Mystical Ninja starring Goemon

"PLASMA!"

Mystical Ninja is very different, original, and hysterical game from the creators at Konami with its bizarre Japanese humor and several mythical creatures of Japanese origin. Put that together with a motley crew of playable characters that grow on you --presto! You make a wonderful game that is fun to play for hours on end...

Story: A group of baddies called the Peach Mountain Gang decides to turn Japan into a “stage”, a plan designed to make some parts of Japan into places to sing, dance, etc. It’s up to four characters: Ebisumasu, Goemon, Yae, and Sasuke to save Japan from becoming a stage, and you also learn about the geography of the four islands of Japan and see mythological creatures like the kappa featured in some parts of Mystical Ninja.

Graphics: Everything in the game has that anime feel to it. The designs of the towns make it seems like you are watching an anime instead of playing the game. Venturing through the game you can see that the textures are not as detailed and many of the enemies are just made up of basic geometric shapes; they just add on eyes, a mouth, and some lines which disappoint me on enemy design. The places you visit capture many of ideas of what medieval Japan used to be and Konami did a god job giving you a feel of Japanese life, adding some caricature-like people that heavily exaggerate on their expressions. In all, they have a large gamut of colorfulness that makes the game cheerful and wacky.

Sound: The music is easy to get hooked on like the music to Goemon Impact’s introduction song. It is very catchy and it makes you want to dance (not like I did ^_^). The other music in this game is very much like the one mentioned above. Some songs are in Japanese, but luckily, they contain English subtitles for you to understand what they’re talking about. When walking in the villages, the music sounds like they mock Japanese instruments such as the Zazen Town music. The music is rarely earnest, but even so, it is not disappointing. Anyways, when you switch to a different character (you can only play one at a time out of 4 different playable characters) they shout out kooky Japanese quotes that add up to the quirkiness this game can be. When entering upon a restaurant, the people shout out, “Irashaimase!” which means welcome in Japanese, making the voices an enjoyable experience in the game. The sound effects sound like what regular anime sound affects should sound.

Gameplay: This game is a lot like Zelda. You go into dungeon-like fortresses with keys to find, puzzles to solve, enemies/bosses to beat, and of course, the artifact that you get at the end, but they are all revamped into colorful and funny-looking designs. Instead of walking into a cavern full of gibdos or mini-dodongo’s, you face flying heads and weird creatures dressed in women’s clothes, and some of them differ in size. In towns, you can enter houses and converse with the townspeople, informing you of important things or just speaking about arbitrary topics about their life. One such character that amused my friend so much is the flamboyant fortune-teller that shouts out “PLASMA!” when receiving your fortune. The dancing men in the background are disturbing to me when I first saw them in the fortune-teller house…*shudder*. Traveling all around Japan may seem like a tedious task, but later on you receive a flute that acts like a summon device to call a huge blue dragon to transport you outside of places you have already been to; it makes it easier to backtrack and get some things that you have missed. The characters all have their own weapons and can later be upgraded from people. They also have special powers that they can use in order to reach a certain something, but they have to earn it first in the arduous mini-games you play that relate to their powers. For instance, Ebisumaru has to contend to this mini game where he has to hide in a giant cupboard with gigantic pepper and saltshakers. Then has to collect these pink and round dumpling things while he has to hide from a bald person who suspiciously opens the cupboard looking to see if Ebisumaru is there or not. Also, the Impact robot battles are very fun to play. You control Goemon Impact (he looks creepy in my opinion) that shoots lasers out of his mouth and stretches out his arms at the other robot. You have to watch out for your power meter since you get most of your power from destroying buildings (yes, you heard me) on the way to the battle scene. They remind me of the sentai robot battles (Power Rangers) in which the zords get out their swords and battle their robot or creature adversary in every single episode…

Controls: The controls are generally all right, but at some parts of the game, they are frustrating. When using Goemon’s chainshot to latch onto a star boz, it’s hard to tell if you are aiming right at the box or not. They should have made it like the hookshot aiming in Zelda: Ocarina of Time. When jumping from platform to platform in the game, it was frustrating for me to jump onto the next platform or ledge because of the awkward camera angles and because of the difficult positioning you have to make in order to jump properly. Moving around is not that bad though. The Impact battles is also frustrating. When using the robot’s chainshot to grapple onto the boss robot, you can sometimes aim wrong and then ending up missing because of the rapid movements of the arm. The controls are inasmuch as average.

Replayability: No, not really. There aren’t that many new things to do except just to collect those fortune cats that help increase your life points. Once you beat the game, there isn’t anything to go back to, unless you like reading the offbeat jokes and the occasional laugh tracks that follow it.

Buy or Rent: I would suggest that you buy this game since it takes quite a while to beat and it adds variety to the collection of Nintendo 64 games you have. But if you are a fan of the Ganbare Goemon series, then go get it.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 04/29/02, Updated 04/29/02