something completely different: NH/NA Series

In my previous post, I made a little description of fighting gamedom and the different games that the genre had to offer. We now move on to the meat of the matter.

The Narutimate Hero/Accel Series is different from all the games I described previously. In its most simplest interpretation, it is a straight up Brawler type game in the style of Smash Brothers. But there are a few things about the game that help set it apart from the rest of these games and make it into a completely different monster entirely.

1. The Narutimate Games are fighting games oriented not only on attack or defense, but on escape.

Isn't escape a form of defense you say? In the Narutimate series, not exactly. Let me introduce a few concepts that Narutimate players know by heart.

Kawarimi no Jutsu (KnJ) - basically a teleporting move that puts you at the other side of an enemy. This move effectively cancels blockstun and breaks a combo, preventing any further damage. Unlike other defense mechanisms in fighting games, it does not interrupt the enemy momentum in comboing, so he must either cancel his action with a shuriken or some other thing to prevent getting counterattacked. Otherwise he is completely open to any kind of retaliation.

The thing about KnJ is that unlike any other burst/combo breaker-like defense mechanisms, it 1) is easy enough to do, but not too easy to be able to spam and do it 100% of the time 2) can be used frequently and successively 3) can be used an infinite times in a match provided there is chakra to do so 4) is applicable to most enemy attacks 5) and aside from the chakra drain, it does not confer any penalty to the player using it.

Basically, it's a method of escape. It renders long, strung-together combos less effective but not impossible, puts emphasis of defensive play and makes the attacker think before attacking: is my attack going to connect? Should I take the risk? It's more or less a glorified parry that both players can do again and again.

The developers of the game could have screwed this up in so many ways. If KnJ were limitless, matches would never finish (or take 20 minutes to play) So they balanced it by using shuriken and the chakra system, two innovations that improved the game system as a whole.

Shuriken - despite being technically an attack, shurikens are used to cancel moves or interrupt animations, preventing retaliation post-knj by attacking the freshly knj-ed player first. They can also be used to "pin" people in place and allow a player to back off. Again, it is a defensive option as much as it is an escape option.

Chakra System - basically an "energy bar" where some attacks and defensive options get their juice. This is basically your second lifebar in the Narutimate series. If you run out of this bar, you 1) lose many defensive options 2) are susceptible to more damage, as chained attacks are infinitely more effective (leading to infinite attacks that can kill you outright, and lol pardon the pun) 3) lose momentum as you struggle to regain lost chakra.

That's the thing with the Narutimate series. Each player is given so many options of escape (not just defense as in blocking or parrying) that defensive play can be done. On the other hand, that doesn't mean that attacking is useless; on the contrary, players are tasked with finding more effective ways of dealing damage, as damage in the Narutimate series increases with every hit in the combo (as compared to other games, where chained hits deal less damage.) And indeed, some moves safer to do than others (more on that later) some are harder to KnJ than others, and out of these moves, some cause more damage.

Escape makes it that attacks (or at the very least, few attacks) are neither 100% guaranteed nor 100% safe. Fighting games in the past have implemented similar moves before, but making them easily accessible at this level of play is something not many fighting games do - this might actually be the first.

The player who escapes better and escapes wisely, (NOT the player who attempts the most attacks, nor the player who just blocks the most) has the winning advantage in the game. Along with this, judicious use of attacks that deal optimal damage, while employing better defense than the other player, wins the game. If you do 100 attacks and the opponent dodges all 100 of them, that effort would matter little. If you do 5 attacks and all of them hit, 5 hits is better than none. There is a caveat to this, however, as I will discuss in another topic: Chakra Management.

So again, NA/NH is all about escape.

2. 'Simpler' attacks do not necessarily mean simpler strategy

In the Narutimate series, attacks are seemingly limited to the circle button. Pressing circle in some combination with the arrow buttons makes any number of attacks. Down + down or Up + up circle unleashes a jutsu.

Does that mean the attacks are simpler? In a sense, yes. Narutimate series moves are not as hard as performing that coveted BnB 36 hit combo. But there are more attack options available.

Shuriken/Items - can serve any number of purposes in the game. You can use it defensively, interrupt another player's attacking rhythm (Kimimaro and Kidomaru offer excellent examples of this) deal lots of damage by abusing damage modifiers (explosive tag,) create a barrier to prevent your enemy from pursuing you (fire pot, caltrops) provide a distraction or handicap to your opponent (seals) and so on. Winning tactics rely on when to properly use the right item or not.

Ougi - basically a one-hit move that causes tons of damage and can facilitate a reversal of match momentum. However, following my first point, the game gives the victim of this move another chance to escape - by way of ougi seal inputs.

With all these tools at the players disposal, one can make any sort of strategy to work around an opponent's defense. NH/NA isn't simply about mashing the circle button, the technical aspect of attacking takes second place to the tactical execution of attacking. Simply punching an opponent is different than punching an opponent closer to a firepot or exploding tag, or luring an enemy towards a trap or unfavorable terrain.

Sometimes escape itself becomes a tactical method of attacking. Take an exploding kunai. To be safe from the resulting explosion, the item user throws this at medium range from the enemy. But some players throw exploding kunai right next to the enemy, THEN KnJ away from the explosion to safety. Not only can this throw off the expectation of the enemy "he'll never throw an exploding kunai at this range" but it gives him the momentum to attack and follow up (especially if the opponent techs.)

3. same button layouts does not mean all the characters play the same

Sure, every one of the characters in the Narutimate series have the same move layout. Everyone has at least two jutsu, an ougi, and a standard movelist.

The thing is, that each character is specialized for a unique function or is geared towards a specific type of play. There are characters that are used only for taijutsu, characters that are more long range oriented, and characters that act as walking tanks that sacrifice mobility for a solid defense and good keepaway attacks.

So no two characters in the Narutimate series play exactly the same. Some may play similar to each other but there's always something that sets them apart. Other games fall into the pit of having similar moves all around PLUS having simplified movesets. With the Narutimate series there is variety all around.

That's all I have to say for now. Next up is a look at the individual titles of the Narutimate series. We'll start off with Narutimate Hero 3, known in the west as Ultimate Ninja 3.