Joystiq [Xbox]

Ninja Gaiden: Black & Dead Or Alive: Ultimate

Continuing his George Lucas-esque reputation of reiterating on previous work, Itagaki and Team Ninja revisited Ninja Gaiden and DOA/DOA 2 in 2005.

Ninja Gaiden Black added multiple features including new enemies, weapons, costumes and a manual 3D camera (which was still problematic).

Ninja Gaiden Black's two most notable additions were new difficulty settings, one was easier (Ninja Dog Mode) while the other made the already difficult game, harder (Master Ninja Mode). The second major addition was the Mission Mode, which was comprised of 50 missions purely based on combat action.

The game also added the original arcade version of Ninja Gaiden, rather than the Trilogy Edition added to the original 2004 release of the game as an unlockable bonus.

Dead or Alive: Ultimate included a port of the original Sega Saturn version of Dead or Alive. A newly designed version of Dead or Alive 2 using the new DOA:XBV engine with Dead or Alive 3 gameplay mechanics was also included as well as two new characters featured from DOA 3. The game was also the first in the series to take advantage of Xbox Live, Microsoft's online gaming service.

In 2007 Tecmo released another version of Ninja Gaiden exclusively for the PS3 titled, Ninja Gaiden Sigma. Itagaki was not involved in the port and has since blasted it as a poor version of the game.

05/06/08