is an arcade game developed and released by

Namco was a Japanese multinational video game and entertainment company, headquartered in Ōta, Tokyo. It held several international branches, including Namco America in Santa Clara, California, Namco Europe in London, Namco Taiwan in Kaohsiung, ...

and Sega in

2000 File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from S ...

. Two years later it was also published as a PlayStation 2 exclusive title with

GunCon 2 The , known as the G-Con in Europe, is a family of gun peripherals designed by Namco for the PlayStation consoles. The original controllers used traditional light gun technology, while newer controllers use LED tracking technology. Background T ...

compatibility.

Gameplay

''Ninja Assault'' was developed by Namco, who also created the ''

Time Crisis ''Time Crisis'' is a first-person on-rails light gun shooter series of arcade video games by Namco, introduced in 1995. It is focused on the exploits of a fictional international intelligence agency who assigns its best agents to deal with a m ...

'' series. However, this game has more in common with '' Lethal Enforcers'', ''

Virtua Cop (known as ''Virtua Squad'' for the North American Windows version) is a 1994 light gun shooter game developed by Sega AM2 and designed by Yu Suzuki. It was originally an arcade game on the Sega Model 2 system, and was ported to the Sega Saturn in ...

'', and ''

The House of the Dead ''The House of the Dead'' is a horror-themed light gun shooter video game franchise created by Sega in 1996. Originally released in arcades, it utilizes a light gun on the platform, but can be played with standard controllers on consoles and a ...

'' series, whereby the movement is completely "on-rails" (i.e., with no hiding pedal), and the player must shoot away from the screen to reload. Both versions of this game support up to two players in cooperative gameplay.

Plot

The story, according to the opening movie, is as follows: "Once upon a time in feudal Japan, a brutal war raged. No one foresaw its conclusion, at least not in the manner in which it unfolded. And now...the evil Shogun Kigai has kidnapped Princess Koto in order to sacrifice her for his resurrection ritual. But there is hope.... Two courageous ninjas (Guren and Gunjo) have stepped forward. The battle among humans has ceased. And in its place, a new battle has begun: humans against demons."

Release

''Ninja Assault'' is advertised in in-game email message in Namco's '' Xenosaga Episode I: Der Wille zur Macht''. After finishing the PS2 release of the game, one would unlock a code that could be entered in the contest at Namco's website.

Reception

In Japan, ''Game Machine'' listed ''Ninja Assault'' on their December 15, 2000 issue as being the fourth most-successful dedicated arcade game of the month. The PS2 version received "mixed" reviews according to the

review aggregation A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

. In its preview,

IGN ''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...

compared it with ''

The House of the Dead 2 is a horror-themed light gun shooter arcade game and the second game in ''The House of the Dead'' series of video games. The direct sequel to ''The House of the Dead'', it was developed by Sega for arcades on the Sega NAOMI board in November ...

''. The same website later gave the Japanese version a mixed review over two months before it was released Stateside, along with ''

Electronic Gaming Monthly ''Electronic Gaming Monthly'' (often abbreviated to ''EGM'') is a monthly American video game magazine. It offers video game news, coverage of industry events, interviews with gaming figures, editorial content and product reviews. History The m ...

'', '' GamePro'', ''

Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine ''Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine'' (often abbreviated to ''OPM'') was a monthly video game magazine, published by Ziff Davis Media. It was a sister publication of ''Electronic Gaming Monthly''. The magazine focused exclusively on PlayStation ...

'', and '' PSM''. In Japan, ''

Famitsu formerly ''Famicom Tsūshin'', is a line of Japanese video game magazines published by Kadokawa Game Linkage (previously known as Gzbrain), a subsidiary of Kadokawa. ''Famitsu'' is published in both weekly and monthly formats as well as in the f ...

'' gave it a score of 28 out of 40.

References

External links

* {{Time Crisis series 2000 video games Arcade video games Cooperative video games Light gun games Multiplayer and single-player video games Namco games Now Production games Video games about ninja PlayStation 2 games Rail shooters Video games developed in Japan Video games featuring female protagonists Video games set in feudal Japan