Ninja or Die: Shadow of the Sun review

Fans of quirky roguelikes will enjoy Ninja or Die’s soaring leaps, and straightforward combat, all set in a world brimming with attractive, pixel-art interpretations of Japanese folklore.

Games that challenge you with mastering sophisticated control schemes or place you in dazzling, three-dimensional worlds can obviously be entertaining. But Ninja or Die: Shadow of the Sun understands that simplicity is a criminally overlooked virtue. Moving around the game’s freely scrolling, 2D missions is accomplished through a single-button navigational system that’s rather ingenious.

By moving the control stick you’ll see a dotted line appear onscreen that represents a trajectory for your springy shinobi. Pressing the action button sends the protagonist leaping through the air, tracing the designated path. Land on a vertical wall and gravity will slowly pull them down, but additional jumps can ping-ping you back skyward. Interestingly, there is no traditional walking.

Keeping Your Cool When Things Heat Up

Moving across the ground is accomplished by a series of short hops. During a jump, colliding with enemies initiates a basic melee attack. In execution, expect pinpoint accuracy when Shadow of the Sun doesn’t have many on-screen foes. But once you’re in a space filled with projectile-launching enemies and miasma that can induce a poison state, the added pressure might provoke a mistake.

By holding the action button down, the nimble ninja can perform a mega-jump. Not only can this catapult the protagonist further, but it triggers slow motion when you are charging, allowing for improved aiming accuracy. When your jump is super-charged, you can even one-shot some lower-level subordinates. Even when you don’t kill them with a single hit, colliding into multiple foes strapped to a ninja kite feels as satisfying as popping bubble wrap.

Survive? Shuriken!

But when mid-jump smashes aren’t reducing enemy health bars quickly enough, you can use some of Ninja or Die’s pickups. Across each mission, you’ll fill your bag with different tools- from restorative riceballs, to stat-boosting equippables, and other assistive multiple-use items. By collecting throwable devices like hatchets or shuriken, you can take aim at adversaries, enjoying the increased damage output provided by ranged weapons. Sure, throwing objects disrupts the marketing claim of single-button action, but it’s satisfying to take down a knife-wielding adversary without taking damage.

Ranged attacks become especially important when you tackle the game with some of the four other playables. Yes, the geisha doesn’t have a lot of health at the start of a run and she lacks a melee attack. But her inexhaustible song can shred enemies, making it easier to swell the game’s combo meter. She also has the grace and poise of a ballerina, as she lithely floats through the air, using a shamisen as her weapon.

Can He Swing from a Thread? Take a Look Overhead!

But that elegance isn’t exclusive to the geisha. Each of the game’s other characters move with mythical athleticism, showcasing some excellent sprite-based artistry. Every time the game’s lead ninja heads into a mission, he bounds over a cliff, falling with the fluidity of Spider-Man. But the visuals could be a point of contention for from. Deliberately, foes are camouflaged behind Shadow of the Sun’s rather busy environments. The result is that ‘reading’ the on-screen action might take a few hours of practice. Another small issue is the inclusion of multiple exits across the title’s blend of procedurally-generated and hand-crafted levels. Occasionally, my poor ninja becomes lost since there was no indication that the exit door would send you back several stages.

Across the game’s multiple milieus, levels grow increasingly labyrinthine, with alcoves and pits concealing monsters, exits, and power-ups. Fortunately, you have an on-screen map that can scale to different sizes as well as a bit of camera control, keeping the leaps of faith to a minimum. But you will want to completely reconnoiter each stage. Rescuing villagers lets them open an assistive storefront in the game’s hub world. From a bank that lets you deposit some of your gold to avoid ‘game over’ bankruptcies to a back-street doctor who provides stat upgrades, you’ll find just enough meta-game progression to keep sending your ninja back into Shadow of the Sun’s depths.

Ninja or Die: Shadow of the Sun was played on
PC with review code provided by the publisher.