Namco Bandai brought a short demo of Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 to Comic Con. Instead of letting players duke it out in versus mode, this build focused on the game’s story mode and showcased a battle between the Third Hokage and the Nine Tails fox that razed Konoha. Remember the giant boss battles from Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 2? The Nine Tails fight in Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 is kind of like those, but you have more room to move around since the Third Hokage can leap from building to building.
The Nine Tails tries to keep distance between itself and the Third Hokage. When its far away you can throw Fuma Shurikens by pressing square. Get close enough and you can smack the Nine Tails with his giant staff by pressing circle. Midway through the fight, a member of the Inuzuka clan shows up and a breadcrumb trail shows the quickest path to him. If the Third Hokage meets up with the Inuzuka clan he can call them in to do a Fang Over Fang barrage.
When the Nine Tails is almost out of life, Ino-Shika-Cho shows up. Shikaku Naru holds the Nine Tails down with his shadow, giant Choza tackles the monster, and Inoichi calls the entire village to attack it with fireballs. All of these actions are done through quick time events like mashing circle to make Inoichi extend the range of his telepathy. Miss a QTE and you’ll lose a little bit of life before replaying the scene.
The next battle was a fight between the Fourth Hokage and a "Masked Man" who uses space-time ninjutsu. Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 is an evolution of this year’s Naruto game with the substitution jutsu meter returning. One major change is you can activate an Awakening at any time. In Generations, you had to wait until half of your HP was depleted, but in Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 all you have to do is flick the right analog stick. Sure, you can severely damage the Masked Man with an early Awakening, but the catch is you’ll be debilitated for the rest of the fight.
Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 also has a "secret factor" that triggers another quick time event. A prompt at the bottom of the screen tells players to do a chakra dash, which makes the Fourth Hokage rush towards the Masked Man. The Fourth Hokage throws a kunai that passes right through the Masked Man, but manages to hit him with a mid-air Rasengan blast.
Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 will be available for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in spring 2013.
Published: Jul 12, 2012 02:42 am