Hi guys!
Does anyone here play Nikujin? Heres the link:

http://tigsource.com/articles/2007/06/11/nikujin

Nikujin is a free, 2d ninja puzzle-ish game, similiar to the extremely popular game "N"
It was made by ikiki, a japanese game developer who keeps his identity secret.

I created this thread so people can talk about levels, level times, etc.

Have fun!

WTF they have no clothes on

That's exactly what I said.

Also: Bad title, it reminds me of Naruto. :S

I know, its an odd little feature theyve put in there, its not explicit though, just skin.
Have you played the game yet?
What'd you think?

This game is utter crap.

It is meant to be a platforming game, yes?

THEN HOW DOES IT MANAGE TO MESS UP ITS PRIMARY GAMEPLAY ASPECT?

The platforming is FLAWED, straight up.

First off, your character SLIDES, like a drunken Wayne Gretzky on PCP.

Second off, any time you so much as breath near a vertical surface, your character locks onto the wall, holding you there in an uninterruptable process for about three seconds.

The combat is broken, flat out. Whenever you swing your sword, you slide forward, which is slightly problematic as TEN SECONDS INTO THE FIRST LEVEL YOU HAVE TO KILL SOMEONE ON A SMALL PLATFORM WITH YOUR SWORD.

Did I mention that you only get five health pieces? And if you lose all of them, you have to restart the level, which, naturally, involves fighting four guards again as DRUNKEN PCP-ADDICT HOCKEY PLAYER NINJA.

About thirty seconds into the main game (although it took me nearly five minutes to work out just how I was actually supposed to FIGHT in this broken shell of a ninja), you come to a challenge.

To the right, there is water. Above you, there is a large shaft, with vertical walls on either side.

Foolishly thinking I was being presented with a choice, I promptly headed left into the water. I promptly died, and was promptly respawned.

At the beginning of the level.

So, I fight bravely past the guards, who are obviously not affected by sins of the flesh and seem to behave as ninjas just fine. Indeed, no drunken PCP-addict antics can be observed in their behaviour.

So, I head inside, and come back to the shaft.

I must admit that this process was not challening; it's a platformer staple. You walljump between the two halves of the shaft.

Seems simple, right?

Except that this game manages to botch it. Badly. So, I start up the wall, and soon realize that I am defying some law of physics, as I appear to be moving at light-speed horizontally, and roughly the rate of an inchworm on the vertical axis.

Eventually I manage to climb up to the top, where I am faced by an apparently unclimbable wall and a box.

Now, having skimmed through the Tigsource article, I am aware that it is possible to kick off the box, shoot sideways, walljump back out, and emerge on the top of this structure. In theory, that is.

So, I go left, into the box. I press the right arrow key, and the shift key, to jump.

I promptly fall down the shaft, taking one heart of damage.

I bravely pick myself up again, walljump back up the shaft, and begin anew.

This time I do at least attain the necessary speedboost, though by the time I resume the walljumping, I appear to be moving at purely theoretical velocities; my screen offers no useful information, and I therefore rely on timing alone.

I fall back down the shaft.

Now, repeat the above process about ten times, and halfway through, add in that I died, and thus had to restart.

Beginning to see where my frustration is coming from?

So eventually I manage to get to the top of this wall, with two health remaining. I get up, stand still for a moment, congratulating myself on victory, and I am promptly hit with a ninja star in the back of my head. No fear; I still have one life left. Feeling foolishly confident, I decide to kill a lone swordsman who has his back to me. Surely, after all the process down below, this will be easy.

Except for the tiny hitch that your sword propels you, and leaves you useless after you swing it for a good two seconds.

This means that I landed on the ground, started swinging, watched myself be propelled uselessly past the enemy, only to end up in front of him, paralyzed, with my back open and one health point left.

This was the point at which I stopped playing.

I do not care how good it is once you get used to it. If a game takes several minutes to master the most basic level of combat in, I feel justified in utterly refusing to play it.

Grif is wrong, I've been playing this for months and I still love it.

Grifs frustration aside, have you completed it yet 21GP?

Edit:
Grif, are you aware that you can roll to avoid damage from falls, or silently kill enemies from above, also providing you with more momentum?

I think this game is meant to make people experiment with the possible moves to configure their own style of play.

Still, everyone has their own opinion, thankyou for providing yours.

Hah, no. It's insanely hard and I'm not a twitch gamer at all.

I know!, still fun though.
have you passed the level with the bamboo spiked tunnel that you dalll down at the beginning, to meet a staff weilding green ninja?
I'm up to that part.

Grif exaggerates. Game's frustrating, but still decently fun.

No, this is when I shall agree with Grif. This game is broken.

Venn and Grif, Try playing ikiki's hakaiman.

Not so, uh, twitchy.
Much more playable.

I became aware of that after reading further into the tigsource article.

It's not intuitive for a 3d platformer. I expect it in, say, a Zelda game, but in a typical 2d platformer, that's not how it works.

The game just doesn't appeal to me; I'd rather play N. It's more streamlined, significantly more visually appealing, and a smoother experience in general.

I finally got to the second level... and I can't even get up. ;-;

Exactly. If it had a different control scheme then it might be a little better.