Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm Review (PS3)

Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm is a fighting video game released on the Playstation 3 and developed by Evolution Studios. Naruto is the famous manga and anime franchise that originated in Japan and spread all over the world. There have been many fighting games made for it, and all of them have been very hit or miss. Let's take a look at Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm.

Story : The stories are taken directly from the manga and anime. The first arc, the Wave Country arc, has been eliminated and should be noted to all fans for it's elimination. This is generally considered the best arc in Naruto and to not include it in the game is a shame.

Graphics : I love cel-shaded graphics and this is no exception. The models all look fantastic and every bit as much their manga counterparts. The animations also look excellent, and really bring the fighting aspect of Naruto to life. The fighting moves are all highly detailed and animated and are a total joy to watch. If you have any prior experience with Naruto or it's games, the graphical aspect of this game will impress you greatly.

Sound : It really is a shame just how awful English voice acting is compared to Japanese voice acting. Being able to listen to the voices in Japanese make this game playable, as it would be total trash if you were forced to listen to the English actors. The music is right from the anime and fits incredibly well and is just in general, really awesome music. The sound effects likewise are important and are directly from the anime. Basically, this game is a great offering sound wise as well.

Game play : Many people consider the first arc of Naruto, the Wave Country arc, to be the best. Myself included. It's been left out of the story mode, and two of it's central characters have not been included in the game. Not having Haku and Zabuza, two of the best characters in the series, in this game generate huge negatives for me that I can't ignore. You're forced to do menial tasks to unlock more characters. Most of the time you aren't even fighting. I realize they wanted this game to fit the manga and anime as much as possible, but this is a fighting game. People buy it because they want to fight. There's far too much monotonous tasks in this game that aren't fighting oriented.

Re playability : The on line capabilities for this game are quite fun, and the roster overall is quite big. Each character plays different and the variety offered on line is very good.

Overall : 3/10. Too many menial tasks, no Wave Country arc or characters, English voice acting is horrible.