It's been a long time coming, and we've had to suffer through the same Naruto stories over and over, but finally the games have moved on and started covering the Shippuden portion of the Naruto history, which sees our young kids a little older and more powerful as well. The same great Ultimate Ninja gameplay, but with new characters, moves, and game modes – yes! Of course, then I started playing the game, and suddenly I'm yearning for the way things used to be. As the 80s hair-band Cinderella would say - you don't know what you've got till it's gone.

Gaara Attacks

The bulk of Ultimate Ninja 4's gameplay revolves around the brand-new mode called Master Mode, which has you taking on the role of Naruto as he grows up and experiences the early portion of the Shippuden storyline. Before getting involved with Shippuden, however, you've got to tolerate a new story done just for the game. The new story begins after Naruto leaves to go train with Jiraiya, and finds himself visiting a local village where a young girl is offering up herself for a human sacrifice. Will Naruto convince her not to throw her life away? Can Naruto help stop the demon demanding the young girl? After the Black Shadow story is finished, we finally get to the Shippuden material, which has Naruto arriving back home to see all his old friends, only to have to soon depart when the Akatsuki – a group looking to harness the demons inside of such people as Naruto – attack Gaara and carry him off.

The new story is merely okay; it hits some nice story beats, but the execution is very flawed (as is the entire Master Mode for that matter). The progression is very linear, as you spend your time exploring a cave system by using platforming double-jumps, and fighting shadow ninja in confined areas. So you dig yourself in deep into the cave system, get to a wall you can't break through, and suddenly you have to go all the way back out, only to do a little talking, find Jiraiya, have him unlock the skill, and finally you can move on through the story…by once again going through every room in the cave again.

Once the Black Shadow story is over, however, things don't progress much better through the Shippuden portion. The game gives you a few cool in-game cinemas depicting some of the more epic, action packed moments, but the game refuses to let you just experience the actual story from the manga. I've read the manga volumes that this game covers and I can tell you Naruto was never forced to find frogs for Jiraiya, run a timed obstacle course, or have to fight a bunch of easily dispatched bandits; these moments do nothing but destroy momentum and affect the overall quality of the game.

This Mode Sucks

Besides the way the Master Mode tells the game's story, it also features some dreadful gameplay, which is laughably simple and tacky considering the game "should" be a 2D fighter like the past installments in the game. You control Naruto in a full 3D environment, letting him run around, jump, double jump, and shadow jump to cross platforms, and you'll use the attack button to smash a bunch of crates and your Rasengan to destroy rock walls impeding your progress. The actual exploration isn't terrible, but it does feel tacked-on and more an afterthought than anything else. It's the combat, however, that completely wrecks the experience.

Ultimate Ninja 4 experimented with a new game mode – I can accept that – and it doesn't bug me that the fighting isn't as fluid and hard to master like other action games like the Ninja Gaiden series, for instance. I do expect more, however, than simply pressing one-button ad nauseum until everyone is dead. Shadow ninja standing in your way – press the circle button over and over and watch Naruto destroy them with ease. Sure, you can throw your knives, perform dashes, and perform clone based team moves when prompted, but they aren't needed…you just hit one button. The combat is so bad I was never dealt any damage until the game's boss, because then I actually had to block a bit. The poor action dominates the Black Shadow story, but at least it isn't used exclusively during the Shippuden portion.

The second mode in the game is the Hero Mode, which you can't even play without playing the Master Mode first. Argh! Hero Mode essentially tells the story up until now, detailing how Naruto first started out, and hitting on the big arcs too, such as the Chunin Exams. Each segment of the story is either presented by a still image with spoken dialogue (the bulk of the mode), a cutscene, or an actual battle that uses the tried and true fighting of the past games. In order to see or play any of these segments, however, you need to find memory orbs throughout the Master Mode portion of the game. You don't have to play the mode if you don’t want the story you probably already know by now, but if you want to unlock all the characters for use in the game, you have to play both the Master and Hero modes.

The final mode is Free Battle, where you pick your character, who you want to fight, the level, and then there you go. If you fight and win you get an evaluation, which rewards money based on performance, which you can then use to buy stuff in the stores. If you lose you just lose – you get nothing. Free Battle is the fast and fun fighting that the past games have focused so much on, but instead of giving you a series of battles tied into the story, there is no typical fighting game Arcade mode transition. You don't find enemies that gradually get more difficult until you get to the final boss. You pick, battle, and then repeat. I'd rather not be able to hand pick the exact battles each and every time.

The controls are amazingly simple for a fighting game; the X-button is used for jumps and dashes, the square button uses throwing items such as knives, the triangle button prepares you for an Ultimate Jutsu attack, and the circle button is your sole attack button. Meanwhile, the L1 and R1 buttons switch between items you have, while L2 and R2 are used to guard against attacks and perform substitution jutsus.

Having combat be attached solely to the circle button will seem strange at first to new players, but those familiar with past installments will be right at home. It's true that pushing the same button by itself will produce the same combo each time, but by pressing in different directions with the d-pad, you can have your character perform a wide variety of attacks. Using the circle button while pressing down, towards your enemy, or up will give you certain moves, while pressing away will cause your character to perform a throw. The easy control scheme makes the game very button masher friendly, but when you learn what does what, simply pressing the button still won't be enough for the win. You've got to know when to attack, what combos to use, and going on the defensive when needed.

The character specific Ultimate Jutsus are the game changing moves, which can spin a battle on its head with one well-placed attack. If an Ultimate Jutsu is landed, a cutscene will show you dealing the powerful blow, which you can tweak and improve the damage of by either pressing buttons as they come up or twirling the thumbsticks (it depends on the setup you choose beforehand). There are minor jutsus too, which don't pack quite the punch, but still look cool and perform some nice damage. You'll need at least one bar of chakra to perform them, and then press up, up, circle or down, down, circle to use them.

Who Doesn't Like Puppets

Graphically the game is mixed and it depends on what mode you're playing. The Master Mode has some pretty nice characters and the Hidden Leaf Village looks good, but other areas – and especially the caves of the Black Shadow portion – are too wide open and with nothing in them but walls. The graphics of the standard 2D fighting work much better, though they are still pretty jagged and flat at times. The sound is very good, however, as it features all the regular voice actors reprising their characters, some great sound effects, and the background music isn't that bad either.

It won't take you a lot of time to go through the story modes of the game, but the game features plenty of little extras to keep you playing. New characters to unlock, action figures of the character, Ultimate Jutsu cinematics, voice work, music – there's a lot to buy in the game's store. The problem is that you've got to really love this game to make the commitment needed to unlock everything. Personally, it's a challenge I'm not up for or want to attempt.

As someone who has played seemingly every Naruto game that's come out in the past few years, I'm often one to overlook some problems, since I hold the Naruto franchise so dear to my heart. I love the franchise and I've been craving for the United States to finally catch-up and discover the Shippuden content for the first time, but Ultimate Ninja 4: Naruto Shippuden is a letdown to me in nearly every possible way. How do you take the fast and fun action of the past games and put it on the backburner for a silly RPG/platforming/adventure game that doesn't work at all? If you want to experience the Shippuden world, don't buy this game, save your money, and use them to buy the manga volumes instead.

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