Ninja JaJaMaru: The Great Yokai Battle + Hell Review
Ninja JaJaMaru has always been a series that has eluded me for some reason or another so I was thrilled to be able to review not only the newest rendition of Ninja JaJaMaru but also a hefty amount of its Nintendo-centric back catalogue thanks to the included retro collection.
The Great Yokai Battle + Hell
Ninja JaJaMaru: The Great Yokai Battle + Hell is the real main event and serves as a refinement of the classic Ninja JaJaMaru-kun gameplay.
The great Yokai Battle consists of three chapters the first features 5 levels, the second chapter has 7 and the final chapter sees you battling across 10 levels which all increase in difficulty as you progress.
Levels are a little reminiscent of the original arcade Mario Bros. games, which is hardly surprising seeing as the original Ninja JaJaMaru was released just a couple of years after the wildly successful Nintendo arcade classic. Levels consist of tiered platforms that our characters can jump or fall down between. Enemies spawn in through doors and it’s down to us to eliminate them with each type being based on a different Yokai. The goal of each level is to defeat all the Yokai on each map with progress being displayed as a green bar on the bottom of the screen.
Gameplay is much faster than the original Famicom game for both the main character and enemies lending to an even more arcadey feel than the original.
Across each map, you’ll collect various powerups with differing effects. A few of my favourites include a powerup that can freeze all the yokai on screen for a small amount of time, a potion that makes you invulnerable to attacks briefly or one that summons JaJaMaru’s Giant frog to insta-kill all enemies on screen at once, very satisfying.
Occasionally a JALECO powerup will appear which allows you to become one of five classic Jaleco characters which are extremely overpowered and always hilarious.
As you progress through each level the difficulty increases with more Yokai to defeat and even some super-sized versions of normal Yokai which can be infuriatingly difficult to figure out at times.
Certain levels will have you facing off with one of the various boss characters from the older JaJaMaru games, these battles can be a lot of fun although they start directly after a normal level so it may be wise to keep your health high before proceeding.
Upon completing a level you are awarded coins based on your performance and they are deposited in the JALABANK. The more coins you have in the JALABANK the more characters you unlock to play as. Each character has their own attacks, movement speed and stats. It’s quite fun trying out all the different characters, most are based on the series’ enemies and even feature the same attacks. Other characters include Princess Sakura, Pirate Namazu Dayuu (the villain of the first Famicom game) and various different coloured Ninjas all with different attacks and stats.
Coins are still awarded even if you don’t finish the level which is a nice touch as you are always progressing in some manner.
The bank also unlocks various high-resolution scans of box art from the various Ninja JaJaMaru games and serves as somewhat of a museum which is a nice touch.
Collect 10,000 coins and you unlock Hell Mode, a whole new campaign that amps up the difficulty. Hell mode allows you to use ‘super’ versions of the starting Ninja classes and you are tasked with rescuing some of your unlocked characters. This put a nice spin on things, especially if you have become overly reliant on one of the characters who has been taken away and forces you to play with characters you may have otherwise overlooked.
I should briefly mention the visuals, which are a mesh between new and old. The character, enemies, powerups etc are all based on their 8-bit Famicom versions and look very clean and blocky. Menus are higher resolution and there’s plenty of colour to the game. A very stylish game indeed, without losing the classic JaJaMaru aesthetic.
Quite early on you unlock the ability to switch between the new and retro soundtrack and I was surprised to notice some of the new tracks have full-blown vocals in them. During my playthrough, I switched between them but definitely preferred the new tracks, a very nice addition.
Ninja JaJaMaru: Retro Collection
Listed as Ninja JaJaMaru The Great Yokai Battle Bonus is a collection of 6 JaJaMaru retro titles across quite a few systems. Each title features all the bells and whistles we’ve come to expect from retro rereleases and features a layout pretty much identical to the Wonder Boy Anniversary Collection, which is no surprise as emulation is once again handled by Ratalaika games. Each game features 6 save states slots, screen options such as CRT filters etc and even the inclusion of a cheat menu along with rewind features.
Emulation quality itself is of a high standard and the ports feel snappy and responsive, although I did have one or two crashes occur in the Game Boy Color port.
Ninja JaJaMaru-kun
The Famicom game that started it all. Princess Sakura has been Kidnapped by the evil Pirate Namazu Dayuu and it’s down to Ninja JaJaMaru to rescue her.
Gameplay is very similar to the main reimagining, you traverse across tiered platforms defeating Yokai against a time limit. This time around you can only move up or down via breaks in the platforms instead of just dropping down as you see fit.
Each level has Namazu Dayuu holding Princess Sakura hostage at the top in an almost Donkey Kong-esque fashion. Occasionally Princess Sakura will drop a cherry blossom that floats downwards which you can collect for a reward.
Bonus boss fights occur where you face off against an ever-increasing number of Pirates firing your shuriken upwards while avoiding flames.
I completed the game at which point it seems to loop at level 22, this is just a feature of the time and something I’m glad is not still around.
Overall a fun little glimpse into the origins of Ninja JaJaMaru, however, I’d much prefer to play the new version over this.
Ninja JaJaMaru’s Big Adventure (JaJaMaru no Daibouken)
Oh no, Princess Sakura has been Kidnapped again! As the title suggests, this time around JaJaMaru is on a big adventure and this time around it’s side-scrolling.
I’m sure this is just a coincidence, but Ninja JaJaMaru’s big adventure came out one year after the system seller Super Mario Bros. and I’m starting to feel like Jaleco was copying someone’s homework but only changing it slightly.
You guide Ninja JaJaMaru from left to right and can actively ignore enemies this time around if you choose. You can smash blocks to acquire power-ups and points as you head towards the door at the end of the level.
At level 10 you’ll have a boss battle where you control JaJaMaru on top of his giant frog and seemingly save Princess Sakura. The game then continues and there’s a massive step up in difficulty. Reach level 20 to have another boss fight and rescue Sakura once again. After this, the game seems to loop and you’re playing for score.
Not a bad game by any means, I just wish it had a proper ending. A fun and quite a difficult platformer worth checking out.
Ninja JaJaMaru: Operation Milky Way
Operation Milky Way is a bit of an oddity. You can play as either JaJaMaru or Princess Sakura across 7 unique stages and gameplay wise it feels like Super Mario Bros. 3 crossed with a later NES Mega Man game. The UI in particular has a very SMB3 feel to it, even the font looks similar.
Once again we are back with the side-scrolling action with nice big character sprites and varied enemy designs. This time around we are headed across space trying to stop the plans of the evil Don Destroyda and save the universe.
Operation Milky Way is a very good game and was a late Famicom title. The only annoying thing I found in the game was the dash mechanic, unlike other games where you hold down a button and tap, here you have to hold down your run button release it and then jump and it took me over half the game to get the timing down. That said, I was dash-jumping everywhere in the final chapters, so perhaps that was just a ‘me’ problem?
My lack of jumping ability aside, Ninja JaJaMaru is a game I would highly recommend checking out.
Super Ninja Kid
The only Super Nintendo game in the collection and it’s a really good one! The game is still a side scroller but a little more open-ended like a Wonder Boy map and will have you once again crossing various different locales to save the princess.
Super Ninja Kid is a very colourful take on JaJaMaru and features very nice 16-bit graphics and very emotive character sprites.
You traverse across nine levels this time around each with a showpiece final boss on at the end of each stage. As is tradition with many a SNES platformer you’ll pass through Mountain areas, Ice levels and the obligatory lava level.
The difficulty is very well balanced and each boss will drop a powerup or item which will either deal damage to enemies or help with traversal.
It took me a good few hours to complete Super Ninja Kid and I think it’s one of the best games in the collection.
Ninja JaJaMaru: The Great World Adventure (+ DX)
I’m cheating slightly, as I played through only the ‘DX’ version which is a colourised version of the included Game Boy original, but the games are identical apart from the inclusion of colour.
The Great World Adventure is exactly as it sounds, JaJaMaru must travel the world to track down and save the Princess. This time around she’s been captured by none other than Satan himself!
All across the world from Brazil to Greece etc all while gaining weapons and knowledge of where to go next.
In terms of Gameplay, we are sides scrolling once more defeating enemies and collecting souls which increases JaJaMaru’s max HP. This will be needed as some of the bosses are tough.
The gameplay loop is you finish a level to reach a mini-boss. The mini-boss will hand you a weapon once defeated to kill the area’s main boss. For example, the Centar mini-boss in Greece upon defeat will give you the mirror needed to deal damage to the Gorgon boss.
Levels are quite varied and are very nicely coloured with boss sprites being very recognizable from their various mythos. The last boss is also an actual beast and took me numerous attempts to get down, you have been warned!
Overall, a great game, very responsive and a lot of fun, however, I did have some issues with this title where the transition between beating a boss and moving to the next area wouldn’t load. This happened a few times and I had to become reliant on using save states to try again with some of the bosses. This was quite disappointing considering I originally when halfway through the game with no save states and is hopefully something that can be fixed in a patch.
Conclusion
I rarely get to complete six unique games for a single review and I really feel the Ninja JaJaMaru series has been done justice here. The Great Yokai Battle + Hell is definitely the star of the show and is a game that I could imagine myself revisiting often for the fast-paced arcade style of action as there’s something very addictive about it.
The Bonus Retro Games collection is a very nice inclusion and you get a lot of games for your money, although I’d probably only class the last three as must-play games and the first two serving as more of a play if you are a curious type of thing.
The collection as a whole is well worth your time and money and it’s nice to see some of these games finally leave Japan and make their way west. I would recommend picking up a copy!
7.5
Nintendo Switch review code kindly provided by ININ Games
