Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm Revolution Review

Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm Revolution is a revolution that no one asked for. Yes, the Storm games needed a change to its system because it has gotten really stale since Storm 2, but this change regresses the series back to an era that has never even existed. The series has taken 54 ninja dashes backwards and as a result, Storm Revolution is one of the worst Naruto games ever made.

Instead of recapping the main story that the previous Naruto games have done in the past, a weird Ninja World Tournament is the main attraction here. In this mode, you fight in 4-person battle royals that tasks you with hitting orbs out of your opponents. There is no health bar, so person with the most orbs wins. So I guess this was supposed to be the Revolution in the game, right? The mode is downright boring. It does nothing new besides put two more characters on-screen, who by the way fight like brain-dead giraffes, and says “hit me until you have enough orbs to win.” At best, Ninja World Tournament should have been a side mode for a nice change of pace, but instead it is the “meat” of the game, and it is awfully stale. 

The commentary during matches provided by a few side characters are somehow worse than the commentary you’d find in a game of Madden. “I see. It looks like the concept is to end this quickly.” That was legitimately said in my playthrough of the game, on multiple occasions. What should probably be replaced as: “I see. It looks like the concept was to push this game out quickly.” Nothing of value can be found in a mode that sounds promising. It’s a ninja World tournament for God-sake! How did they manage to get a ninja tournament wrong?

Possibly the only neat thing about this game is the Ninja Escapades mode. I would call it this game’s story mode, but each escapade lasts no more than 30 minutes and with only three available, you won’t be spending much time with it. The three escapades show how the akatsuki was formed, the relationship between Itachi and Shisui Uchiha, and the shortest one deals with Kushina and Minato’s squad. It is cool to see an expansion on already established groups and characters, but the effect wears thin. The mode offers no replay value and will take less than two hours to complete. If more escapades were added, or if the existing ones were fleshed out, then maybe a lack of story mode would have been justified.

Story/Presentation: 3 out of 10 

My main gripes against Storm 3 were as follows:

• The same old graphics from Storm 1 six years ago
• Long cutscenes that didn’t do the dynamic Naruto storyline justice
• Missing characters and lack of updates to existing characters
• English voice acting

Everyone of these problems exist in Storm Revolution, except for the long cut-scenes, because this time, they don’t even try to include a story. Some characters have been added to the mix, but at this point, who cares? Most of them play exactly like everyone else (Mash circle/B) and without a story to add depth to the characters, what’s the point of me using them? Yeah, I get that this is a game for Naruto fans to play as their favorite character, but I’m a Naruto fan, and I still don’t care that CyberConnect2 finally decided to add in a few cool characters. Time and time again, they fail to update existing characters like Jugo, who is still in that gaudy grey outfit that looks like he’s lounging around his two-story apartment. Some characters actually did receive an update, but the word “SOME” bothers me. This isn’t DLC you get from a $7 update, this is a $50 retail game that took away story mode, added a few characters and added updates to SOME characters.

Lasting Appeal: 2/10

Yup. This is the best we got… $50 please.

Year after year, a “new” Naruto Storm game comes out, and year after year it becomes more and more obvious that they have run out of ideas. The graphics are unchanging, but somehow, the visuals have gotten worse. Every time a character enters their “true awakening” mode, you’re thrown into some weird platform surrounded by lava. Then when the awakening mode ends, you’re placed back into the original stage… it makes zero sense. I can’t even go into detail about how it doesn’t make sense, because my mind can’t comprehend as to how an entire stage can turn into a platform surrounded by lava because one guy turned his power level up, and then when the character turns it back down, the stage goes back to normal. Not even Dragonball Z did that nonsense. This is a new “feature” that has never been in any Naruto Storm game before, and it is an oddity that should not have been added in this one.

Visuals & Audio: 4 out of 10

The Storm series are a casual fighting games, so a hardcore fighting mechanic will never be found, and at this point, that’s okay. It is obvious the system will never move on from mashing the circle or B button to attack, so fans aren’t expecting anything different from the series. The casual fighting is fine, but again, with no story to progress through, fighting seems pointless unless you’re playing against friends. But even if you are playing against friends, you’ll quickly grow tired of the monotonous mash one button to attack, hold another button to block, press another to charge routine and eventually you’ll ask your friend to play something else.

Gameplay: 4 out of 10

Wait… what happened to the rest of the world?

Basically, there is no story mode apart from the 30-minute ninja escapade storylines, and in place of a story mode is the awfully done Ninja Tournament and that’s the main reason that this might be the worst Naruto game ever created. Yes, the same casual gameplay is still there, the graphics look okay, and the roster is big. However, it does absolutely nothing with its foundation to build itself into a better game. Like I said in my review for Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3, the series hit its high point at Storm 2. After a certain point, you have to realize that this is literally the same engine people bought two years ago. Same graphics, same mechanics, same characters. What is so revolutionary about this Naruto game?

Quick recap:

+/- I’m not even sure fans of the series can tolerate this anymore

+/- Ninja escapades adds some never-before-known info, but it is way too short

– Ninja World Tournament mode is a bore

– No story mode

– Not worth the price tag

– Graphics that impressed six years ago are now just plain

– CyberConnect2 needs to stop. 

Overall: 3 out of 10