Received the game yesterday because it was preordered and I defeated Story Mode already, today. Short playing time if you're only playing Story Mode. It's 11 'tales' you can play through:
The Tale Of Young Naruto
The Tale of Naruto Uzumaki (Shippuden)
The Tale of Sasuke Uchiha (Shippuden)
The Tale of Zabuza and Haku
The Tale of Jiraiya the Gallant
The Tale of Itachi Uchiha
The Tale of Kakashi Hatake
The Tale of Gaara
The Tale of Minato Namikaze
The Tale of Madara Uchiha (Tobi)
The Tale of Killer Bee (have to defeat Tobi's storyline to unlock)
Your choice with who to start with, I started with Young Naruto. The game play is easier yet harder at the same time. My problem with it is that you cannot Ninja Dash to your enemy, you literally just have to walk/run towards them in Story Mode although it's not much better in Free Fighting Mode. Now Substitution jutsu is a thousand times easier and sets up your battles to look awesome but it is so easy to get around people's Ultimate Jutsu which isn't welcomed if you're the one trying to use it. I also dislike the distance in this game, when you you Substitution jutsu, sometimes you appear close to them but other times you end up so far away from them and it hard to close the gap especially when fighting Deidara and Tobi. I don't know what they were thinking when they programmed that in. It sucks but the overall battle is pretty if you can pull off some wicked combos. Sasuke and Killer Bees are beasts in this game, their taijutsu are damn near impossible to block or substitute so be weary of that, they have some long, heavy hitting combos which get annoying real quick.
Another problem with this game is the repetition of some of the battles, for some reason they thought it was fun to have Sasuke and Itachi fight one another 5 times throughout the game, it gets boring but the other fights are pretty cool. You can play as and against Tobi when he had the handcuffs as weapons, Tobi is one hard motherfucker to beat but it is possible.
The anime scenes however are awesome although the dubbing is atrocious. Seriously the words do not match the mouth 80% of the time, given the time they had with this game, this is no excuse for that. I WANT TO BREAK VIC MIGNONA'S JAW SO HE CANNOT VOICE ACT FOR A COUPLE OF MONTHS! Not only does he fail as Nagato but he also voices Obito which just does not fit. SOMEONE GET HIM THE FUCK OFF THIS SHOW! Tobi's voice has changed from Ulitmate Ninja 2, both as his childish personality and "Madara" personality. His new "Madara" voice makes him sound like he's 100, its deep but its also graveling, like the guy is chewing on rocks. Actually, he sounds a lot like Kakuzu which doesn't fit either. I prefer Nolan North as Tobi's "Madara's" personality, that guy had a cool voice. Also, only Gaara had good voice acting in this game which he is voiced by Liam O'Brien. A problem I have with the Shippuden cast is that all their characters still sound the same. This is a one in a million show where the characters grow and get older yet they still sound like they're 12, except for Gaara here. His voice is much deeper because Mr. O'Brien probably realized that his character is now 17 years old and and is a respectable leader and not a 12 year old psychopath anymore. I salute you Mr. O'Brien, I salute you.
For Free Fighting, there are several modes such as single or team battle, Survive, Tournement and the return of Training Mode which is awesome since the gameplay is slightly different. I haven't spent much time here except to test try Hashirama Senju because I'm a Madara Uchiha fan. Fuck you and your wood jutsu.
There are more collectibles here and you get to buy titles, yay. I defeated all 11 Storyline but that just doesn't get you half the collectibles. Not by a long shot which made me feel as if I played Story Mode for no freaking reason. Story Mode however is good for ryo. Anyone else notice that Zetsu is yet again forgotten in this game? Poor Zetsu.
All in all, it is a fun game to play and the anime scenes that haven't come out in English yet are very good so I give this game 4 stars. I spent $59 on this game, I'm keeping it for that reason alone. You can defeat this game in a day.
tell me your experience with the game and if you are stuck on a battle in story mode.
