The Ninja JaJaMaru series has remained mostly an unknown outside of Japan, where it found wide popularity. It’s a real shame too as the games were actually rather good. Having only played the Famicom original and the Saturn reimagining (which was criminally excluded from the ININ Ninja JaJaMaru Retro Collection), my knowledge of the series was rather limited – but I was still more than happy to give this new one a shot.
Does it live up to the addictive classic games? Why, yes. yes it does,
Many thanks to the publisher for the review code.

HOLDING THE FORT
Oh no! The great Yokai Army is commencing their invasion, and its up to JaJaMaru and his friends to stop them. Set over three chapters, your goal is to eliminate all the Yokai enemies in each stage before progressing to the next. The setup is a little reminiscent of the original Mario Bros, except you’re armed with deadly shurikens. You can drop down to previous floors with ease by simply holding down and the jump button, but should you wish to ascend you will need to destroy the blocks barring the way. These blocks also have a chance of dropping hearts to replenish your health, invincibility potions, or temporary buffs to your attack, speed, or jumping abilities.
It’s quite a standard formula, but the beautiful artwork mixed with the fast paced gameplay make it incredibly fun. Enemy Yokai are varied enough that you’ll need to consider how best to take them out, especially when you have an assortment of different enemy types altogether. Surviving requires prioritising the ones that pose the most threat and beelining for them first. I personally prioritised the ghostlike enemies that spray a shower of projectiles across the map, as even walls are unable to stop their attacks.
Souls earned from defeating enemies will be transformed into coins via the end of level Jalecoin Changer. This currency will then get funnelled inside the ‘Jalabank’ – a piggybank in the form of the titular ninja, whose eyes shake as coins get crammed forcibly into his head at super speed. It’s a ridiculous process, and the amount of noise, flashing lights, and ancillary nonsense makes the whole thing one glorious sensory overload. Whilst eventually it can get a little tiresome, even when you speed up the process with the B button, it’s still very charming seeing how they make the process of turning one worthless currency into another just to hype up the unlocking of new prizes. Unlockables are earned at a surprisingly frequent rate and not only includes duller stuff like artwork, but also contains a wide range of playable characters and Jaleco bonuses, These latter unlockables affect a special rare pickup in the game and allow you to transform into one of a handful of different characters based on Jaleco properties, including a car that can zoom around at high speed firing collectibles. Something like this would normally seem out of place in a game based around ninjas, but the ridiculousness of the game’s arcadey nonsense actually makes it work rather well!
The real meat though is with the unlockable playable characters, JaJaMaru is fine, but it’s the others that really make the game interesting. There are coloured ninja variants that represent all the colours of the rainbow, complete with their own attacks and abilities. The pink ninja is weak, but can fire shurikens in 8 directions; the black ninja can breathe fire, and the emerald ninja has the ability to lay caltrops at very short range. They all play rather differently and it’s fun to play around with and find a favourite. Characters aren’t just limited to your Ninja friends either, as enemy Yokai can also be unlocked and played as. Considering how weird some of their attacks and abilities can be, these characters can either by extremely good or terrible. There’s one character in particular that I found to be almost unusable in most stages, but he was the only way I could beat the final boss of the second chapter!
Speaking of bosses, these foes are encountered after beating certain stages within each chapter. They are a lot of fun with some great attack patterns, but having to beat both a full stage and boss in one life can make encounters far trickier than they probably should have been. I spent more time on the final level than the rest of the game combined for this very reason, as this stage is already incredibly tough before taking into consideration the hard-hitting final boss afterward. It felt a tad obnoxious and made the game end with a little bit of a downer. Perhaps having bosses listed separate to stages would have made things far more balanced and helped with this sudden difficulty spike.
That final boss isn’t really the end, however, as the credits will reveal that a lot more is to come. As the “+ Hell” part of the game’s title implies, there’s a whole new game waiting for you after seeing the credits. Hell Mode is a much harder variation of the main game and comes with some new level layouts and bosses too. Whilst I won’t spoil some of the intricacies of this game mode, I will say that there are some key changes to the mechanics of the game that make it worthwhile trying to work through. Just bear in mind that this mode is hellishly difficult from the very start!
There’s quite a lot of additional content included here for the game’s reasonable pricetag. From the mountain of unlockables, to the secondary Hell story mode, to the two player (local) co-operative mode, to even a tough little ranking stage to work through, there’s plenty of bang for your buck should you want to keep playing for a while.
Those interested in a physical version of the game can find it directly from ININ’s site:
https://www.iningames.com/
I wasn’t prepared for how addictive The Great Yokai Battle turned out to be. It sunk its hooks into me quite early on, and the bright colours and loud noises rammed into all my sensory organs kept me addicted to earning more and more stuff. There’s quite a lot on offer here, but just bare in mind that the difficulty of the final stage and the titular Hell mode may be quite offputting for those who aren’t fans of arcade games such as these!

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