Tweet
We're fast approaching the endgame of ITV's knockabout Saturday night gameshow Ninja Warrior UK, the latest international incarnation of a tried-and-tested Japanese format. Centred around a comically oversized and carefully padded obstacle course, the show is an absolute triumph of non-lethal razzamatazz, with guffawing commentary from former footballer Chris Kamara as competitors negotiate awkward hurdles and tumble into water hazards. There are no shurikens but lots of shrieking. Any true ninja would harrumph at the overeager procession of Lycra-clad, would-be shinobis and rightly dismiss the whole gaudy enterprise as frivolous shadowplay, a noisy, inelegant distraction from the important business of infiltration, sabotage and assassination. In video game terms, Ninja Warrior UK has more in common with Sonic the Hedgehog than Tenchu, the franchise that hews closest to our pop culture ideal of the austere shadow warrior. The once ascendant series is now essentially defunct, and while invisibility on current-gen consoles might seem appropriate for a stealth game, the fact that Tenchu has melted away so utterly over the past few years makes me melancholy. Ninjutsu scholars might quibble over which instalment represents the apex of the series, but there was a tangible sense of purpose and poetry to 2003's Wrath of Heaven (essentially Tenchu 3, and the franchise's first outing on PlayStation 2). It arguably deserves the prize for that awe-inducing subtitle alone: Wrath of Heaven sounds like it's what your Azuma clan ninjas will be battling against, but in truth it's the ultimate unlock, a devastating technique awarded to those players dedicated enough to surpass Tenchu's exacting shinobi standards.
Set in Edo-period Japan, Wrath of Heaven initially presents itself as a sweeping epic that threatens to tip into the melodramatic, thanks to a long, dreamy and at times logic-free opening cinematic soundtracked by a mash-up of rock, dance and classical that all sounds a bit Clean Bandit. But for all the overarching grandeur of Lord Godha's campaign to defeat an evil warlord by claiming three enchanted jewels or somesuch, Wrath of Heaven boils down to a series of discrete infiltration and assassination missions for its two leads: the severe, white-haired Rikimaru (who resembles a katana-wielding Alistair Darling) and the poised, lethal Ayame (a tyke with two stubby kodachi blades and more speed than brawn).
Read more…
More...