Shinobi: Art of Vengeance was a game I was looking forward to but didn’t actually pay a lot of attention to until it suddenly released. Given it was an old Mega Drive era SEGA franchise in the hands of the same people who made Streets of Rage 4 I wasn’t worried though, and sure enough I loved my time with this game. Let’s take a deeper look.
Background:
Look at how many different layers that background has…
Shinobi: Art of Vengeance was released worldwide on August 29th 2025 for the PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, XBOX One, XBOX Series, Switch and PC. It’s a return to the 2D routes of the franchise after some less-than-successful PS2 3D entries and general SEGA old IP disinterest led to the series going dark for the past decade or so.
Gameplay:
Uppercutting an enemy with a katana… yep, that’ll do it.
The gameplay is actually quite different from the Mega Drive classics, as you’re not solely relying on kunais and magic spells and killing enemies in one strike, in fact you use your katana more than anything else in this game and enemies often take a lot of hits to defeat. You have a light and heavy attack and can combo with presses of the two buttons, plus a whole bunch of combos revolving around jumping strikes, dashing strikes and other such things that you can unlock with collectables. You can also do “executions” to injured enemies, and if more than one enemy is down on health at the same time you do a chain execution to all of them, which is very visually pleasing. You do still have kunais which run out after certain use, plus magic spells that need to charge up and a new “Revenge gauge” that builds up the more you get hit (and carries over from death) that allows you to use one of four extremely powerful spells once it’s done filling up, from screen-clearing attacks to one that completely refills your health (which I used a lot when on tough bosses, I’ll admit) I have to say that much like the great combat in Streets of Rage 4 you really feel each hit you get thanks to the combination of animation, sound effects and controller rumble. It’s extremely satisfying and got me through any notion of repetitiveness due to just how fun it was.
Um, I’m using magic to wipe out a large amount of enemies, if the screenshot isn’t clear (… and it isn’t…)
What sometimes wasn’t fun was a series of special challenge levels which required extremely accurate platforming, wall jumping and wall-clinging, which was sometimes quite annoying. Never maddening though, the responsiveness of the controls and accuracy of the jumping meant any time I failed was on me, it was just on me a lot during the last few bonus rooms… Still, the fact I even bothered should show you how into the game I was! While still an action platformer where you go from left to right in subsequent stages with bosses at the end of each there is a twist this time as you unlock abilities in later levels and can redo older stages to get bonus items using the new abilities, like a Metroidvania but without the one large open map stuff (or in other words, more like the Mega Man X series really…) The items are all traversal based as well, like swinging on hooks, climbing walls, breaking through walls and floors, that sort of thing. So with very few exceptions it was never about using them to defeat bosses or anything Zelda-y like that, it was all about using them to get to the bosses in the first place. There are a couple of autoscroller levels placed in between chunks of stages to break things up too, just some of the classic games. There are plenty of checkpoints and unlimited lives, so there isn’t any frustration really, you just keep retrying until you do whatever you’re stuck on!
That’s an electric floor, buzz saws in the ceiling, rotating flame throwers and moving platforms, if you’re counting…
The collectables allow you to buy things at a shop, like the previously mentioned extra combo moves and more kunais, more health that sort of thing (though the latter two things can also be unlocked by finding them in the bonus areas of the earlier levels with new equipment I mentioned earlier). Once you finish the game you can play through it again with limited lives/continues via an Arcade Mode and see how quickly you can complete each level, Time Attack style. Overall though the game will last a good while, especially if you go for all the bonus challenge stages like I did, not to mention there is a 100% tracker on each stage to motivate you to return to the older levels with the new equipment, as mentioned. Once you do reach the end though there isn’t much else to do, it doesn’t have that fun replayablity like SoR4 or anything, so for whatever reason once I was done I was done…
Graphics and Sound:
Some of the neon-drenched city levels are real lookers… plus full of on-the-nose SEGA Easter eggs!
The graphics are really nicely detailed 2D sprite work with fantastic backgrounds and lighting effects too. A real visual treat.
The soundtrack is good too, though I can’t say I wanted to listen to any of it isolated each track fitted each stage well.
Story:
Who names their lead villain “Ruse”? Unless he’s not the main villain after all! … He is though.
Not a lot to say here, as the title suggests it’s your classic revenge story as a group called “ENE Corps.” have begun to takeover the world thanks to their leader Ruse having stolen the powerful magic scythe from the Grim Reaper himself and used its power to control a large army of demons and yokai (which is just a phrase for demons in Japan, so don’t know why I wrote both there… whatever!) The Oboro Clan is the last line of defence and as the game opens the clan is all but wiped out, leading to classic protagonist Joe Musashi heading off as a one-man army to take them down in revenge. On his journey he allies with a woman called Chiyo who was brainwashed by Ruse and Ankou, who is the Grim Reaper whose scythe was stolen and together they eventually eliminate the ENE Corps. boss by boss, factory by factory until the final stage set in the afterlife itself where Joe calls upon the spirits of his dead Oboro clan members to help him defeat Ruse. It’s not exactly award-winning, but it does the trick given its all about the fun gameplay.
Thoughts Now:
Dashing through the fields on the back of a giant dog. Just like actual ninjas did, back in the day…
Shinobi: Art of Vengeance was a great ride from start to finish, full of satisfying combat and tricky but always doable platforming. My only real gripe was, for whatever reason, once I was done I didn’t feel like going back to it, it didn’t have the kind of replayability as I’d have thought. Still, given I did 100% every area before fighting the final boss I can’t say I wasn’t pleased with my purchase!
Hogan Reviews 