The Revenge of Shinobi, released in Japan as The Super Shinobi (in Japanese: ザ・スーパー忍), is a side-scrolling action platformer game released in 1989 for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis. This game is a direct sequel to Shinobi, and features a soundtrack by videogame music composer Yuzo Koshiro. The game was included in numerous compilations, such as Mega Games 2, Mega Drive 6 Pak, Sega Classics Arcade Collection (for Mega-CD), and Sega Smash Pack (for the PC and Dreamcast). It was released for the Wii Virtual Console in 2009 and on both the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 via each platform's respective download service in 2012.
Story[]
Ninja. A shadowy presence that is essential for secretly obtaining and protecting information. And the world of ninjas has always been divided into two. One is the force that lures righteous ninjas into the world of evil and tries to rule the darkness. The other is the force of justice, the Oboro-ryu ninja, who restrain evil and maintain the balance of peace.
Among the Oboro-ryu ninjas, one who excelled in particular was Joe Musashi. He had mastered the martial arts and ninjutsu of the Oboro-ryu at a young age. And he made his name known by destroying the crime syndicate "ZEED" that tried to rule the darkness and bringing about peace.
Three years have passed since then... Now Musashi is far away from the "Shinobi Village" where he was born and raised. He has left his fiancée Naoko, who he has pledged his future to, with his master and is traveling. Alone in a foreign land, Musashi undertook a new life for himself and trained to master the ways of the ninja.
However, the time of peace did not last as long as Musashi had imagined. An evil shadow began to wriggle in the corner of the world. The remnants of "ZEED" were trying to form an even more powerful organization with even greater ambition and revenge...
"NEO ZEED" - the resurrected evil. It was the name of an evil organization that had grown so large that it far surpassed the former "ZEED". Only three years. A short but certain blank period allowed evil to return. Compared to the power of justice, how greedy can evil grow? To test their strength, "NEO ZEED" first massacred the "Shinobi Village" where Musashi was raised and where many of their comrades still train. The young ninjas who were training to become the Musashi of tomorrow were attacked by "NEO ZEED" and had no chance.
Musashi rushed over after receiving sudden news, and what awaited him was the silence after the massacre and a mountain of his comrades' corpses. He regretted that he had arrived too late. He picked up each corpse, called their names, and wept. However, Naoko and his master were nowhere to be found. Musashi searched for them with a glimmer of hope. At that moment, he sensed someone's presence beyond the burnt and crumbled earthen wall behind him.
"Mu...Musashi..."
"Master!"
As Musashi ran towards him, it was his master himself who collapsed into his arms. The master who had taken in Musashi when he was an orphan, and raised him into a full-fledged ninja. Now that master was before Musashi, completely changed.
"Master, please pull yourself together!"
"M-Musashi... This is the end. One by one, the strongest ninjas have been defeated, and even Naoko has been taken away..."
"Na...Naoko?!"
Musashi heard the screams of his fiancee, Naoko.
"Don't panic, Musashi. Until the very end, Naoko was more worried about you than herself...Musashi, the rest is up to you. Defeat 'NEO ZEED' and rescue Naoko. I'm counting on you..."
With that, his master's lifeline expired. Musashi paid a respectful funeral to the body, then made up his mind. To avenge his fellow ninja who were massacred. To avenge his master who had raised him as a surrogate parent. To save the world from the clutches of the evil organization 'NEO ZEED'. And above all, to rescue his beloved fiancee, Naoko.
Musashi suddenly broke out into the drizzle that had begun to fall, and like a gust of wind, he took off running, risking his life...
Gameplay[]
The game is a traditional side-scrolling platformer. The player controls Joe Musashi and must complete eight districts before the final confrontation with the head of Neo Zeed. Each district consists of three scenes, two of which are platforming levels and the third of which is a battle against a unique boss character.
The directional pad moves Joe around, while the A, B, and C buttons are used to perform ninjutsu techniques, attack, and jump respectively. A key move in The Revenge of Shinobi is the Hassou tobi (in Japanese: 八双飛び: Hassou styled flight), or double jump, which maximizes Joe's jumping height and enables him to perform a shuriken burst. Additionally, some stages consist of multiple layers, such as the first scene of the military base and the freeway in area code 818. Switching between layers (outdoor/indoor, or on-the-highway/next-to-it) is also done with the double jump.
Missions and Bosses[]
The 8 Rounds
| Stage | Name | Boss | BGM |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ibaraki Province, Japan | Blue Lobster | The Shinobi |
| 2 | Tokyo | Shadow Dancer | Sunrise Boulevard Make me Dance |
| 3 | The Military Base | Biocomputer | Like a Wind Run or Die |
| 4 | Detroit | Hulkless | Ninja Step |
| 5 | Area Code 818 | Missile Carrier | The Dark City |
| 6 | Chinatown | Metamorphomer | China Town |
| 7 | New York | Monster G | Over the Bay |
| 8 | Neo Zeed Marine Stronghold | Masked Ninja | Labyrinth |
Enemies[]
Reception[]
The Revenge of Shinobi is considered the best in the Shinobi series. The game received 8/10 from IGN, and 5/5 in Dragon; the final boss battle was criticized, however, for being too difficult. MegaTech magazine praised the "smart gameplay, graphics and sound". Mega placed the game at #18 in their Top Mega Drive Games of All Time. Reviewing the game's appearance in Sega Arcade Classics, Glenn Rubenstein said it "was one of the first Genesis games released, and it shows how far Sega has come since then."
Legacy[]
The Revenge of Shinobi introduced many new moves for Joe Musashi and its famed soundtrack, as composed by Yuzo Koshiro, is considered the best on the Genesis. A suite of music from the game was performed live by an orchestra at the Fourth Symphonic Game Music Concert in 2006 at the Gewandhaus zu Leipzig, Germany. The arrangement was done by original composer Yuzo Koshiro himself. Music from The Revenge of Shinobi was also performed at two concerts of PLAY! A Video Game Symphony in Stockholm, Sweden in 2007. It was also played during the encore as the most voted song when PLAY! A Video Game Symphony was performing in Singapore (June 2007).
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Joe Musashi's face which appears on the game's title screen and the Japanese game cover was taken directly from Sonny Chiba's appearance in the posters for the Japanese TV series Kage no Gundan. Modern rereleases of the game replaced it with the likeness of M2's director and programmer Tsuyoshi Matsuoka.
- The game also features the likeness of various pop culture icons such as Rambo, Spiderman, Batman and Godzilla in the form of enemies and bosses. Said enemies had their sprites edited or replaced in newer revisions of the game in order to avoid any copyright problems.