what the fuck happened here? in theory this should be the best game in the trilogy. you have decreased knockback which means less cheap deaths, and you can finally see what the candles contain now, but what the fuck? the jp version is braindead easy, but from what i gather the US version is just stupidly hard. The gameplay overall feels slower, ryus jump physics are way floatier and less tight than previous entries. theres never a real 'flow' state like in ninja gaiden 1 and 2, less running like hell and slashing, more "what if mario had a sword?"

the graphics and music are nice at least