La "suite" spirituelle de Sunset riders: le déjanté Mystic Warriors.
Le jeu ne réinvente rien, un certain classisisme flagrant. Néanmoins il fait tout bien. vitesse, fluidité, enchainement, scénario (si si ), variété des situations, boss...une putain d'Ode aux "jeux de comme on en fait plus".
Wiki Konami:
Mystic Warriors: Wrath of the Ninjas (ミスティックウォリアーズ -怒りの忍者-) est un jeu vidéo d'action/plates-formes à scrolling horizontal, développé et édité par Konami sur borne d'arcade en 1993. Il a été réalisé par la même équipe que celle étant à l'origine du jeu Sunset Riders sorti deux ans plus tôt. Bien qu'ils bénéficient tous deux d'univers diamétralement opposés, Mystic Warriors est considéré par beaucoup comme une suite spirituelle de ce dernier, avec lequel il partage de nombreux éléments de gameplay. Il constitue toujours à l'heure actuelle une exclusivité arcade et n'a jamais connu d'adaptation sur consoles de salon.
Principe de jeu
Comme évoqué plus haut, le gameplay du jeu Mystic Warriors s'inspire fortement de son aîné. Le personnage incarné par le joueur dispose d'une quantité illimitée de projectiles, remplacés ici par des shurikens ou des kunai, en fonction des power-up récupérés. Lorsque celui-ci se retrouve à proximité d'un ennemi, il alterne automatiquement en utilisant une arme blanche plus volumineuse, de la même manière que dans la plupart des Shinobi-like sortis durant la même période.
Tout comme dans Sunset Riders, il est possible de passer rapidement d'un niveau supérieur à inférieur de l'écran (et inversement), en maintenant la touche directionnelle appropriée juste avant d'exécuter un saut. Le personnage peut également effectuer une glissade (en pressant simultanément les touches : diagonale bas/avant + saut), ou s'agripper aux murs à l'instar de Hiryu, le héros de la série Strider de l'éditeur Capcom. Le jeu se découpe en neuf stages, se concluant chacun par l'affrontement d'un boss de fin de niveau.
En anglais:
Plot
Mystic Warriors focuses on a group of five modern-day ninjas and their fight against the evil Skull enterprise, which plots to take over the world. At the beginning of the game, one of the ninjas is kidnapped by the villains - the kidnapping victim being decided at random between the non-selected characters, or in case of four simultaneous players, being the last remaining character. The kidnapper is a tall and powerful ninja who wears similar garments to Spyros'. This character reappears numerous times throughout the heroes' journey to taunt them, eventually culminating in a honorable final match between both sides.
The group of heroes eventually succeed in infiltrating the enemies' base and rescuing their comrade... although just for a short time, as the latter ends up sacrificing themself in order to save their friends. The main objective of the game then focuses on the Mystic Warriors heading directly to the Skull enterprise's headquarters to put a stop to their evil schemes once and for all.
After many arduous battles, the heroes finally break into the office of Skull's CEO and mastermind - a middle-aged, bald and overweight man who at first sight isn't a match for them. Looks can be deceiving, though, and upon him pressing a button on his desk, he gets clad in a powerful, four-armed, robotic suit bearing a skull head for the game's final match.
Gameplay
The game plays much like Sunset Riders, with a few new additions. The main change is the presence of a health bar in lieu of lives, with players being able to take three hits before dying and with health restorative items being found in the stages. Alongside power-ups and score items, players can also find Ninjutsu, which will either clear the screen of enemies upon being picked up or grant them temporary invincibility. Up to four players can join in at any time in simultaneous cooperative play.
Players can choose to play between one of five available ninjas:
Spyros: A ninja clad in a full blue suit and leader of the group.
Keima: A kabuki ninja with long, blue hair which he uses for close combat.
Brad: An eighties styled African-American monk-like ninja wearing rad shades wherever he goes.
Kojiro: A ninja wearing yellow sleeveless garments and fashioning a traditional Japanese ponytail hairstyle.
Yuri: A skilled kunoichi wearing a rather revealing apparel.
As in Sunset Riders, stages commonly include sections with two layers the player character can stand on: ground level and an upper level. The player can change between these two planes by pressing either UP + JUMP to climb to an upper level if on the ground, producing with this a higher jump; or DOWN + JUMP if they want to drop down from an upper level. There are also certain spots in some levels that have tall walls which cannot be jumped over; these can be climbed on by moving the player character into them, which will make them stick to the wall and become able to escalate it. A few stages also count with sections where the player character can hang onto a rail, usually in order to traverse a hazardous zone (for example, the cables of a ski lift to easily move over a snowy mountain landscape).
Player characters attack by throwing an infinite supply of small ranged weapons, which mainly consist on shuriken and kunai. These can be thrown in eight different directions and the ATTACK button can be held down to rapidly throw them without stopping. If the player character is close enough to an enemy, they will attack them with their melee weapon instead (usually slashing at them with their sword or performing some form of martial art), which is significantly more powerful than their ranged weapon.
Weapons can be upgraded up to two levels by acquiring special items for this purpose, granting them more projectiles/wider range when thrown and/or increasing their power. These, and other power-ups, can be uncovered by breaking special boxes that contain them. These boxes are usually accessed by defeating enemies that carry them, or are carried into the screen by small parachutes, or are already found lying on the environment.
Trivia
There is a cameo appearance of Sunset Riders in the first stage, where a big drive-in screen shows part of the Sunset Riders introduction sequence.