Bandai Namco announced a new Naruto themed arena fighter and after a quick introduction at the Gamescom presentation, we got our ninja on against other ninjas!
Naruto to Boruto: Shinobi Striker is a follow-up of the latest Naruto Storm. You might wonder why they did not go for the same name as the previous fighter. Naruto Storm games try to give the fans the best fighting experience as they possibly can, set in the current existing tale of the beloved anime franchise. The Naruto era has ended in the anime franchise and the producers already launched a couple of episodes of a new chapter in the series and it goes by the name “Naruto to Boruto”. Boruto is the first child of Naruto and Hinata. The former fighting squad kept In touch with each other and that’s the reason why “lookalikes” of the previous fighters set the stage, you’re actually seeing the kids representing their parents to keep the veteran fans excited. In other words, a brand new era has arrived and it will go well with a brand new fighting experience. The game will implement existing characters and even new characters that are only created for the game!
Let’s talk about some of the basics of the game: It’s an online game that you play with different players all over the world. When you start up the game, you can choose between Versus or Mission to get your game on. The online versus mode is called “Online Ninja League” which is a 4v4 PVP game that’ll allow you to form up a team of 4 players to compete in a couple of battle modes: flag mode and barrier mode. Flag mode is your classic “capture the flag” mode where you grab the enemy’s flag and take it to your own base. After the time limit, the team which scored more points wins the game. Barrier mode is a bit MOBA-like whereas players need to capture barrier nodes that’ll lower the defensive barrier around your AI leader. Once the barriers are lowered, the enemy team has to attack and defeat the AI leader to gain victory. It’s all about defending and attacking at the same time. The “Mission” sequence is 4vs1 PVE and consists of a variety of missions: escort, subjugation, annihilation, and exploration. This mode is more of a training ground to gain experience and understand your character’s mechanics. It’s about training and preparing a strategy for your upcoming PVP battles.
The game will have different battlefields which consist out of highs and lows. Your character can run up to walls and jump from one place to another but you’ll have to know when to jump and when to move across the walls. Each battlefield has its own form and feels to it, so it’s good to prepare yourselves first at the “Mission” section before you take it head to head with another team.
There will be plenty of characters to choose from but they didn’t give us too much information, it all depends on how the Naruto to Boruto series evolves. An interesting feature of this new fighting game is the fact that you can create your own avatar and train him to be an amazing ninja. Of course, there’s also the opportunity to choose from a roster of characters. Each character has a certain style that it’s focusing on. You have Attack, Long Range, Defense and Healing. It’s important to find a good group with a variety of these “styles” of course this depends on how you and your fellow teammates want to approach the PVP battles. It’s great to see these different styles as it gives the players a choice on what style they want to focus. This game has Esport potential if it’s done right.
Before you start your battles, you’ll be able to walk around in Leaf Village, the social hub of the game. You can run around in your own character and customize it to your liking. Your own Shinobi can be customized on different levels: weaponry, ninjitsu’s, look and style. The good thing is, a character isn’t stuck on one style that doesn’t suit him or her. The developers made sure that you can constantly change or re-arrange your character’s fighting style and equipment, even during battles. Of course, this feature can only be accessed when you’re dead and have to respawn again. It’s a great innovation that has a lot of potential, this will keep the battles interesting because people can change characters and strategies on the fly.
The game focuses on Replayability, Avatar Creation, and online 4v4 gameplay. From what I’ve seen or tried, the game feels and looks great. I’m definitely keeping my eye on it until release. The game will release in the future, an exact release date hasn’t been confirmed but it will be released on the PS4, Xbox One and PC in Europe and North America. The game will offer future support, Japanese/ English voices and different subtitles alongside the audio.
We also had a sneak peek of another Naruto mobile game which is called Naruto X Boruto: Ninja Voltage. It’s a co-op game that’s already been announced in Japan but the developers confirmed that it’ll launch in Europe as well. The game is a mobile tower defense game that focuses on building your fortresses and defend it but also attacking other player’s fortresses. These fortresses can be filled with traps and enemies, so be prepared when you’re charging in. There will also be a character roster to choose from and you can form up a team with 3 other players to attack certain fortresses and gain different rewards.
This is the announcement trailer:
Here’s our gameplay footage:
