Welcome to my review of Kunai, my first experience with the Ninja Metroidvania genre.
A traumatic event has shaken the balance of the world. Human life has been almost wiped out by the evil A.I. Lemonkus. Robots roam free across the earth. You take control of Tabby, a killer robot infused with the soul of an ancient warrior.
Start out with nothing, progress and increase in strength by killing enemy robots to unlock abilities, weapons and ninja tricks. Explore a world filled with secrets, hidden passages, and mysterious characters. Kunai is all about movement and agility. Use your ninja mobility to reach places where no normal robot could ever go.
Explore the different pixel-art environments of Kunai, each with a minimalistic palette, while Tabby makes cute faces. Use a variety of ninja tricks to move around the world and unleash your deadly arsenal of weapons to fight your way through armies of evil machines, rogue androids, and mindless mechs.
Kunai is exactly what you’d expect from the moniker Ninja Metroidvania. You take the Metroidvania genre and you add in ninjas, easy as that, end of review. I am giving it an 8.5 score because it is quite cool and thanks for reading…
Not quite that easy though. Kunai is exactly what I described it as, but there is a lot to talk about first. Kunai is quite the great game, a Metroidvania, but great nevertheless. I know, I sound sour but that is because I am. I completely burned out on the genre and ever so rarely, do I find a Metroidvania that appeals.
In Kunai, you got a way ahead of you, first finding the sword that you can use to slash the enemies all over the place. Next up to find are your kunai. Kunai are ninja weapons that most gamers and otaku will know from the hit manga series Naruto.
Once you get both kunai, you can climb up ledges on the left and on the right. This is where new parts of the game become available. Then you move on to the first real boss fight, the garbage collector. Once you figure out his tell, you can beat him and yet another open path awaits for you to explore.
While Kunai does not excel like some others in the genre, it does do enough to keep you entertained and that is the money shot. The action is swift and you do not need a ton of over the top moves to beat a boss, you just need good reaction speed and some smarts to figure out what to do.
Graphically, Kunai is your daily dose of a Metroidvania, not amazing and nothing special either. What does stand out, however, is the audio, I loved the soundtrack and would even go as far as to say I would buy it if given the chance. It is that good and I can hear myself listening to it in my car already.
In conclusion, Kunai is above average as a Metroidvania and it blends the ninja influences rather well. I was entertained and I would go as far as to say that Kunai is well worth the time and money to check it out.
