a listen to the “cutscenes” in the game. You won’t regret it.
Game #557
Like you, I had no clue that this game existed until I decided to look it up for myself, and based on what I did see about it, it looked extremely underwhelming. It was a launch title for the Neo Geo systems back in the day, so that is to be expected, but that doesn’t automatically spell out the quality of a game. I mean, Super Mario World was a launch title, and we still love that game, so who’s to say that this game wouldn’t be any better or worse? Well, unfortunately though, it isn’t quite on the same level as Super Mario World, and it wasn’t bad enough to where I could have fun ripping it to shreds, so the most I can say is that it is just… there. It does it’s job, and I bet you could have a good time with it with the right person to join you, but if you aren’t immediately on board with what the game gives you from the minute you press the start button, then you are gonna be in for a very mediocre time.
The story is just as generic as the game itself, where the evil Shadow Family starts to take over New York with the help of their Ninja Tower and all the baddies that dwell within it, so it is up to the brothers Joe and Hayabusa, along with a few other faces they run into along the way, to storm the tower and take the family down, which can only be an exciting plot if you have never played any other game in your life, which, let’s be honest, the chances of this being someone’s first game are VERY slim. The graphics are ok, looking on the same level as all of ADK’s other games I have played so far, meaning that it looks on par with other Neo Geo titles, but somehow feels cheap and artificial when you play it, the music is fine, having decent tracks for the levels and boss fights, but they are gonna leave your mind just as quickly as the game itself when you are done with it, and the gameplay/control is very generic and simple for the genre, but somehow it feels more soulless and generic then most of the other beat-’em-up games I have ever played… but it somehow isn’t as bad as Rushing Beat, so it gets a gold star!
The game is your typical hack and slash beat-’em-up, where you take control of Joe, Hayabusa, or any of the other characters you meet along the way, take on seven different stages through several different generic environments on your way to take on whatever lies in the Ninja Tower, slice down plenty of enemies using plenty of different attacks, including a special attack that you can pull off if you have enough health, gather plenty of weapons to help you out along the way, as well as scrolls that can grant you increased strength and speed, along with extra lives at points, and take on plenty of bosses that do look threatening enough, but is about as challenging as breathing air… or at least, if you have infinite credits like I do. You see it, you know it, you love it, you know what you are getting into with the game, but as I have mentioned several times already, aside from one or two admirable aspects of the game, there isn’t really anything here to make this anything more than a generic time waster for a half hour before you never touch it again.
I will say, despite how generic and soulless the game is as a whole, I did like some aspects about it, such as how it handles additional characters and power-ups. Like I mentioned before, there are those scrolls that upgrade your character as you keep going, which is pretty sweet to get and hang onto, and for the first couple of stages, whenever you beat them, you end up unlocking a new character that you can switch to in-between stages, and they can be fun to mess around with, especially Musashi, who became my go-to character for the remainder of the game. However, that’s really where all of my compliments end, as when you play the game for yourself, you can feel all the care and love that the developers DIDN’T put into this, especially when it comes to your main attack, which is so broken that you can pretty much just spam it and take care of whatever comes your way. Yeah, bosses require a bit more strategy, but most of the other enemies aren’t a threat whatsoever, and you can defeat them all with one hand while checking your phone, which I’m pretty sure I did at one point.
In addition to that, there are also the typical roadblocks that I ran into when it came to what I don’t enjoy in these kinds of games, such as arcade syndrome, where the game throws many enemies at you at once and expects you to deal with them all before they get the chance to take you down, and there are repeating bosses, which aren’t too bad most of the time, but there was at least one instance where a boss was repeated TWICE, because I guess the devs just loved fighting him so much, they wanted us to feel that same love as well. With all that said and done, again, I will say that the game as a whole isn’t really all that bad. It accomplishes what it sets out to do, and again, if you need some way to kill 30 minutes, it is a good way to do so, but with nothing here to not only stand out, but also make it seem like the devs had any kind of idea how to make an engaging product, why would you choose to play it over anything else?
Overall, despite the fun-at-times combat and some gameplay features that I did end up liking, this is one of the most “nothing” beat-’em-ups that I have ever played, doing the bare minimum and showing off what the Neo Geo is capable of, but not giving any reason for players to return to it, or even choose it over the many better games in the genre that came out before and since. I would recommend it for those who are obsessed with the genre, as well as those who want an idea of one of the earliest points in the Neo Geo’s lifespan, but aside from that, I would just stick to other titles if you want some great beat-’em-up action with your friends. But, I will say, there is one thing very appealing about this game that only this company and SNK can manage to pull off to make me want to check out every one of their games from this era: the voice acting. Like most of these games, it is so terrible, that if you don’t have any interest in playing this yourself, at least give a listen to the “cutscenes” in the game. You won’t regret it.
Game #557