Preview: Naruto: Clash of the Ninja 2

By nestlekwik

Glenn Stotz, product specialist for TOMY, was kind enough to invite us to yet another phone conference to detail the company's newest announced title based around one of the world's most popular anime franchises - Naruto.

The game in question is the North American sequel to the Nintendo Wii brawler Naruto: Clash of the Ninja, which, much like our previous Naruto preview, brings the U.S. yet another completely original story in the Naruto universe. In fact, Stotz was quite happy to throw the word "new" around quite a bit, promising us a new, original story, new characters, new stages, new gameplay features and new modes.

The most attractive new feature to fans of the series will no doubt be the addition of four original characters to the Naruto universe, introduced for the first time in Clash of the Ninja 2. The quartet is completely shrouded in mystery at this point as Stotz is not uttering a word at this point about the contents of the game's original story and who these characters are and how they are involved, but they will join a cast of three extra characters new to the series, with two never having been in a Naruto game prior to CotN2. While nothing is known about the new story and characters, they will no doubt hold true to the source as the team has been working in collaboration very closely with the team who produces the series' stories. All we know at this point is the game will fall in the Naruto timeline after Sasuke has left the village and it will delve a little into some of the characters' pasts and place them in new situations, facing new enemies. Finally, hardcore Naruto fans no doubt follow the series' Japanese progress, but they should know TOMY is required to follow the American television progress and no Shippuden characters will be present in the title.

Thankfully, this time around, static portraits with dialog are out and the game's original story will be told through fully-rendered cinematic sequences. However, through this delivery, the story remains the same no matter which character you play as and since the story is original to North America, the Japanese voice actors have had no involvement with the title. While this might strike as bad news to some, we think the fleshed out cinematic will make for much more compelling storytelling. Along with brand new voicework from the animated series' cast, players will also get the benefit of a larger number of music tracks since the amount of stages in the game has doubled and the title will also feature new music outside of the battles.

Naurto CotN2 has been in development for nearly a year now and in that time, TOMY has been able to add in a brand new kumite mode. While Stotz labeled it as a variation of the game's survival mode, he noted kumite and several other modes to be detailed at a later date will join the game's time attack, score attack, survival, story and versus modes. The team has worked with the suggestions of tournament players in order to beef up the in-game combat and those playing with a Wii Remote and Nunchuck will get the added benefit of motion controls which will tack on additional damage to attacks and buffers through stances. After activating a special chakara attack, onscreen commands will appear and by following those commands, players can add additional damage to the attack. Also, by holding down the C and Z triggers and entering stance motions, players can give boosts to chakara or attack power or transform. There are more game play features that couldn't be revealed during by Stotz during the call, but players can also opt to play with only a Wii Remote or the Classic Controller or Gamecube controller if they don't mind not having the extra boosts.

Unfortunately, the title will not feature online game play, but Stotz offered up a suitable explaination: "We chose to invest the time in refining the game system and adding content," he said. "With the quickness and nature of the game, it would be hard to properly implement online. We thought that time was better invested in content."

While fans of the original title will be able to dive straight into a familiar title with CotN2, Stotz noted Naruto and fighting game fans won't be disappointed with the game. "It's a lot different due to the original content," said Stotz. "Everything has to be approved by the series' owners. It's a lot more work, but it ends up making the title a lot closer to the series and true to the universe."