It must be difficult to be a ninja. You have to be in great shape, be specially trained, and always ready for battle. However, you do get those awesome outfits. And ninja stars. Tough choice. Anyways, let’s talk about ninjas. Ninjas are in this game. This game for iOS devices. It’s called Ninjump. That is all. The intro is over.

The Basics

Now, Ninjump as a title pretty much tells you what it is. You’re a ninja and you jump. Just thought I’d get that out of the way for you. So instead of the usual over-analysis of the game’s title let’s talk about graphics. Ninjump has nice, cartoony graphics that fit a game like this perfectly. However, nothing really stands out visually in the game. Everything looks very generically “ninja”, right down to the main character. Whose name is….Ninja…Boy? See, I don’t even remember his name. Let’s just call him Dave.

The Gameplay

While you’d expect a game like Ninjump to be similar to Doodle Jump, that’s not exactly the case. You travel upwards and you jump, but it’s not from platform to platform. Instead, you’re constantly running upward, jumping from one side of the screen to the other. Along the way you avoid enemies and attack bluebirds in order to gain their powers and fly upwards. Which seems a bit mean, as the birds really don’t look all that threatening.

Is It Fun?

I can honestly say I had a good time my first few playthroughs of Ninjump. However, as I kept playing, I noticed there was a bit of a lack of variety. I would constantly break my high score just to see the same enemies and obstacles as I got higher up. Maybe throwing in a few more obstacles or enemies or a rival runner who you have to battle only to defeat him, remove his mask and reveal that he’s your long lost brother. How dramatic!

The Bottom Line

Ninjump has a pretty good concept. I can honestly say I haven’t seen an endless runner attempt what Ninjump is going for. However, there’s a few things that could make it more memorable. Putting some more effort into designing the characters and backgrounds would make the game much more memorable. And throwing in some more variety to the gameplay would keep the experience from being monotonous. It’s so close to being complete, just like this conclus-