Topic: Ninja Gaiden 3 --tonned down--most likely rated T

[Ymeegod]

No more beheading your victims or cutting them to ribbions .  Ubisoft removed M rating from the Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands a year or so ago and now my beloved NG series is getting the kiddy treatmeant.  The bad news is developers think the M rating is hurting sales but if you look at Ubisoft's example--it actually the other way  around.

Boo, I'll most likely end up getting the game but it's sad to see the publisher/developer taking this road IMO.
 
 
 

[TJ Spyke]

Having a Teen rating is not making a game "kiddy". If this is true (I don't know, I haven't heard about it), I will wait to see how the game is. It can still be a great game anyways.

[Oblivion]

If it was given the kiddy treatment it'd be rated E. Come on, T rated games aren't kiddy. Gimme a break.

[Morari]

Ubisoft removed M rating from the Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands a year or so ago

I don't think that is a very good example, given that the Sands of Time series began with a T-Rated game. If anything, the ridiculous things they did to give Warrior Within an M-Rating hurt the series more.

Ubisoft has made bigger mistakes than shooting for certain ratings as of late. They've caught a lot of flack for their DRM on Driver and From Dust. You'd think they would have learned their lesson last time?

[TJ Spyke]

The only flack I recall Ubisoft getting for the POP series and the rating was when Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, which had a M rating, was ported to the Wii as Prince of Persia: Rival Swords and had a T rating (by doing stuff like removing blood).

[Ymeegod]

Ahh, but you forgotten the forth game, Prince of Persia: Forgotten Sands which lacked alot of things that were added with Warrior Within.  In PoP FS the enemies where all made of sand so they simply vanished back to grains but Ubisoft also took out alot of other things like environmental damage/objects like I recall swinging around a pole and knocking enemies down, ect. 

NG since it's rebirth on the XBox has always been blood and guts, but the last game the fans felt betrayed because the developers toned down the gameplay so just about anybody could have beaten it.  In NG2 the main character regenerates health for crying out loud.  Now they are removing other elements which also effects gameplay.  For example you're not going be able to cut off legs or arms off enemies which was a great tactic to beating hordes of enemies. 

[Caterkiller]

Aww man, the first console Ninja Gaiden Nintendo gets and the violence gets toned down! What a surprise!

Only kidding now...

[TJ Spyke]

Aww man, the first console Ninja Gaiden Nintendo gets and the violence gets toned down! What a surprise!

Only kidding now...

Ahem:
Ninja Gaiden (NES)
Ninja Gaiden II: Dark Sword of Chaos
Ninja Gaiden III: Ancient Ship of Doom (NES)
Ninja Gaiden Trilogy (SNES)

They are even on the Virtual Console. But I know you meant the current series.

[broodwars]

NG since it's rebirth on the XBox has always been blood and guts, but the last game the fans felt betrayed because the developers toned down the gameplay so just about anybody could have beaten it.  In NG2 the main character regenerates health for crying out loud.  Now they are removing other elements which also effects gameplay.  For example you're not going be able to cut off legs or arms off enemies which was a great tactic to beating hordes of enemies.

If the series needed tons of blood and guts and a challenge level so obscene few could complete it for the experience to be entertaining, in my opinion it wasn't a good series to begin with.  Considering statistically so few gamers even bother to complete games with manageable difficulty, I fail to understand the logic of choosing to make your game so punishingly hard that even fewer people will ever experience the full game.

I tried the demo for the first Ninja Gaiden Sigma a while back, and just found the experience frustrating (especially the really terrible camera).  If they're taking steps to actually make the game fun for people like me that don't like an endless gauntlet of unforgiving Trial & Error hack & slashing, the game's probably better for it.

[Adrock]

The only reason to lower the rating is to make the game accessible to a wider audience. I get it... Too bad the game will probably still make you hate yourself thus making the switch pointless. Unless Tecmo plans to make the game at least playable to the average gamer, they should stick to their niche and go all out punch-a-baby-in-the-mouth hardcore like they did with the previous 2.

[Morari]

The only flack I recall Ubisoft getting for the POP series and the rating was when Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, which had a M rating, was ported to the Wii as Prince of Persia: Rival Swords and had a T rating (by doing stuff like removing blood).

Warrior Within caught a lot of flak because Ubisoft obviously forced the M-Rating to increase sales. They added tons of gore, made all of the female characters look like dominatrixes, switched the Prince's voice and personality around, and added a bunch of generic heavy metal to the sound track.

The Two Thrones backtracked in a lot of ways, and thankfully so.

[Caterkiller]

Aww man, the first console Ninja Gaiden Nintendo gets and the violence gets toned down! What a surprise!

Only kidding now...

Ahem:
Ninja Gaiden (NES)
Ninja Gaiden II: Dark Sword of Chaos
Ninja Gaiden III: Ancient Ship of Doom (NES)
Ninja Gaiden Trilogy (SNES)

They are even on the Virtual Console. But I know you meant the current series.

Completely forgot about those. I thought I was covering my bases saying console versions. All I remembered was a hand held one from GBA or DS. Did that exist?
 
I hope this game is good. During the gamecube days up til now I feel like everytime Nintendo gets in on the awesome 3rd party action, the series in question seems to fall from grace. I remember thinking the Resident Evil remakes were going to jump start the Cube, no one cared. Tomb Raider was on Nintendo finally, by then it was joke. Awaiting similar things to happen with current gen cool games. Once the next home console starts the cool games will be lame and laughed at.

[TJ Spyke]

Yes, there was a DS game called Ninja Gaiden Dragon Sword. It takes place in-between the first and second games in the new series. I remember reading before it came out that Tomonobu Itagaki made the game because one of his kids asked him to make a game in the series for the DS.

There was also a Game Boy game called Ninja Gaiden Shadow, but it was just a licensed edit of the Natsume game Shadow of the Ninja.