Mark of the Ninja review: from the shadows

The preceding chapters, however, are paced brilliantly. The first three quarters of the game are linear missions in which enemies, traps, and acrobatic feats are pitted against the player in increasingly difficult order. The game is teaching the player, one lesson at a time. You come in contact with an enemy, learn how to silently slay him, and later in the level have your memory and mettle tested by similar enemies in more complicated environments.

While these early levels carefully guide the player from beginning to end, they gradually open up. Each room of goons and boobytraps can be handled in a different way or skipped altogether if player uncovers the right path. Later chapters have smarter enemies, equipped with the heavy weapons and gear you'd expect to be rewards for the player. But the opposite happens. The player occasionally loses his weapon and gains more minimalist, mystical abilities.

Not that there aren't cool weapons to be bought. A hallucinogenic dart that causes guards to turn into homicidal maniacs before turning their weapon on themselves is a favorite. It's just that skills, abilities, and specialty items-which can be bought using in-game currency awarded by completing side-objectives-tend to be more defensive, used for hiding or causing distractions. Mark of the Ninja is a stealth game through and through. I can't help reiterating the point. Despite being a two-dimensional game with a colorful look, it finds a way to do everything its 3D contemporaries do and more.

Because Mark of the Ninja does stealth so well, it feels fair. The player can sense what the computer senses. By that, I mean the computer's senses are visualized on the screen. Sound is represented by circles that ripple outwards from running feet or squawking birds, drawing attention to those in earshot. Eyesight and spotlights are visual cones. Characters are full-color cartoons in light, but in darkness they become silhouettes with thin white outlines. Curiosity and alertness are represented by punctuation above an enemy's head.

They're simple, familiar visual metaphors that tell the player how the world is reacting to their decisions. There are also nice, less obvious flourishes, like when a background lightning storm lights up the cityscape, giving away the Ninja's position.

It's top-notch design that puts the creative onus on the player: see something, learn its meaning, and smartly or not-so-smartly use that information how you sees fit to proceed safely.

The end of the game, roughly the final quarter or so, opens up its stages, allowing the player to take his own path. After hours of the computer lightly holding the player's hand, it lets go. The environment becomes a canvas for play. Everything has an alternative use. Traps become weapons when tripped intentionally. Bodies become keys to locked doors. Lights and gongs and dogs become distractions. Will he paint the world red in blood or manipulate it so that he needs not a drop?