It didn't evolve from this into a platformer. Ninja Gaiden (arcade) and Ninja Gaiden (NES) were developed at the same time by different teams. Brawler type games were big in the arcades during that time frame, such as Double Dragon and Final Fight, and platformers were big on home consoles during that same time frame, such as Castlevania (which Tecmo copied for their home versions of Ninja Gaiden) and many others.
Other than the arcade, I liked the Lynx port most of all. While it's missing a couple of levels, what's there is nicely done and recognisable as Ninja Gaiden. OTOH I don't care for the PC DOS version. Why not? It generally looks terrible, with jerky scrolling and annoying beeper sound. The hanging kick doesn't knock enemies away in one hit like it should. It's missing about half the game... after completing the first stage you find yourself in round 5. Amiga looks fine, with all the levels and great BGM by Matt Furniss. Unfortunately, the casino level loses its background animations. The Japanese arcade version, Ninja Ryukenden, has some improvements over Ninja Gaiden. It actually came out later than Gaiden. Ryukenden gets a longer version of stage 3's BGM and also better balance. Final stage enemies do normal damage in Ryukenden, unlike Gaiden where one hit can take a full life block away instantly and the final boss can one-shot you. The BGM in stage 4 is changed... YMMV there.
To be fair, they didn't have that much to work with. Even the arcade version wasn't that good of a game. When you think about it, that so many of the Amiga's arcade conversions were ST ports, and when you find one that isn't, it's a port of a fairly mediocre arcade game. :P Ah well. At least we got Moonstone. Moonstone makes up for a lot. 😂
@@Jayce_Alexander I agree, when you compare the arcade version of Ninja Gaiden to Capcom's 'Final Fight' from the same time, Tecmo's game pales in comparison to the Capcom classic in practically every department, imo. As for Moonstone, I remember playing this as a kid and thought it was a lot of fun and very 'gory' for the time. :)
Qué te voy a contar de la de C64... La única forma a avanzar es con el penoso ataque del lanzamiento y tienes que ser muy preciso para poder hacerlo con éxito... Ufff
It’s always fascinating seeing how classic arcade games were adapted to consoles of the time. The Lynx version actually looks pretty cool despite being a weaker system. Amiga’s music is also pretty awesome. Personally the only version I played was the arcade one since Ninja Gaiden Black had it as a bonus unlockable game. Can’t say how good the rest play but it’s still cool to see.
Lynx version is awesome. Unlike many other versions game logic is similar to the arcade. Did the creator of the video not know how to to do the throw move on the arcade and Lynx version? Team that did the Lynx version should have done the Lynx version of double dragon and ditched the zoomed in look of that game.
certain features in the arcade game were excluded in the Lynx port because of hardware limits 64 KB RAM or the media limited storage Lynx game cards 2 MB ROM storage in 128 KB, 256 KB, 512 KB sizes
I wanted a Lynx for my birthday when I was a teen cause of the Ninja Gaiden port. It’s a great version excluding some levels, animations and no 2 players co-op which was disappointing
I got the NES version of Ninja Gaiden for Christmas in '90, but was not familiar with the arcade version. After playing the NES version, my youngest uncle (just under 3 years older than I am...sadly, R.I.P.) loved it, and my dad got him the PC version when my dad saw it for sale sometime in the next year. We were surprised about how different it was, but we still had a ton of fun playing it on his Packard Bell 286. Was it a great port of the arcade version? Nah, but we had no idea at the time, since we'd never even seen the arcade version. I have a lot of good memories with him and some cousins of playing a games like this port, the Bad Dudes port, Winter Games, P.T. 109, F15 Strike Eagle II, Wolfenstein 3D, etc.
really enjoy your comparisons, but you should use bilinear filtering or integer scaling to avoid mis-shaped pixels and scrolling artefacts. That, or record at 4k and scale the footage down :)
I don't think this is a particularly brilliant game in any of its incarnations, even in the arcade, but I do enjoy the arcade version, if mostly for historical significance. But this was one game where I was really glad the NES version wasn't based on the arcade game, as it's clearly the best Ninja Gaiden game. It's a vastly superior game to this beat ' em up, and I think it can stand comfortably next to Castlevania 1 & 3 in the NES library. Even the PC-engine and SNES "upgrades" of the NES game don't play quite as well as the NES one. The Master System and Game Boy games are also superior to this one, and both excellent games in their own right, although they don't quite reach the incredible heights of the NES game. Great video, though. It's always interesting seeing all the different ports next to each other.
q recuerdos y q vicios, con 25 pts recuerdo llegar solo hasta el 3 nivel, con dos monedas al 4, era bastante dificil. Respecto a las versiones. La de spectrum la recuerdo gratamente jugarla, y envidiar en micromania las versiones de 16bit, pero no llegan al level del arcade. En consolas, son ports de la NES y en megadrive se canceló el juego , menos mal, porque era muy regulero.
Probably because the 'arcade' versions were the 'gold standard' original creations, and therefore were almost always also the 'best' incarnations of the games. Hence, the common 80s and 90s gaming term of "arcade perfect", meaning that the desired goal for all subsequent versions of the games on home computer formats, would be to strive to re-create the arcade original, with varying degrees of success/failure, as demonstrated in such comparison videos as this. In modern gaming, the Coin-operated Arcade scene is nothing close to what it was in the 80s/90s, and so super powerful game consoles (and PC) are the main focus for all gaming. Nowadays, 'home versions' (console/PC) are usually the 'best' versions, often with additional features and enhancements added to already 'arcade perfect' versions. This wasn't the case in past eras, when simply trying to achieve what the arcade original had delivered was a mighty struggle in itself, given the often vastly inferior hardware available for the home computers/game consoles.
In a race to see who made the more cringe version of Ninja Gaiden, the PC DOS version takes the lead, with the C64, Amstrad & ZX Spectrum bringing up the rear.
