Support NeoGAF

[Reizo Ryuu]

there might be something off about the pc version, because it doesn't feel as smooth as it should be, it's probably some extremely small UE5 traversal stutter that I'm noticing.
Also the game has ghosting, if I switch back to NG2 the image is extremely sharp and clear and there's zero ghosting, but the only way I can replicate that in black is if I turn global illumination to light, but even then there's some slight ghosting and I'm not sure where it's coming from, must be the lighting engine they are using; yes I turned upscaling off as well.

Like is shown in the screen the opening fight is different, these guys use guns. At least on the hardest difficulty.

The enemies change depending on your difficulty, same as the original, I'm playing on warrior (hard) and there are no ninjas with guns in the first chapter.

 

[MazingerDUDE]

I love boobs, but what is up with that new character design?

Sonya now looks like an Asian girl, and Genshin looks like an white dude.

Not sure what to make of this, a Team Ninja's way of DEI?

 

[MMaRsu]

Mate, you are playing on Very Hard which is equivalent to Mentor on OG NG2. The tactical ninjas appeared on the first chapter for that difficulty level.

They LITERALLY DO NOT.



The enemies you fight here are Spider Clan enemies with claws! Not with guns!

And the claw enemies are harder than the gun guys. The claw enemies do show up later in lvl 1.

 

[deeptech]

I love boobs, but what is up with that new character design?

you don't like???

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

Sonya now looks like an Asian girl, and Genshin looks like an white dude.

Not sure what to make of this, a Team Ninja's way of DEI?

Maybe they made Rachel black?

 

[deriks]

Out of nowhere

Blood feels kinda off, but that's ok

Maybe it's a spoiler, but better graphics to DEFEND THE TURTLE EXPLOSION WITH YOUR FUCKING SWORD!!!

Yep, it's a great game

 

[kevboard]

currently downloading the PC version, hoping that DLSS and hardware Lumen, as well as some .ini tweaks to remove SSR, will help fix some of the typical UE5 ugliness.


the console version sadly has all the typical UE5 issues. while it has many graphical improvements over the original of course, the TSR artifacts, constant Lumen boiling, SSR + Software Lumen and general smearing of many elements make it a one step forward two steps back version imo...

which sadly is getting more and more common. new releases often show modern graphics tech, but also just awful motion clarity and inage stability not found in older releases I fucking hate UE5

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

you don't like???

No, I LOVE boobs.

 

[MazingerDUDE]

there might be something off about the pc version, because it doesn't feel as smooth as it should be, it's probably some extremely small UE5 traversal stutter that I'm noticing.
Also the game has ghosting, if I switch back to NG2 the image is extremely sharp and clear and there's zero ghosting, but the only way I can replicate that in black is if I turn global illumination to light, but even then there's some slight ghosting and I'm not sure where it's coming from, must be the lighting engine they are using; yes I turned upscaling off as well.

The enemies change depending on your difficulty, same as the original, I'm playing on warrior (hard) and there are no ninjas with guns in the first chapter.

The game does NOT use PSSR in PS5 PRO version, perhaps sticking to UE5's own TSR in ALL VERSIONS.

 

[GinSama]

My SSDs are getting full, is it playable alright from HDD (with extended loading between levels or whatever, sure, but no issues during gameplay)? I just moved Dynasty Warriors: Origins to HDD and it seems completely unaffected during gameplay, though it already had a bit long loading on SSD.

That's good to know about Origins I will definitely move mine to HDD thanks for the tip

 

[Reizo Ryuu]

The game does NOT use PSSR in PS5 PRO version, perhaps sticking to UE5's own TSR in ALL VERSIONS.

Well ok, but as mentioned I turned off all upscaling, it's not the source of the ghosting.

 

[PJX]

They LITERALLY DO NOT.



The enemies you fight here are Spider Clan enemies with claws! Not with guns!

And the claw enemies are harder than the gun guys. The claw enemies do show up later in lvl 1.

Learn how to COMMUNICATE better. You said they don't appear in the first chapter which they do. That small little section you are talking about is not the whole of the first chapter. YES they changed it for this version of the game, now they are the first enemies you encounter for the VERY HARD difficulty.

 

[Madflavor]

Reading some impressions saying it feels good to play, and is like a blend between the OG and Sigma 2, barring enemy count it seems.

I actually don’t love how the difficulty is designed in the OG. It feels like the strategy to challenge you was to throw as much shit on the screen as possible.

 

[MMaRsu]

Learn how to COMMUNICATE better. You said they don't appear in the first chapter which they do. That small little section you are talking about is not the whole of first chapter. YES they changed it for this version of the game, now they are the first enemies you face for the VERY HARD difficulty.

Sorry I.kept saying the first fight maybe I wasnt clear enough my bad

 

[fersnake]

my god, finally!!! i remember playing NG on my OG xbox. it was hard...

 

[PJX]

Sorry I.kept saying the first fight maybe I wasnt clear enough my bad

It's cool. I didn't see that you said first fight until I had to go back like 3 pages to see you mentioned it. I was getting confused as to what you were talking about but it's all good.

But they have definitely moved enemy encounters around. Even removing the Buddha and Statue of Liberty fight entirely.

 

[grvg]

Wait is NG 1 black available anywhere? I thought all we had was sigma

 

[kevboard]

So, I downloaded the PC version just now, and in the settings I can not enable DLSS. it mentions DLSS in the Frame Gen setting (essentially it says you need to have either FSR or DLSS enabled to use frame gen) which seems to imply DLSS should be available... but it isn't... only FSR3 and TSR.

further more, just for the sake of it, I tried enabling FSR Frame Gen... and it does nothing. the setting doesn't change anything, it basically doesn't work.

on top of that, the game runs like ass on my 3060ti, a GPU generally more powerful than that of the Series X. on high 1440p I barely get 50~60fps, doesn't matter if raytracing is on or off... a setting that I think also doesn't work properly as it doesn't affect performance whatsoever.

so far the PC version seems very unfinished. at least the Windows Store version.

 

[kevboard]

Wait is NG 1 black available anywhere? I thought all we had was sigma

Xbox One/One X/Series X|S backwards Compatibility.

960p 60fps on Xbox One,
1440p 60fps on Xbox Series S,
and 1920p 60fps on Xbox One X and Xbox Series X.

 

[Efren is G.O.A.T.]

Is this any good? I have only played NG1 on the OG Xbox briefly when I would visit my relatives, as I didn't own the console, and remember being very impressed.

 

[Timberwolf25]

Wait is NG 1 black available anywhere? I thought all we had was sigma

MS Store has/had NG Black

 

[Timberwolf25]

Sorry I.kept saying the first fight maybe I wasnt clear enough my bad

Other difference for Mentor difficulty. OG has exploding shuriken Ninjas vs Black that has Ninjas with guns.
I'd argue exploding shurikens are harder to deal with, but also that Ninja with guns can almost insta kill you with a takedown taking more than half your health instantly.

Definitely not a like for like as OG the more I see, but that's not a bad thing as exploding shurikens were one of the more BS things about the OG especially when they come from off screen.

Also, I was wrong about the path before the 1st save in Black. A f less enemies than the OG, but instead of the enemies all appearing at once, they seem to spawn/straggle in. It was actually easier to kill them in the OG if you charge attack them as they rush you though.

Very excited to play more for sure.

 

[Timberwolf25]

Is this any good? I have only played NG1 on the OG Xbox briefly when I would visit my relatives, as I didn't own the console, and remember being very impressed.

Among the best action games of all time in my book.

 

[Stafford]

Am I the only one who thought visually the trailer of 2 looked a lot better than what we saw of 4?

 

[kevboard]

Am I the only one who thought visually the trailer of 2 looked a lot better than what we saw of 4?

UE5 always looks nice in trailers and curated sections. however I bet NG4 will look much better while you actually play it.

UE5 allows for quick and dirty ways to add "impressive" graphics features, but in practice these often just look smeary, dithery, broken or break in motion whenever you actually are in control of the game and aren't looking at the aforementioned curated sequences
it seems like NG4 doesn't use UE5 (thank fucking god)

 

[lachesis]

Am I the only one who thought visually the trailer of 2 looked a lot better than what we saw of 4?

Well, NG2B gfx seems to be literal update on the existing one - while NG4 seems to be very Platinum Games style.
I am not so sure of the flat "red" kill screen for NG4 though - and not too kin of the look of it.
I can see it could be flow-breaker in the middle of the game, but having my judgement reserved till its release... but all I want is that they won't mess up.
Hopefully the difficulty will stay as challenging as they have been too.

 

[Reizo Ryuu]

Finished chapter two.
Differences:
First big change is the lighting, it's day instead of night.
second is the ninja dogs, there's no cutscene with the dog walking with the hand in it's mouth, three of them just attack you right away, they also don't look like ninja dogs anymore, they don't have the neat little gear with the kunai or wield katanas, they just attack by charging like the very first one you meet in the original.
If you move to the part with the practice targets/water running, the ninja dogs there have been replaced with spider ninjas.
Later when you get the bow it's using sigma's mechanics, so the entire bow puzzle thing there where you have to gather the stones to lower the bridge is gone, you just kill the archers and then the bridge lowers.

The gyuki fight is quite a bit easier now, or maybe not depending on your playstyle; meaning it's just gyuki, no additional ninjas, so if you're good at on land UT, the gyuki fight is actually easier in the original, just kill one ninja and then start spamming UTs for gg.
Also I had the lunar staff at level 3 already almost at the start of chapter 2, seeing how OP it is, I'm kinda cruising to the game pretty easily, I'm not entirely sure if you could have it at level 3 already this quickly in the original, since my concurrent playthrough of NG2 is NG+ where I'm already fully upgraded.
I also turned down the effects quality to light, because it seems it's another culprit of fps drops/hitches when doing UTs
My full settings are:
shadows standard
effects light
GI standard
reflections standard
foliage HQ
motion blur OFF

This seems to be the most stable/closest to NG2 for me.

About to start chapter 3, so I'm switching back to NG2, but the immediate difference is that the rain is barely noticeable in black, in NG2 it's a full heavy downpour.

 

[kevboard]

but the immediate difference is that the rain is barely noticeable in black, in NG2 it's a full heavy downpour.

I almost wanna bet that is due to UE5's incessive particle smearing. there probably is a lot of rain particles there, but you can only see half of them lol

 

[Guardian Monkey]

The textures are ass wtf is that about. At least it runs smoothly for the most part on the series x. Does pc have higher texture resolution options because the console one seems like it’s in low or something. That or they just kept the original ones and used some type of clean up which helped some but something seems off.

 

[FreeY$L]

Made it to chapter 7 or 8 (The one with Rachel), love the game, not sure about enemy count but the gore really adds to the experience, can't believe how i put up with sigma 2 for so long.
The game on PS5 Pro 120fps mode is definitely funky looking, looks better in 60fps, but some enemies are missing effects like the purple enemies (the big ones), also, there is constant pop in, pretty sure it an issue, otherwise i could be breaking the game by doing the good old traversal method of L1+X, as sometimes when i'm entering an area, i notice enemies just pop into existence.

 

[MagiusNecros]

Is this any good?

Yes. It's gonna be a blast.

 

[Reizo Ryuu]

I almost wanna bet that is due to UE5's incessive particle smearing. there probably is a lot of rain particles there, but you can only see half of them lol

Perhaps, but it doesn't feel as intense since you can see the individual drops instead of them being almost straight lines.

 

[MazingerDUDE]

wolves don't throw limbs, this game is just 100% Sigma 2

 

[Reizo Ryuu]

Man I know it didn't run like this on the 360, but ng2 is so incredibly clean and smooth on xsx in a way that black doesn't seem to quite reach, on pc at least; I'll download the console version as well to see if the little drops are just a pc issue.

 

[MazingerDUDE]

Since this game is fundamentally Sigma 2, it's totally broken that they have brought the NG2 shop where you upgrade with the essence, because there're just too few enemies (probably about 1/3 1/4 of the original NG2) in each level to gather enough essence to upgrade your weapons. I expect to fully upgrade about 4~5 weapons by the end, that's without buying any of the healing items

 

[evanft]

So it's basically just a tweaked version of Sigma with better graphics. What a pointless release.

 

[Giallo Corsa]

Big NG fan here and :
This was an impulse buy and...I think I made a mistake.

- Like another user already said, UE5 graphics looked good in the trailer but man, when playing it on a big TV...the upgrade doesn't feel like anything special.
There's dithering, shimmering (not major thank God) and generally speaking, the game feels / looks kind of blurry.
PS5 pro has 60 and 120Hz/fps options (no 30 like on base consoles).
And oh, someone mentioned that the 120Hz option looked ghastly, at first I thought that it was the usual internet hyperbole but shit, it does look worse than the OG X360 version, frankly, it's inexcusable, shit must be 720p or something

- Yep, this is Sigma 2 alright

- Don't know what the fuck they did with the difficulty but G'damn shit is now piss easy, I'm steamrolling through the enemies on Hard and it's not fun at all, feels more like Dynasty warriors than NG for fuck's sake...
Now it's either because I forgot how easier Sigma is compared to the original, finishing the OG on Master Ninja 2 years ago, or, because I've been tearing my hair out lately with Wukong/Lies of P/Lords of the fallen etc.
It's incredibly easy to the point of literally button mashing through the encounters.

- Talking about the GFX again... don't know boys, something feels "off", like it's one of those YouTube UE5 remakes done by enthusiasts giving the game a "cheaper" looking feeling if that makes any sense.

I'm regretting my purchase so far, 50 Eurodollars for this shit...ehhh, I don't know - to all the Xbros out there, stick with the OG NG2 BC version, it's always been the better game plus, on the XSX it looks PRISTINE at 4K/60 compared to the blur-o-vision version that this remake is.

Fuck, I should have gone for DW Origins but the hype got the better of me...

Avoid it for now and get it when it's down to 20 Eurodollars, just my 2 cents

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

wolves don't throw limbs, this game is just 100% Sigma 2

Did the patch improve the graphics on pro?

 

[simpatico]

When I woke up this morning I did not expect to see NINJA GAIDEN 2 as #6 best seller on Steam holy shit.

 

[peronmls]

So, is this a pointless release because they fail to add the substance from the original release in every other version? Beheadings, and special execution animations. Are any of these back?

 

[MazingerDUDE]

Did the patch improve the graphics on pro?

nope, no PSSR here, but overall the graphics acceptable

 

[kevboard]

- Like another user already said, UE5 graphics looked good in the trailer but man, when playing it on a big TV...the upgrade doesn't feel like anything special.
There's dithering, shimmering (not major thank God) and generally speaking, the game feels / looks kind of blurry.
PS5 pro has 60 and 120Hz/fps options (no 30 like on base consoles).
And oh, someone mentioned that the 120Hz option looked ghastly, at first I thought that it was the usual internet hyperbole but shit, it does look worse than the OG X360 version, frankly, it's inexcusable, shit must be 720p or something

that's Unreal Engine 5 for ya...

and people still defend that trash heap of an engine. the moment I see the UE logo in trailers now I just expect the game to look like a blurry and unstable mess, and 90% of the time that is the case.
the only time it isn't is when a studio develops on UE4 or doesn't use even a single UE5 feature... which is essentially the same.

it is legit such a dogshit engine it's insane. Lumen is absolute cancer (especially software lumen), Nanite is just a shortcut for the lazy development practices of today's AAA studios, and TSR is basically always used, and is also just cancer.

btw. at least on Series X, there is no 30fps mode. only a 30fps mode for cutscenes. but that's the same on all systems it seems, even PC only has 60fps or 30fps for cutscenes.

to all the Xbros out there, stick with the OG NG2 BC version, it's always been the better game plus, on the XSX it looks PRISTINE at 4K/60 compared to the blur-o-vision version that this remake is.

slight correction here. NG2 on Series X runs at 3360x1755, which is a 9x resolution increase (3x on each axis like all 360 games with One X enhancements) over the 1120x585 resolution of the original version on 360

 

[Ozzy Onya A2Z]

Stealth ninja drops are the best.

I remember when Apex Legends dropped outta nowhere.

 

[adamsapple]

btw. at least on Series X, there is no 30fps mode. only a 30fps mode for cutscenes. but that's the same on all systems it seems, even PC only has 60fps or 30fps for cutscenes.

Yeah, I was gonna say.

30fps toggle only for cut-scenes, but at least they look properly frame-paced, so if someone wants the event scenes to run at the highest DRS, the 30fps cap there will be helpful.

Other than that, the game play is pretty smooth. Seems like a fairly solid 60, didn't try the 120hz mode yet and probably won't.

 

[TerribleAtThisGame]

I wasn't really a fan of NG2 when it came out so was pretty psyched seeing this. I've wanted to give it another shot for ages. Went to PSN and at $50, I'll wait for a sale at some point instead. Too much for an impulse buy.

 

[kevboard]

Yeah, I was gonna say.

30fps toggle only for cut-scenes, but at least they look properly frame-paced, so if someone wants the event scenes to run at the highest DRS, the 30fps cap there will be helpful.

Other than that, the game play is pretty smooth. Seems like a fairly solid 60, didn't try the 120hz mode yet and probably won't.

well, I'm not sure about this even being the case.
when I first started the game on Series X, I set it to 120fps mode, and 60fps cutscene mode.
the resolution was so unfathomably low, that I legit closed the game from the System menu and rebooted in 60fps mode.

suddenly the opening cutscene looked a million times better, even tho the cutscene framerate was still set to 60fps like before.

if this setting worked in the way where the DRS goes higher at lower FPS settings, it should have stayed the same in both of my cases, since in both cases the cutscenes were locked to 60fps.
so it seems to me like the upper resolution limits of the cutscenes are still just the same as the upper limit of the main gameplay FPS mode

 

[MazingerDUDE]

OK FINALLY A GOOD NEWS!!!

This fountain area, you only get about 3~4 centipede enemies in BOTH the NG2 and Sigma 2,

but I just fought 10+ centipedes, big flying fiends, and wolves all at the same time that nearly got me killed for the first time!!! ( which is a rarity )

So, it seems that they kept only the earlier levels to be similar to Sigma 2 and kept the greatness for later levels. I'm excited!!!

 

[Orbital2060]

Well, NG2B gfx seems to be literal update on the existing one - while NG4 seems to be very Platinum Games style.
I am not so sure of the flat "red" kill screen for NG4 though - and not too kin of the look of it.
I can see it could be flow-breaker in the middle of the game, but having my judgement reserved till its release... but all I want is that they won't mess up.
Hopefully the difficulty will stay as challenging as they have been too.

Looks like thats reserved for Yakume, in a different style of animation from Ryu.

 

[NeverYouMind]

OK FINALLY A GOOD NEWS!!!

This fountain area, you only get about 3~4 centipede enemies in BOTH the NG2 and Sigma 2,

but I just fought 10+ centipedes, big flying fiends, and wolves all at the same time that nearly got me killed for the first time!!! ( which is a rarity )

So, it seems that they kept only the earlier levels to be similar to Sigma 2 and kept the greatness for later levels. I'm excited!!!

That fountain is as empty as the upcoming boss fight. (It is full in the original.)

 

[Gamer_By_Proxy]

I haven’t played Ninja Gaiden since the NES, has much changed?