Samurai Ghost (Wii)

CNET editors' rating: 1.0 stars Terrible
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Overall score: 2.0 (1.0 stars)
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Gamespot editors' review

• Reviewed by: Frank Provo
• Reviewed on: 11/05/2007
• Released on: 10/29/2007

In 1992, Namco produced a side-scrolling action game for the TurboGrafx-16 called Samurai Ghost. You haven't heard of it because few people bought it back then, and those who did hated it. It was complete garbage. This garbage is now available as a download from the Wii's Virtual Console service.

As the title explains, you play as a samurai who has come back from the dead. Your goal is to save China from a demon infestation. So, over the course of seven short side-scrolling levels, you walk forward, jump if need be, and use your sword to stab whatever creatures appear. Occasionally, the creatures will leave behind candles or logs, which refill your health, as well as colorful orbs that let you hurl energy waves with your sword. At the end of each level, you'll square off against a large boss that does the typical "attack and show weak spot" routine.

Since when did samurai have flowing red hair, or fight in China? This game is nuts.

The design itself isn't bad--simple, maybe, but there are plenty of good games out there that chiefly involve walking, jumping, and slashing. Nobody complained that Castlevania or Strider were too simple.

The problem with Samurai Ghost is that Namco's programmers put zero care into fashioning the design into a decent game. Every level has the same simplistic enemies and the same style of platform-jumping sequences. Progress through the levels is excruciating, because the ghostly hero walks too slowly, and his attacks frequently leave enemies unscathed. Some enemies can block your attacks with their swords and shields, and that's understandable. However, more often than not, what you'll witness is your sword just passing through enemies without hurting them. You can perform different sword-based attacks by holding the up and down buttons when you press the attack button, but that hardly matters when the game only registers that you've hit an enemy half the time.

You won't get any satisfaction from the visuals and audio either. The actual samurai ghost is very detailed and has a striking mane of red hair, and his animations are remarkably fluid. However, nearly all of the enemies are crude, two-tone globs that vaguely resemble balls of fire, disembodied hands, and the occasional goblin. Their choppy movements consist of approximately two frames of animation. The audio consists of a few clangs, some grunts, and a selection of woefully generic Asian-tinged action music. To put it bluntly, Samurai Ghost wasn't worth 50 dollars in 1992, and it hasn't been made any less horrible now that it costs six dollars.

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