Progamer to Programmer

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

Narutarded

I'm currently addicted to a flash-based multiplayer game called Naruto arena. The game allows you to form your own 3-man squad of ninjas from the Naruto cast, and pit them against other players. Gameplay is somewhat similar to "versus"-style CCGs like Rage or Pokemon. Your ninjas receive chakra, which may be one of four different types - Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, Taijutsu, and Bloodline. They may then execute moves based on the available 'chakra' pool.

To many veteran gamers, the concepts in Naruto Arena will be familiar. It's very easy to draw analogies of the different ninjas to heroes in DoTA (Rhasta, Sven, Centaur, Queen of Pain), or the different 'team' concepts to deck concepts in Magic: The Gathering (Land Destruction, Prospero-Bloom).

The game is currently at a young stage (it started mid-July), and it still has the 'raw' feel of an immature game. It has its balance quirks, although the development team releases frequent updates to try and resolve any blatant issues. At this point however, it has evolved to the point where a game can get pretty interesting.

Me and my housemates (Andrew and Francis picked up this game a few days ago, and have currently managed to ascend to the top portions of the ladder. Hopefully it will stay that way until we get bored. :P


My player card


Top 25 ladder rankings screenie