Naruto: Ninja Council 3 [DS]

After two appearances on GBA, cosplayers' favorite ninja has made the jump to the DS. I was actually looking forward to playing this game. After all, the DS could always use another solid platformer (even if the previous games weren't all that hot). My excitement was knocked down a couple notches when I started to play the game and found out that it wasn't a standard side-scroller at all.

Sure, Ninja Council 3 is still played from the old 2D perspective, and the artwork looks fantastic (even if it does look an awful lot like its GBA predecessors), but instead of being broken up into levels, you lead Naruto and his buddies on a series of missions. Counting the multiple secret challenges, there are over 60 different missions to play through. Unfortunately, most of them can be completed in a couple of minutes, so you're only going to get a couple of hours of gameplay.

Adding insult to injury is the fact that most of the missions are pretty darn boring. They tend to fall into three main categories: defeat an enemy, defeat multiple creatures/enemies under a strict time limit, and collect a certain number of items within a time limit. There are a few variations on the formula here and there, but those are the main mission types. Out of these, the only missions that are enjoyable are the standard "fight a dude" levels. The timed ones are typically dull and occasionally frustrating. The worthless radar-style "map" on the bottom screen doesn't help, either. When you're running around a level looking for flags or animals as the clock ticks down, it'd be swell if the map showed more than an empty void with a dot where your character is.

Ninja School Will Help You

So the game is short and boring, but as least Naruto fans will enjoy unlocking all the hidden characters in the game. All told, there are over two dozen fighters to play as, which is pretty impressive. Other than their individual special moves, they all play pretty much the same. One nice feature is the ability to swap around special moves before entering a mission. You want Rock Lee to have Sakura's Girl Power move? Well, now you can! This bit of customization helps keep things a bit more interesting. The way to initiate certain special techniques helps, too. Some of the moves require interaction with the DS's touch screen or microphone. The extra interaction helps create the sensation that you're performing an extra powerful move.

Strangely enough, there's no "restart mission" option when you pause the game. If you're in the middle of a mission and realize that it's going poorly, there's no way to pause the game and start it over. You have to back out to the mission select screen and pick the same mission again. Seems like kind of a lame oversight.

Aside from the Mission mode, there's a multiplayer Party mode for up to four players. Unfortunately, it requires each person to have a copy of the game. The option to use Download Play would have been nice. Within Party mode, there are three games to play: Scroll Battle, where you race to collect scrolls that are dropped by defeated characters; Treasure Hunt, where you race to collect treasure before your opponents do; and Battle Royale, which is the ol' "fight 'till somebody wins" mode. Given the human interaction involved, the multiplayer bits will probably keep you entertained longer than the main game.

If you're looking for some anime-themed game to play on the DS, there are certainly better titles that you could be playing. Ninja Council 3 comes across as a game that was quickly slapped together just to get something Naruto-related on the DS. Unless you're the type who doesn't even remove their Naruto headband to shower, you have no reason to bother with this one.

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