Ultimate Guide: The Legend Of The Mystical Ninja
HISTORY. THE MYSTICAL ITS ARCADE NINJA SERIES, ORIGINATOR OR GOEMON WAS LUKEWARM, IN JAPAN, FEW HAS RELEASES A TROUBLED WERE OFFICIAL LOCALISED, ENGLISH AND NOW RELEASE IT SEEMS IS ONE ABANDONED. OF THE GEMS SAD, BECAUSE OF THE 16-BIT ITS FIRST ERA
Revisting Konami’s wacky platformer
Starting in arcades in 1986 with Konami’s Mr Goemon, our eponymous ninja didn’t have the most auspicious starts. It featured a Hokusai-inspired art style and was fine to play, but no one would have expected any great legacy from it. There followed some sequels on the Famicom and MSX2 and then, in the summer of 1991, there was Ganbare Goemon: Yukihime Kyuushutsu Emaki for Super Famicom. It’s hard to imagine but, as of writing this, the game is nearly 30 years old. It’s also hard to tell what Konami’s aspirations were for the title, given that the rudimentary credits list mainly programmers, with a few artists and musicians, almost as if the joyous mechanics within happened without planning. Under the title of ‘Boss’ the credits list programmer Shigeharu Umezaki, previously director on Konami’s Contra and Life Force, and also coder on the next two Super Famicom sequels. This was the first Goemon game to be localised, reaching America a year later as The Legend Of The Mystical Ninja. Sadly it suffered some censorship, losing the farting dance and striptease. It’s unknown who translated it, but Goemon became
Kid Ying and Ebisumaru became Dr
Yang (get it?). The in-game English was clear, though maybe lost some of the original’s humour, while the
English manual was a hilarious gag-reel of outrageous puns and nonsensical jokes. Import purists may complain, but honestly the wacky shenanigans are in keeping with the series’ tone.
Electronic Gaming Monthly judged it well, though complained it was too pastel, with scores of 8/8/9/8. The UK and European PAL territories wouldn’t see reviews until December 1993 and, contrasting with our po-faced former colony, scores across the board were unanimously excellent; CVG, Super Play, Total!, Game Zone, and others, all scored it 90% or above. It also featured in the 2010 book, 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die.
These are the facts and yet, searching our shared collective memory, is that truly how Mystical
Ninja is remembered? Despite the accolades, high scores, praise, and how everyone either played or knows someone who played it, the game never quite entered the SNES era’s defining zeitgeist in the same way Zelda,
Final Fantasy, or even Konami’s own Castlevania and Contra titles did. Heralded as good, maybe even great, but never legendary. If you’ve eagerly read this far to the fourth paragraph, then you know what we’re going to say (and are in agreement). Retro Gamer sees The Legend Of The Mystical Ninja as an essential part of experiencing the 16-bit era, and the equal of Konami’s other classics.
Functionally it’s similar to Zelda, albeit with chronological stages and alternating overhead/ side-scrolling sections. A blend of action platforming with light RPG overtones. The game starts with an impressive for the time cinematic, complete with written dialogue and Mode 7 facilitated close-ups. The ghost woman of Horo temple is acting strangely so the two comrades vow to investigate. Thus players are thrust into a satire of ancient Japan; houses with sliding paper doors, fishmongers with oversized catches, while the music is unmistakably eastern. Here also is one of Mystical Ninja’s strengths – make a mental note of what you see, because each stage will introduce numerous single-use qualia. Some aspects, such as spear enemies and stores, show up throughout, but so much else is unique.
The ghosts of the haunted village; the actionstage bell which kills all enemies; the taiko drummers at the festival; the burger joint at the theme park; a multitude of Mode 7 gimmicks (rotating stages, inflating bosses); even a Kid Dracula secret if you know where to look. Not to mention the restaurants which restore health. In any other game you’d have a text menu, maybe three generic items repeated forever – in Mystical Ninja there are 20 distinct little graphics representing real delicacies, and they all just do the same thing.
All of this is why even 30 years later the game holds up well. Everything, every stage, every foe, is part of an ostentatious framework of redundancy and novelty. When you play it today, try to imagine how much effort the developers must have put in, creating objects and situations which would last only seconds.
Investigating the ghost woman expands to tracking down a counterfeiting gang, disrupting a festival, discovering the Otafu Army has kidnapped princess Yuki, and rescuing ninja spy Yae. The scope of the adventure grows and suddenly Goemon/kid Ying and Ebisumaru/dr Yang are fighting wooden robots, getting shot through the sky, awakening a guardian spirit, and ultimately liberating the Kingdom Of Ryukyu and its true ruler while tussling with some mischievous animal spirits and the Hannya Shogun (who has made the castle fly!). Each new area brings a new twist or unique mechanic, keeping the entire rollercoaster adventure fresh. Is it not the same as Castlevania or Contra?
The other strength of Mystical
Ninja, in addition to its pursuit of novelty, is how the game is presented as a buffet of indulgences, rather than just a goal-oriented challenge.
Over the course of the nine Warlock Zones are a multitude of pleasurable
distractions. Some, such as the jobs, serve the function of increasing money, but many are there just for amusement. Academically it could be asked if these exist to mask shortcomings of the core game, since a distracted player is less critical. But if you strip away the dice games, card games, horse racing, Gradius arcade and so on, you’re still left with some excellent action stages, tight controls, great music, and sublime use of the SNES’S available 32,768 colours. The many unnecessary frivolities are not there to distract from the core, but rather supplement it, so as to allow players to luxuriate at their own pace, in a fun and original world.
It’s unfathomable why Mystical Ninja didn’t storm the sales charts and open the way for its sequels to be localised. Some have argued the game is ‘too Japanese’, but is it really? The colours are bright, the sound upbeat, the dynamic rhythm of the exploration and action stages nicely balanced, while the Rpg-lite mechanics are accessible without being shallow. Would such things alienate a young British player? It is the everyman game, crafted to be loved by everyone.
Today the game can be experienced in several ways, including a port to the GBA and Virtual
Console release, both of which remedy the inconvenience of passwords. As to the future, the series has been dormant since the 2005 Japanese DS game, with the last western release being in 1998 on N64! Hopefully, Konami revives the series, if not an original title then a compilation. The surreal and indulgent flamboyance of the first release gives a glimmer of how much potential the property has.
Special thanks to Jessica Gonzales of retrographicbooksllc.com for supplying hi-res original box art by Tom dubois.