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Mark of the Ninja- My thoughts and review of one of the best 2D stealth action games ever made!
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Hello gamers! It's me again and I do have an interesting game to share with you all. It's called Mark of the Ninja and let me tell you that this game will RUN on all systems with zero lags unless you are still using PC's from the 1960s haha. That's also one of the reason why I decided to blog about this gem so that others can enjoy it on their PC as well without much hassle. My highschool friend introduced me to this game back in 2012 and it's still one of the best 2D stealth action games I have ever played in my life. At first glance the game won't look much awesome unless you are like me who likes 2D animation art. Compared to the souless next gen games releasing these days this game is worth every penny. Yes, it's not free but wait for the offer season on steam to buy it. Currently you can get a remastered version with improved textures and graphics if you pay 4 more extra dollars. For first timers I would absolutely suggest you guys to play the remastered version itself.
Mark of the Ninja
This game was developed by Klei Entertainment and published my Microsoft studios on October 2012 for Windows. It's an offline game where you play as a Ninja against a bunch of enemies using kickass moves and stealth. As you progress you will unlock new skills and accessories as well as new type of enemies which forces the player to use different strategies according to the environment around you and weapons that you possess over time. While the enemies use new technologies to kill us, we as the Ninja uses traditional weaponry to take down our enemies. It's a battle between traditional vs modern technology in a nutshell. This contrast creates the game more engaging and fun to play.
Launch trailer
Remastered trailer
Source: YouTube
The game is available for the following platforms as of now.
- Windows
- Linux
- Xbox
- playstation 4
- Nintendo switch
Can you run it?
If you can't run this game then you are in dire need for an upgrade my friend!
Let's look at the system requirements
See what I mean? You can run it even on old Intel Pentium CPUs on it's integrated graphics. Isn't that great? The remastered version may need a bit more juice though. It's working fine on my low end laptop without a graphics card running ryzen 3 3250u 15w TDP, 16GB RAM, 256GB ssd @1080p etc. The real winners are people who got the portable version of this game. When you see something like this your first thought will be why they didn't bother to release it on popular platforms like Android and iOS considering the graphics and gameplay. It almost feels like it was built to run on portable platforms like this however they never bothered to do that until now. I'm getting around 60 fps on my laptop hehe.
Graphics
Oh boy, you guys are gonna love this one. Again get the remastered version of you can. It's highly recommended because the art in its game is freaking incredible. It follows a 2D vintage cartoon style all over the game. It's very refreshing to see because the majority of the games released so far have realistic graphics. To the people who got tired to seeing that kind of visuals all the time this game will refresh your senses. The light and dark visuals are heavily used to show the field of vision of the enemy and light source. The trick is to stay quiet and hide in the shadows to avoid triggering the alarm. Once they spot you, some points will be deducted plus all the enemies nearby will be on full alert for a short time. They will check your last known postion for any disturbances until they feel like you are no longer there.
Sound
Like every game sound has also an important part in this game but you don't really need it because this game is filled with visual indictors to show the vibrations of sound in the environment and atmosphere when you make movements and interactions around some objects nearby like running and throwing darts. This can used to plan a kill or attack an enemy by surprise. Although without sound it will be boring haha. The best part about this game is when you terrorise the enemies with dead bodies of their soldiers they tend to go crazy and shoot random stuff lol. That shit is funny as hell. I try to mess with them everytime when I get a chance. As you progress you will unlock some accessories like Oni Mask which is shown in the title image. With this equiped you don't need to put any effort to inflict fear. The mask does that for you and when it does these idiots will friendly fire their soldiers as well as giving us a tactical advantage. Them screaming in terror after acknowledging our presence is just chef's kiss!
Gameplay
I can call this as a stealth game perfected with confidence after playing it many times over the years. This game utilises both visuals and sound but mostly visual indicators to stand apart from other games. As the Ninja you are equiped with a sword as the primary weapon and darts, noisemaker, traps, smoke bomb etc as secondary weapons. You have both lethal weapon for instant kill and non lethal ones for distractions and diversion. For rapid movements you are also given a grapple which can further be used to hang enemies to terrorise the prey hehe. This skill gets unlocked as your progress. You will also get a teleportation skill which will be incredibly useful in some areas with lasers. Like other stealth games like Splinterlands cell, Assassin's creed etc you can use the objects in the environment for a kill like throwing a dart at a chandalier will make it drop instantly killinh anyone under it. If you combine noise maker and lure multiple enemies under the chandelier, it will be a multi kill with bonus. Overall your creativity and common sense are the biggest factors which will elevate the gameplay. You have the toys and the playground is built for your advantage sometimes. Be patient, Hide in the shadows and take advantage of the situations and environments around you to complete the goals. My biggest regret is that they never produced a sequel to this game even after it's success.
My Impressions
I love it so much that I desperately wanted the developers to produce a sequel or prequel to this game. Unfortunately at best a remastered version is what we got instead. This is one of the games that doesn't show up on your radar unless you are introduced to it by someone. I'm so grateful that my friend recommended me this back in high school. I didn't understand the value of these games back then. Games like this are so hard to come by so I play it every few years when I forget the story. I'm so surprised and disappointed that I never got to tell you guys about this game sooner. I really hope you guys give this game a chance. It's around 20$ on steam and is 100% worth it guys. If you don't believe me check for the reviews on reddit, YouTube comments, steam community etc. This game also has full marks of steam and that tells a lot.
I hope you guys try this out. This game deserves more recognition. Who knows, may be we might even get a sequel if it gets popularity again.
This is also my second longest blog that I have ever written on hive. I hope I didn't bore you.
All photos are owned and taken by me, otherwise credited.
Thank you so much for your time and I'll be back next week with a new game blog!
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