With the announcement of a new Ninja Gaiden title and a remake/re-release of classic Xbox title Ninja Gaiden 2 (subtitled Black), as well as a 2D Ninja Gaiden game in the works from the folks behind the awesome Blasphemous metroidvania series, 2025 is looking like a ninja of a year.

Long has this classic video game hero archetype has seen the light of day in action format, with the most recent and most-popular being 2020’s Ghost of Tsushima courtesy of sneaky hero Jin Sakai. Honestly, it’s nice to see a comeback for game ninjas in the year of our lord 2025. To celebrate 2025’s bombardment of action ninjas, let us talk about this gaming archetype in brief while also detailing the earliest and most prominent ones in gaming history, as well as sort out what makes them tick.

The 80s

The 80s was a ripe time for gaming, whether you owned a console like the MSX or frequent an arcade nearby. In any case, Japan has it made with its early ninja games, at least if you want your shadowy assassins as cute puffy mascots.

It’s safe to say that Ninja-Kun is the first game in an arcade and MSX series that features a ninja as its main character, followed by Ninja Jajamaru. Released in 1984, this Japan-made title from UPL, Tose, and Jaleco had you climbing up vertical stages killing black enemy ninjas with shurikens. Simple, but a fun quarter-muncher that’s sure to entertain the younglings. Ninja-kun and Ninja Jajamaru would spawn 10 titles between 1984 and 1999, alternating between 2D action platforming and top-down turn-based RPG combating.

While playing a kid ninja was fun for the children, teenagers wanted something a bit more mature and “grown-up”, so along came European developers who made ninja simulation titles for home PCs. 1986 saw the release of PC title Ninja Master (and its sequel Oriental Ninja) for the Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, and Commodore 64 (alongside other PCs); this is a simulation where you play as a ninja going through a bunch of ninja tests to win a belt. Nobody liked it because it didn’t really evoke the power fantasy of being a badass ninja with speed and skill, so along came the Last Ninja series which sorted that out.

The Last Ninja series focused on a ninja name Armakuni who has to deal with an overarching evil force spanning across cities and even through time; the first game had you fighting and puzzle-solving your way through a mystical island, while the second game had you transported to modern-day New York City. The visuals of the game were groundbreaking at the time, as well as its action and controls alongside the challenges. Targeting specific parts of an enemy was quite a breakthrough at the time, with only few immersive sim games doing this in the 90s onward.

While The Last Ninja games scratched that itch for meticulous puzzle-solving and exploration, predating titles like Ghost of Tsushima and the Assassin’s Creed series, the 80s was a time when people wanted faster-paced action and arcade-like immersion. This was also the same period when two gaming juggernauts dominated the ninja game scene with their respective franchises: Shinobi from Sega and Ninja Gaiden from Tecmo.

Sega’s Silent(?) Hunter

The first Shinobi game in the arcades, titled Shinobi and was out in 1987, featured life-like graphics, hardcore action, and simple addictive action mechanics where you had to rescue people under a strict timer, then fight off enemy ninjas and bosses to succeed. Your main hero is called Joe Musashi and while he didn’t look that intimidating in his debut game on-screen, he subsequently wore his mask for future titles and kept that air of mystique and badassery with each other appearance.

Shadow Dancer was the follow-up to the arcade hit, which gave Joe Musashi a dog who can incapacitate foes on command. While the arcade versions of Shinobi and Shadow Dancer were fun in their own rights, Sega had to bring the action home onto consoles. Unlike now, it’s really, REALLY hard to do a one-to-one port of an arcade game with limited space and memory found on your Sega Megadrives.

The solution? Just make a new “smaller” game out of scratch that’s similar to the arcade experience, but different enough to justify people to spend loads of money on a new game bearing the same-ish title. And then get marketing to tout the Megadrive as the console that brings the arcade experience to your home. Revenge of Shinobi in 1989 led the arcade home console experience charge with its detailed “mature” and realistic (for its time) graphics and music style alongside its fun gameplay with challenging platforming and boss fights.

The Shadow Dancer port (subtitled The Secret of Shinobi) came out in 1990 and was arguably the better version than the arcade because it was just faster while retaining the “one-hit-and-you’re-dead” penalty the original Shinobi was known for. Sega Megadrive owners had two different choices for their action ninja gaming fix: one with longer stage progression, gameplay depth, and epic boss fights with Spider-Man and Godzilla (which obviously were modified and copyrighted with subsequent re-releases), and one that was quick arcade action fun that mimicks the quarter munchers Sega made, but in fair home console form.

After those hits, Sega continued on with making more Shinobi games for their Megadrive and Game Gear consoles. The series reached its apex with Shinobi 3, boasting modified and deeper gameplay as well as variety in stages and boss fights. Joe Musashi learned a few new tricks -dive kick, wall jumps, ceiling climbs- and also rides on horseback and surfboard for certain on-rails segments equipped with a baller soundtrack and even more mechanical and bio-mutant monstrosities. One can argue that Shinobi 3 is superior to Revenge of Shinobi due to it being a more improved sequel with a lot more in tow.

After the release of Shinobi Legions for Sega Saturn (which combined the 2D platforming gameplay of past titles with live-action graphics ala Mortal Kombat), the series went in hibernation until the PlayStation 2 era.

In the era where character action hack-and-slash titles were slowly becoming a home console favourite, Sega stepped in with its reinvention of Shinobi for PS2, now a 3D character action game where you had to kill enemies quick via the Tate technique lest your life forces gets slowly sucked out by your evil sword in your possession. And just like past games, the game gets brutally hard and punishing, requiring players to master its fast-paced combat and be as efficient as possible in dispatching enemies and staying alive as long as possible until the checkpoint.

Tecmo Bowls A Hot Turkey

In another part of Tokyo, we rewind back to 1987 and 1988 when Tecmo (pre-Koei absorption) were making a name for themselves with video games, starting with its Ninja Gaiden series. The first Ninja Gaiden game wasn’t really the most remarkable entry: it was a 2D arcade-only beat-em-up and was slow-paced, with its sole purpose being a quarter-muncher riding on the wave of other pioneer beat-em-ups like the Double Dragon series. Following the arcade-to-console-porting technique mentioned earlier however, the NES version of Ninja Gaiden was a completely different beast, and a better one for that.

In fact, you can attribute Tecmo’s early success to its NES/Famicom gaming library. Ninja Gaiden 1, 2, and 3 were fast-paced 2D side-scrolling action games where quick-thinking and efficiency is key. Your main character Ryu Hayabusa is a fast-moving and quick-jumping killing machine who has access to all sorts of collectible ninja magic, but his foes are persistent, equally fast, and positioned specifically to frustrate even the most talented of 2D action game platformer pros.

To say that the original and remake of the Ninja Gaiden series were influential in gaming is underselling its importance. Not only was the gameplay on par with other addictive fares at the time like Super Mario Bros. 3 and Castlevania (and arguably more challenging and fast-paced), but it featured cinematics that tell its story and stage progression in-between the victory screens. It was novel at the time, with lovely artwork, gripping plot details and conversations, and suspenseful music to reward players with conclusions and resolutions to their hard work when going through mineshafts, dank caves, and evil cult hideouts populated by rocket-pack ninjas and demon falcons.

Much like Shinobi, the Ninja Gaiden series went on a hiatus after 1995. Fast forward to 2004 when Microsoft is gaining home entertainment dominance with its Xbox console, and we have Tecmo’s reboot of the franchise. Led by eccentric developer Tomonobu Itagaki, the Ninja Gaiden reboot featured fast-paced 3D character action combat and punishing difficulty, requiring patience and skill from its players. In a sea filled with character action titles, Ninja Gaiden came out on top and made people buy Xboxes because of its exclusivity and challenge factor; essentially the Dark Souls mentality before even From Software’s RPG series came into light.

In a sense, the reboots followed the game design and structure of the original platformers: quick-thinking, efficiency, and high levels of challenge to test the best players. Ninja Gaiden, Ninja Gaiden Black, and Ninja Gaiden 2 did exactly that, and were all universally praised for it, showing that not all gamers want to take things easy and wanted to truly test themselves while being immersed in a 90s-style high-octane blood-filled action experience.

Compared to the original trilogy, story takes a backseat as it’s just a bunch of nonsense involving stolen artifacts and rival ninja clans coupled with demon invasions, but it’s a worthy trade-off. To this day, action game fans still discuss about Doku in Ninja Gaiden Black and the absurdity (and frame rate drop) of the Ninja Gaiden 2 Chapter 10 stairs battle.

The True Ninja Games

While the aforementioned Sega and Tecmo ninja titles were immaculate, they had one major thing in common: you did non-ninja like things and just kill things to death, attacking enemies in the open. Stealth was never an option, with both series giving you the power fantasy of an 80s ninja commando just flipping out and killing people. Ninjas are popular in pop culture and gaming: just look at most fighting games in the 90s and 2000s and you have a huge list of them like Sub-Zero and Scorpion of Mortal Kombat, Mai Shiranui of Fatal Fury/The King of Fighters fame, Kage from Virtua Fighter, Ayane from the Dead or Alive series, and Hattori Hanzo from Samurai Shodown. But these assortment of shinobi scrappers don’t exactly show off their stealthy maneuvers on the one-on-one battlefield, do they?

Enter the PlayStation era. The late 90s and 2000s featured better hardware and console power, meaning developers and studios can make viable stealth games using realistic character models rendered in 3D and more expansive levels to go along with stealth-based gameplay that gives players tools and many options for subterfuge. Here are a few examples:

-The Tenchu series really had you playing as a ninja named Rikimaru in the 16th century feudal Japan, sneaking around and assassinating targets. The series had a good run from 1998 until 2008. From Software now owns the IP, so it remains to be seen if they plan on reviving it after finding success with their Soulsborne games. Interestingly enough, their ninja game Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice was previously perceived as a new Tenchu game. So maybe the adventures of Rikimaru live on in Wolf, only with more oni and giant snakes?

-The Splinter Cell and Metal Gear aren’t exactly games that feature ninjas, but their activities, skillset, and combat techniques might as well be classified under actual “ninjas” who do “ninja-like” stealth missions.

-Ditto the Assassin’s Creed series, which had “ninjas” under an order of Assassins and parkour all around the towns/cities they’re in while dealing with their assigned targets throughout various historical periods. Also, aliens and space magic.

-Mark of the Ninja (2010) is arguably the most noteworthy ninja game that sticks true to the stealth aspects of the group. It’s on a 2D plane, your main ninja character cannot deal with most enemies head-on unless you approach them stealthily, and he dies pretty quick under fire. Players had to creatively find ways to their targets, be it snuffing out light sources, use distractions to change up patrol routes of foot soldiers, or terrify enemies so that they’re more prone to making mistakes, making it easy for you to stealth-kill them.

Final Cut?

So what’s next for ninjas in video games? Well, 2025 is looking sweet with Ninja Gaiden (and maybe Shinobi) making a comeback with their respective titles. Ninja Gaiden 4 is helmed by both Team Ninja (via Koei Tecmo) and PlatinumGames and seemingly retains the hardcore 3D action of the Xbox reboots. Ninja Gaiden Ragebound is a 2D action title made by The Game Kitchen, known for their hit metroidvania titles Blasphemous and Blasphemous 2. Sega is working on a 2D Shinobi game featuring lush graphics that’s clearly crafted by the folks behind the Streets of Rage 4 sequel.

If you want a more nuanced and realistic portrayal of the shinobi, 2025 has two upcoming titles: Ghost of Yotei and Assassin’s Creed: Shadows. Ghost of Yotei is developer Sucker Punch’s follow-up to ninja/samurai open world action game Ghost of Tsushima, while Assassin’s Creed: Shadows has you switching roles between an actual ninja and a possibly fictional African samurai helping his cause by beating up his oppressors.

All in all, it’s looking very sweet for both fans of realistic shinobi and old-school players still wanting that hot ninja game that’s less on being sneaky and more about being in-your-face with shurikens, swords, and instant death blows. I’m leaning towards the latter, but it’s still a good year for both types of ninja connoisseurs.