Hyyyaaaa!  Kwwwaaaa!  I am a Master Ninja, black belt at Nokando (no-can-do), slayer of demons and monsters!  Now whilst that may not strictly be true in terms of my personal Ninja prowess, it can at least be partially realised in a boyish way with Naruto: The Broken Bond.  I’ll be honest with you, I didn’t have a clue what this title was about, and it could have easily been a case study of a defective adhesive for all I knew.  But I have now been educated in the ways of Naruto and indeed the way of the ninja; I have come through stronger, wiser and believe it not quite entertained!

Who is this Naruto chap then?  Well, yes he’s one of those ninja types, a young one at that. Think of him as a cross between Dennis the Menace and The Karate Kid, a small, cheeky little tyke that knows how to chop a Suey.  Where did he come from?  Well, he’s one of those Japanese imports that are proving to be most popular; one of those stylish cartoon jobbies…  Anime!  Now you must forgive my apparent impudence, for I’m of the older generation and the closest I got to Naruto was probably the infamous ‘Monkey’.  Before I start going all nostalgic on you, I’ll have you know that serious research was carried out for this review; yes I sat down and watched a Naruto episode!   What did I discover?…  Ninjas, and lots of them too, in fact Naruto’s whole world is ninjas.  Oh, and quite a lot of trees too!  Why Naruto?  What’s special about him?  Well, knock me over with a feather; he only has the ‘Nine Tailed Fox’ trapped inside him!  Oh no, not the ‘Nine Tailed Fox’!  So how did a mega-demon become ensnared inside a small boy? 

Once upon a time, there was a huge battle; the good-guys (ninjas) against one massive bad guy (Foxy).  Old ‘pointy ears’ was not only trying to destroy the ninja Hidden Leaf village, but also the very world itself.  Fortunately the boss Sensei known as ‘The Third Hokage’ had the gumption to imprison the feisty fox inside a small child, however the cost was his own life.  With the village and indeed the world saved; enter Naruto; the little pickle with a kick!

This isn’t the first Naruto game, there have been a long line of Japanese Playstation releases and most recently ‘Rise of a Ninja’ appeared on Xbox 360 in 2007, courtesy of Ubisoft Montreal studios.  The Broken Bond is by the same western developer and in a similar vein in terms of content.  What you get is a surprisingly well blended, if not an overly deep combination of genres.  There’s a bit of RPG, sandbox type exploration with sub-missions, a hefty action/adventure story and of course good old one-on-one beat ‘em-up action.  On top of that you have a whole glut of mini-games, ranging from literally jumping through hoops in trees whilst ‘quick-travelling’, to actual fairground facsimiles enabling you to win not only hard-earned ninja cash but also ominous sounding ‘Friendship Points’.  Whilst none of the particular gametypes are particularly outstanding or indeed pushing barriers, they are all very competent in what they do and merge well to make one entertaining and value-for-money package.

It all kicks off with you playing the part of ‘The Fourth Hokage’ Sarutobi, engaging in an immediate conflict with the evil boss Sand Ninja Orochimaru.  How can you tell he’s evil?  By the red eyes and ominous tone of his voice of course!  Now, I’m guessing if you read this far you’ve probably seen quite a few animes, and therefore you’ll understand that dialogue in a fight is very important.  This isn’t your beer and curry fuelled Brit style ‘smack ‘em over the head and ask questions later’ type brawl.  The Japanese Ninja way is to reveal your detailed plans for world domination to your opponent, and then explain how you’re going to eliminate him in a long and drawn out fashion. 

After several verbal exchanges Orochimaru only goes and resurrects the first and second Hokages, however they are only mere mindless puppets to assist in the pummelling of Sarutobi.  Once this little episode plays out you’re placed in direct control of Sarutobi in a fight to save the Leaf Village.  So not only do you have to see off old despicable Orochimaru but you also have to despatch the reanimated Hokages’.  This is all done in a traditional beat ‘em-up fashion.  Through appropriate button presses you can achieve horizontal attacks, vertical attacks, throws and blocks.  As with most contemporary games within the beat-‘em-up genre, these moves can be stringed together to produce devastating, and sometimes un-blockable attacks.  Combos aren’t particularly technical but it’s all solid enough and good fun – this isn’t Street Fighter but it’s not bad considering how much else this game has to offer.  Should you block enough blows or inflict successful hits to your opponent you build up your Overdrive meter to a level that allows you to let loose a ‘Jutsu’.  This special move is instigated by holding the left trigger and moving both thumbsticks to create hand-movements that unleash awesome ninja powers.  Each character has their own range of Jutsus’, essentially just quicktime events that require you to follow button sequences, rapid button hammering or some simplistic minigames, which are all fine; mostly.  At the end of this introductory battle you are treated to another world-defining cut scene that results in the demise of the fourth Hokage.  Fortunately Sarutobi’s sacrifice is not in vain as Orochimaru flees the Leaf Village with his arms crippled and therefore is unable to perform any further evil Jutsus.

The story picks up with you taking on the role of Naruto, newly promoted from the preceding ‘Rise of a Ninja’ game.  He has his ninja stripes and the shouty little Shinobi is not happy about the death of the head Sensei.  So the story begins…  Sort of, it’s much like the fight dialogues; a protracted affair to say the least.  The title itself gives a clue to the general premise of the game in that Naruto and his best buddy, the moody and sulky Sasuke have a ‘bit of a tiff’.  The single player campaign progresses in a largely linear fashion, with the main plot visited every so often along the way.  But in between you get a wide range of arbitrary missions.  Opening up a supply route of crisps for example is not really essential for survival, but it all pads out the fairly limited main plot.  These seemingly mundane missions act as an introduction to new characters with their unique abilities.  Choji is the main protagonist in the ‘crisp’ mission, he likes eating and funnily enough his Jutsu causes him to increase in size.  Whilst running these missions you can travel as a group of up to three in size and swap between characters.  When you are in exploration mode you can still make use of Jutsu’s to overcome obstacles.  Naruto for instance can use his ‘Shadow Clone’ Jutsu to create multiple instances of himself that jump on each other’s shoulders to create bridges.  Choji can smash appropriately shaped boulders out of the way with his special expanding Jutsu and so on.  Also, you can split the party up to overcome simple puzzles, two of your team can stand on pressure pads while the third runs through a lowered gate to switch it off etcetera.  Along the path to your next quest there are a lot of traps such as spiky pits and reciprocating barbed gates, all of which sup your life points a little.  Just to make sure you don’t get too bored with all the jumping and puzzle type action you’ll be interrupted by ninja bandits who just want to, well, beat you up.  So a bit of exploring, a bit of puzzling and a few scraps along the way, all glued together very nicely.  On top of all this you get to move between the game areas with a tree-race minigame, this is different again with its first person viewpoint.

One criticism levelled at the previous Naruto game was the inconsistency of the voice acting.  It would seem that Ubisoft Montreal have taken heed and everything is now spot on in that department.  The musical score has also been lifted from the anime so sonically you can’t really fault this game.  Similarly the graphics are of an equal standard and fans won’t have much to complain about here. The game environments range from Tanzaku Town to the Leaf Village and lots of places with trees, all of which look very good with pretty lighting effects and shadows.  This also applies to game characters, which all look authentic and nicely animated.  I think it’s fair to say that this game is pretty much an interactive cartoon, if anything the graphics are more detailed than the anime original.  You can roam to pretty much anywhere you see, including ascending to rooftops by means of a ninja ‘wall walk’.   Why would you want to do that?  Well, there are numerous coins which can be hidden virtually anywhere, and should you be a collector fiend then you have a bit more fun for your money.  Of course this isn’t a full-blown ‘Crackdown’ within Naruto but the idea is very similar to orb collecting.  Not only do you collect coins from around the world, but fights are also rewarded with cash.  With this currency you can make essential purchases from stores.  At the top of the shopping list is a health pill; you’re going to need an awful lot of them with all the fights that take place.  Additionally you can buy strength pills, chakra pills (replenishes Jutsu power), throwing knifes and stat boosting scrolls for when you need an edge in battle.

I haven’t mentioned much about the RPG element within Naruto, and as with the other gameplay features its depth isn’t huge, however it is necessary.  If you want to see this game through to its conclusion on anything other than the easy setting, then you need to invest in your character’s statistics.  Naruto gains ‘Friendship points’ from completing missions, which can be spent on boosting his health, damage or Jutsu power.  However to max out these stats and those of his friends, time must be spent within the dojo.  Completing a series of challenges that range from learning combos to performing Jutsus, you can fulfil the potential of your team.  This isn’t particularly revolutionary, but what it does accomplish is to make you learn those combos and finishers, with a valid reason to practice.

As an added bonus you can play this game as a strictly one-on-one brawler, with the game’s compliment of some 30 characters to choose from.  You have the choice to play against the CPU, beat up a mate in local multiplayer or even challenge the world over Xbox Live.  As I’ve said the beat-‘em-up element at Naruto’s core isn’t going to sway the hardcore away from the likes of Soul Calibur, but it is very good as a more ‘casual’ effort.

So Naruto: The Broken Bond; good or bad?  Well, this is going to seem like a bit of a cop-out answer but I’d have to say, both in degrees.  You see, if you’re a follower of Naruto, then you’re absolutely going to love this, it has pretty much everything you could wish for.  However for the newcomer such as myself the game can seem a little shallow, and the story, well, very anime-like.  The good bits are that there’s a lot of variety and it’s an absolutely massive increase of content over the traditional beat ‘em-up.  The most annoying component surely has to be losing the boss battles and re-watching the long drawn-out ‘I’m going to kill you’ dialogues before you can re-start; very grating even after the first time!  I can’t be too scathing of this game, I enjoyed my adventures with Naruto and the overall experience left me not overwhelmed, but certainly pleasantly surprised.

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