by: Michael Ogunnubi

January 01, 2009

To me, the cons outweigh the pros and don’t make the game worth the full $59.99 price. This actually disappoints me quite a bit. I was excited for this game because of everything that it promised: playing with Naruto or Sasuke, playing with a different mix of teams and playing through some memorable battles in the series. But, there are a lot of things in the game that annoyed me and just made it something that wasn’t very fun to watch or play. There are some good points with the game so let’s discuss the good first.

Unlike some of the other Naruto games that tackle the Sasuke Retrieval Arc, the 360 game actually gives attention to ALL of the characters who are involved with that arc so you’ll be able to play the battles with each individual character instead of having a random team up that sort of messes up the plot. The game stays true to the main plot pretty well, letting players play through parts that other games didn’t really touch (the Hokage funeral, for example, where you meet up with your teammates and go to the funeral together). Even the backgrounds stay true to the plot and as you play you can see the destroyed Leaf Village slowly being repaired. Also cool is that the background changes during the rebuilding process. There’s also a bit of creativity in the tutorials, the main one being right in the middle of the Hokage and Orochimaru battle, and optional tutorials for character combos taking place in Gai’s dojo. And fans will be happy to hear a lot of music from the actual anime in the game, and the original music that’s in the game flows well with the anime soundtrack.