Mark of the Ninja: stealth redefined
Noirit Mustapha
Before Klei Entertainment released Invisible Inc, they came out with another stealth game a few years prior, this one more real time and a platformer instead of turn based strategy. Mark of the Ninja places you in the role of an unnamed ninja, whose clan and base come under attack from an unknown armed force. With the help of another ninja named Ora and a few other allies, you are tasked to hunt down the leaders of this organization and eliminate them before they can do greater harm. Of course, despite the simple start for the story, there are some carefully presented twists which are best experienced personally without any spoilers.
Instead of fast paced platformers like Sonic the Hedgehog and sometimes the Super Mario games, Mark of the Ninja is slower and much more methodical. One could say it even plays like a classic Metal Gear Solid game, just from a 2D sidescrolling perspective. The objective of each mission is typically to head from point A to point B without getting detected and while saving captured allies. The player also has some handy tools and weapons to make the journey easier. The beauty of the gameplay comes in just how creative one can be in tricking and bypassing the enemies. The guards can be either knocked out or killed, but it becomes more fun to kill one in front of another. This way, the first guard becomes terrified and becomes easier to take out. Such ideas are implemented in each missions three challenges, where the player can try to complete them to gain rewards. These are usually gameplay modifiers to help one play the game in a different but more specific way, such as easier to kill enemies or to bypass them altogether.
Mark of the Ninja excellently crafts a stealth adventure which had been rare at the time, mixing great gameplay and an intriguing story with crisp visuals and sound design. This is definitely the new standard by which all future stealth-only games will be judged by.
