Monday MAME Club [09/12/05] - SHINOBI

[Flack]

This week's game is SHINOBI (Sega, 1987). Download, play, and discuss! (KLOV Info)



Club Rules

01. You do not need to sign up for the club. If you want to participate, simply download the game of the week and join in on the conversation.

02. At the end of the week, I will randomly select someone who participated this week to select next week's game.

03. The current MAME Club Pick of the Week can be found Mondays stickied at the top of the main forum, and after that stickied at the top of the Arcade Alley forum.

Previously Picked Games: Blood Bros, Bubbles, Donkey Kong 3, Great 1000 Mile Rally, Gunforce 2, Haunted Castle, Liquid Kids, Mad Planets, Ninja Clowns, Rescue, Top Hunter, Yie-Ar Kung-Fu, 19xx: The War Against Destiny, Alligator Hunt, APB - All Points Bulletin, Armed Police Batrider, Ataxx, Battle Bakraid, Battle Bakraid, Battle Circuit, Berzerk, Biomechanical Toy, Blazing Star, Block Out, Bomb Jack, Bronze Adventure, Burgertime, Caliber 50, Chuka Taisen/Cloud Master, City Bomber, Combatribes, Crossbow, D&D: Shadow Over Mystara, Daisu-Kiss, Darius Gaiden, Dr. Micro, Dynasty Wars, Elevator Action, Elevator Action Returns, Escape From The Planet Of The Robot Monsters, ESP Ra.De., G.I. Joe, Go! Go! Mile Smile, Gryuss, I'm Sorry, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Lady Bug, League Bowling, Mega Twins, Metal Slug 2, Mighty! Pang, Mysterious Stones, NARC, Pandora's Palace, Pang, Penguin-Kun Wars, Portman, Prehistoric Isle in 1930, Pu-Li-Ru-La, Raiden II, Rampart!, Rastan, Rollergames, Satan's Hollow, Shinobi, Solomon's Key, Splatterhouse, Strike Force, Super Burgertime, Tempest, The Punisher, The Simpsons, Vendetta, Waku Waku 7, Withdrew, WWF Superstars.

Now, MAME ON!

[Flack]

Ninja popularity exploded in the mid-80's. Every kid in my neighborhood had a ninja suit and a weapon to go with it -- rubber nunchucks, foam rubber Chinese stars, or a wooden sword. Ninja movies and television shows (such as Master Ninja) were big business. Half the kids I knew signed up for Karate lessons (I took them for almost ten years). Before long there were a slew of ninja-based videogames on the market, such as Caveman Ninja, Dragon Ninja, Kid Niki: Radical Ninja, Ninja Clowns, Ninja Gaiden, The Ninja Kids, Ninja Warriors, and more. But without a doubt, my favorite ninja related game of all time was Shinobi.

I'm pretty sure the first place I ever saw Shinobi was at my local bowling alley. For those of you who haven't played it, it's a simple side scrolling platform game. Joe Musashi can jump up and down between levels, throw stars to dispose of enemies or attack using his sword (or feet) when in close range, and use "Ninja Magic" to destroy all on-screen enemies. The graphics were top notch and the music is catchy as hell (it's playing in my mind as I type this up).

Shinobi was one of the first arcade games I ever personally owned. I bought it before the big retro boom we're seeing now, and paid a whopping $25 for it. The game worked, but had no sound. I later found out that Shinobi PCB's have a custom battery which, when dies, causes the game to lose sound. I didn't know anything about fixing games back then, so I just played it without sound. I sold that cabinet when I moved, but I now have two more of them, one in my home arcade, and one in my garage as a spare.

The game is pattern based (not random) so after playing a few times you will begin to learn the patterns. That being said, to this day after almost 20 years of playing this game, I still haven't beaten it. Maybe I'll try and do that this week.

[Damaramu]

What a great game this is!

I played the heck out of it when I was a kid. Funny enough though, the bonus stage still has me sweating after all these years!

[s1lence]

Well I'm in for some ninja goodness.

[Pantechnicon]

Having grown up in the era of the early 1980's original arcade classics, I regarded the side-scrolling platformers of the late 1980's as complete anathema to my gaming life. Seeing games like Rush-N-Attack, Contra, et al push aside greats like Joust, Galaga and Robotron in the arcades was a personal affront; A never-ending stream of the same game play concept re-hashed ad nauseum. It made me long for the "old" days of unique games.

Shinobi, however, was where the hypocrisy manifested in this defiant ideology of mine. I loved this game and still do.

Its main appeal for me was the whole ninja theme. Personally I never took the ninja fad of the 1980's seriously. But around the time Shinobi came out I was in high school and being regularly hounded by a group of about 10 thugs who I and my equally nerdy best friend, Tom, dubbed "The Ninja Commandos". Playing Shinobi at the arcade was a way for us to amusedley vent our daily rations of fear and frustration at the Ninja Commandos. Joe Musashi's ninja suit, his never-ending stream of shuriken and the various manifestations of "Ninja Magic" were all just utterly hilarious and campy to two teenagers living in constant peril of having their asses kicked.

In 1988 on the night before I was going to go to my first-ever Star Trek convention (hey, I told you I was nerdy) Tom and I made the mistake of visiting the Happy Bear Arcade where the Shinobi machine sang out its MIDI-siren song - which I hope is stuck in all your heads by now - where we were bound and determined to beat the thing once and for all (Note: the whole idea that an arcade game could have an actual "ending" was at the time a novel and mysterious concept to an old-school gamer such as myself). The long and short of it was that I wound up spending about half of my Trek-Con money - perhaps twelve dollars - and we never got past the Mission 3 boss , but oddly I felt very little regret, such was Shinobi's pull over me at the time.

When I discovered MAME Shinobi was one of the first ROMs I went hunting for, and when I eventually built my first MAME cab I used a "Golden Axe" cab machine which happens to use the exact same button layout as Shinobi. Thus Shinobi is one of the few ROMs that "feels" 100% perfect on my particular MAME cabinet.

I actually was lucky enough to own a real Shinobi machine once. Paid $50 for it from a going-out-of-business grocery down the street. But it was a generic cabinet and the monitor was burnt out. I eventually parted out the board and controls on Ebay and converted the cab to a MAME which I sold locally. I kept the marquee, though (pic), as a tribute to one of my favorite arcade games...and not one I expected to be a favorite.

[IntvGene]

Ah.. good ol' Joe Musashi...

I love this game. It's a great action game. Sort of like Rolling Thunder, it plays on your laziness. But, one mistake, and you're toast. At least Joe has some close attacks to fend off guys. I love most of the level designs in this game. It's one of the few games that holds up all the way through. One of the keys for each stage is getting the gun and not dying. As soon as you've lost it, it can get considerably harder with just the shurikens.

I also love the bonus stage. The bonus stage announcer is just so happy to send a bunch of crazed ninjas at you.

I did beat this game as a kid once. It took me awhile though.

Some other weird thoughts about Shinobi:

- did they acknowledge the Marilyn Monroe posters on the wall, or is it just supposed to look like her?

- what's with the unlicensed Spiderman character too? Jeez, Sega's a bunch of intellectual thieves.

- has to have some of the ugliest thugs ever in a game. Those basic enemy guys are hideous.

[Sotenga]

Back in the early days of MAME, I simply liked the game because I liked the name of the first boss, Ken Oh.

Now I respect it for so much more. It's certainly a great game to open a great series. I do agree that it plays like Rolling Thunder, but thankfully, not as balls-obliteratingly difficult. Joe has unlimited ammo to spare, the amount of enemies, although numerous, are not liable to flood the screen, and there is the handy-dandy ninja magic to bail you out of a tight situation. For 1987, the boss fights were damn impressive and/or difficult. I swear, you either need a turbo function or caffiene-loaded fingers to beat the third boss, Mandara.

One thing I do hate, however, is the disablement of the continue function in the last mission. I HATE when games do that (Rastan and Time Soldiers are two others that come to mind), but the trend thankfully died in the nineties. It sucks here, though, and rest assured that I had to reduce the difficulty of the game and give myself the maximum number of lives allowed by the dipswitches... and it was STILL a pain to beat the game! But rest assured that I did, and I thought for sure that I would lose on the last boss, as I only had one life. And yet I beat him on my first try! He wasn't easy, I was just so nervous about losing that I just somehow managed to do my best and kick the Masked Ninja's ass. I was so surprised that I literally had a minor heart attack! Really, my chest hurt for a few seconds! Ahhhhhhhh... twas a proud victory.

Shinobi is a classic action-platformer, no two ways about it, but... just one Q. Did they think it was a practical idea to give Joe a gun? A Ninja with a firearm?! Thank goodness they made it fire shurikens in all upcoming Shinobi titles...

[roushimsx]

It's ironic, because I spent my entire lunch break reading about ninjas on wikipedia.

Haven't played this sucker in a while, but I've got a ton of fond memories of playing it in arcades and eventually picking up the PC port.

Time to roll up the ol' sleeves and put some time into this baby.

[NeoZeedeater]

:

- did they acknowledge the Marilyn Monroe posters on the wall, or is it just supposed to look like her?

It's probably supposed to be her. What's funny is that in one of the posters the mole on her face is on her forehead like a Hindu dot.

Shinobi is one of my all time favorites. It's a shame Sega has never released an arcade perfect version at home(although I think the SMS game is just as good but different).

[Gapporin]

Shinobi was a pretty good side-scroller in its time. I only played the arcade version a handful of times through MAME, but I have (or used to, anyways) the Master System version, and I thought that it was pretty faithful to the arcade version.

The Level 1 boss was a pain, though. You couldn't duck under those heat-seeking fireballs*, and you couldn't jump over them, either. I usually just went-for-broke, and flung shurikens at him until he croaked.

The bonus levels were pretty good, as you tried to go from place to place tossing shurikens at various ninjas in a first-person view. Take too long, and a ninja would pop in front of you, and that'd be that. (I never knew what the ninja did to make you quit the bonus round, anyways. He just kind of stands there.)

- what's with the unlicensed Spiderman character too? Jeez, Sega's a bunch of intellectual thieves.

Not only that -- in The Revenge Of Shinobi (Genesis), you fight Spiderman and Batman. Sega's got some 'splaining to do.

* = Get it? Heat-seeking fireballs? Hah! I slay me!

[RetroYoungen]

I must admit, I haven't found myself really drawn into this one (at least, not yet). Not to say it's a bad game or anything, it's fun; just not my style, I guess. I've always had some time really getting into side-scrolling platformers in the arcade. And through MAME it's a little bit better than I thought it would be, but I've still had trouble really engrossing myself.

[Pantechnicon]

Back in the early days of MAME, I simply liked the game because I liked the name of the first boss, Ken Oh.

During my first go-around at college in Lincoln, Nebraska there was a local radio DJ who was known as "Ken Oh". The coincidence of this did not escape my attention. He actually married one of my wife's cousins. We see them rarely, and it never occured to me to ask if he got that name (not his real name, naturally) from Shinobi. Next time I see him I've got to ask about that

Q. Did they think it was a practical idea to give Joe a gun? A Ninja with a firearm?...

Why not? One of the reasons real ninjas were equally feared and reviled by the samurai was because they didn't fight "by the rules". There was no bushido among the ninja. When it came to combat they were the ultimate pragmatists. And if possible, they probably saw nothing wrong with bringing a musket to a katana fight.

Ninjas rule. And by "rule" I mean they're totally sweet!

[Icarus Moonsight]

Who can deny the draw of a ninja video game? Ninja are an obvious choice for a protagonist. They make awesome antagonists as well. So much about them seem to have been tailor-made for great action gaming. Just the mention of Ninja invokes images of swords, shiruken, grappling hooks among other tools of their art. That's some powerful stuff going on there. With all that ninja have contributed to gaming, gaming has contributed as much, if not more, to the legend of the ninja. The facts about ninja are not very flattering when compared to the lime-light they enjoy in our beloved games. In the world of games, a ninja is a master of both death and shadow. In reality however, things were much different.

Little known facts (I learned recently) regarding ninja:

- Ninja originated from China, not Japan. **eek**
- Ninja were lousy assassins. **gasp**
- The first (confirmable) ninja, was a crossdressing spy. **retch**

Despite all of that, I prefer to think of ninja as we've all come to know and love them. In all their ass-kicking glory. Shinobi played a major part in adding to the lore of the ninja. When your playing this weeks selection, I have a suggestion that might illicit a laugh. Imagine Joe Musashi... in a mini-skirt and tube top. See? Truth is stranger than fiction.

Q. Did they think it was a practical idea to give Joe a gun? A Ninja with a firearm?!

Didn't seem that strange to me. In the game manual for the SMS version Sega boastfully claims the handgun to be "The ultimate ninja weapon!"

[Cryomancer]

Pretty fun game. This is where I register on the WTF scale and mention that this is probably the first time I've played it. It only came out a few years after I did afterall, and my childhood arcade useage was limited at best.

Since Flack mentioned never beating it, I had to use cheats and quaterfeed. Actually, I was doing pretty well except for the bosses...I tried to play as if I would still take damage as well, but yeah, I still cheated. But not right away at least. Don't worry though, the ending really isn't all that important of a thing to see.

The "only one hit" part is pretty crazy. Maybe I'm just too used to games being easy. I was never really great at games that required actually skills anyway (well, i was pretty awesome at both jet set radio games...was being the key word). Pretty cool game though, although I'll never understand why there's always yellow and green ninjas. Somehow I doubt those colors are great for stealth.

[Neil Koch]

Not only that -- in The Revenge Of Shinobi (Genesis), you fight Spiderman and Batman. Sega's got some 'splaining to do.

Later releases of the game have a copyright screen at the beginning for Spider-man and the Batman character (along with the Godzilla and Rambo ones) changed.

I like the game, but it is pretty tough -- I can only get to the third stage without continuing, and I've gotten to the last boss (who is level 2's boss in Revenge of Shinobi) a couple of times.

Anyone play Tenegn's version for the NES? I seem to recall that it was inferior to the SMS version in just about every way.

[NeoZeedeater]

Anyone play Tenegn's version for the NES? I seem to recall that it was inferior to the SMS version in just about every way.

The NES version has a better ending but that's about it.

[Sotenga]

[quote="Pantechnicon"]

Q. Did they think it was a practical idea to give Joe a gun? A Ninja with a firearm?...

Why not? One of the reasons real ninjas were equally feared and reviled by the samurai was because they didn't fight "by the rules". There was no bushido among the ninja. When it came to combat they were the ultimate pragmatists. And if possible, they probably saw nothing wrong with bringing a musket to a katana fight.

Ninjas rule. And by "rule" I mean they're totally sweet!

Whoops. I thought ninjas actually had some semblance of code... I think I remembered that from the third mission of Tenchu, where they mention that part of the ninja code is to rescue any fellow ninja in danger. Heh, that might not be canon to actual ninja guidelines, so I can see your perspective on why Joe used a gun... it just never seemed natural to me, s'all.

And I actually remember visiting that webpage! Man, those guys hate pirates.

Since Flack mentioned never beating it, I had to use cheats and quaterfeed. Actually, I was doing pretty well except for the bosses...I tried to play as if I would still take damage as well, but yeah, I still cheated. But not right away at least. Don't worry though, the ending really isn't all that important of a thing to see.

I still think that I was EXTREMELY lucky when I beat the game without savestates... I did have to give myself a few extra lives in the dipswitches, but anyway, I agree with the ending. Meh... just text. Ehhhh, the Shinobi series have never been all that cinematic, IMO. Each ending has pretty much been basic fare for VG endings... just goes to show that I never play games to see what the endings are like.

[Graham Mitchell]

I can't say much that hasn't already been said. Shinobi is a brilliant game, and I've liked just about every entry in the series that followed (especially Shadow Dancer, and Revenge of Shinobi). The PS2 reincarnation is also a very solid action game. It's not as good as this classic, but I still play it 3 years after first trying it.

This is a great pick, and I can't believe nobody had picked it before.

[stargate]

wow, what a turn out this week. must be due to the new rules.

Never played this one before, but past it many times in the arcade back in the day. Not sure why I never gave it a shot as I was into the whole Ninja thing like every other teenager.

I tried it and I like it. Responsive controls, cool music, good action. Graphics are decent, but not spectacular. Overall a very cool choice!

[Flack]

wow, what a turn out this week. must be due to the new rules.

I hope that's what it is. I decided to change it around a bit and reward the people who are participating, instead of letting people who signed up a year ago and have never responded pick games. I don't know if it's the new rules or the awesome game I picked (), but this is the highest turnout we've had in a while!

Remember folks, after 24 hours, the MAME Club post moves to the arcade alley -- join us there!