OUR RATING: 6.9 GOOD About our ratings

TANGIBLES: Gameplay: 7 Visuals: 8 Audio: 7 Value: 6 Quality: 7

Why you should buy it: Not Available Why you should rent it: Not Available

UNIQUE RATING: 6.9 SUGGESTION: N/A

The wildly popular Naruto: Gekitou Ninja Taisen series has been running for a long time in Japan, and is already up to its fourth installment. With the Naruto anime series recently starting up here in North America, the folks over at Tomy decided it was finally time to send the GNT franchise across the pond, with the one that started it all in Japan. Released as “Naruto: Clash of Ninja,” Naruto fans over here can now get their brawl on without first springing for a FreeLoader and a spare memory card.

While the second, third, and fourth installments of Naruto: GNT are brawlers in the vein of Super Smash Bros., the first game is a proper fighter that just happens to feature some brawler-like mechanics. These include the one-button special attacks and the inexplicable double jumps. Naruto: Clash of Ninja may not be as deep as Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike, but that isn't to say it’s undeveloped.

Rather than approach the fighting genre with the typical selection of punch and kick buttons, Naruto goes for a slightly different approach. On the face, you have Taijutsu, Ninjutsu, Throw, and Super buttons. Taijutsu, for those who do not watch Naruto, are strictly physical techniques. This is mapped by default to the B button, but acts much like the A button in Super Smash Bros. Melee. Ninjutsu entails special moves, such as projectiles, weapon attacks, active counters, and so on. This is on the A button, but contains functions similar to the B button in Super Smash Bros. Melee. The other two face buttons, Throw and Super, are pretty much self-explanatory; Throw works much like the respective throw function of any given fighting game, while Super is a one-button super move whenever your Chakra meter is filled. Beyond those, you have your shoulder triggers, which serve as defensive systems—primarily evasion, but also counters and recovery attacks when timed right (at the expense of some meter).

The battles themselves take place in a spacious, closed-off arena. Even though it looks like you can be ejected from many of the game's stages, there is no ring-out mechanic to be found here. You must win via KO. Fighting is fast-paced thanks to its mechanics and its counter-oriented gameplay. Combos are simple, consisting of button presses alternating between the B and A buttons, but are also very breakable, as you can counter even while being hit with an attack string. Think Killer Instinct with “Easy Breakers” turned on. It'll just cost you some meter.

Unlike any other fighting game yet to appear on the Game Cube, the controller actually causes very few problems for Naruto. This is a sword with two edges, though—yes, it means you can play the game easily with the stock controller, but it also means that there's not enough to this game for the controller to be a hindrance. There's no real demand for execution, and combos are effectively limited to the canned strings you can find in the instruction manual. It's a fun game with a solid engine, but it can only offer that fun to Naruto fans, not to fighting gamers in general who will quickly tire of the game's simplistic play style.

Another fault of Naruto: Clash of Ninja is its lack of content. You have your usual Arcade, Versus, Time Attack, Survival, and Training modes, along with a bare-bones Story mode in which you can only play as Naruto. There are seven characters playable up front; Naruto, Sasuke, Sakura, Kakashi, Iruka, Haku, and Zabuza. Over time, you can unlock three more characters; Rock Lee, Sharingan Kakashi, and Kyuubi Naruto. It's nice to see little extras like bonus characters at times like this, but it's far too little to bring the game's inexcusably-small character lineup up to an acceptable level.

Visually, the game is solid. It further establishes cel shading as the standard method of delivering 3D visuals to anime-based video games. It looks perfect for what it's trying to be; it won't blow you away, but it gets the job done. How you'll take the audio depends on what you're looking for. There's really nothing to complain about with the game's music. For the most part, it's all taken from the TV show, giving it a very authentic sound that will satisfy fans easily. Unfortunately, just like the Naruto anime DVDs that are coming out over here, you don't get to choose between the Japanese voices and the English ones; if the dub leaves you with a bad taste in your mouth, you can't get away from it here.

Naruto: Clash of Ninja is what you would get if Super Smash Bros. Melee decided to become a fighting game, but gave up almost all the meat on its bones in the process. It can be an enjoyable game, depending entirely on what you want from it. If you're a fighting gamer looking for something to tide you over until King of Fighters NeoWave comes out, you will be sorely disappointed. If you are a Naruto fan who just wants to take a handful of the major characters for a short-but-sweet rumble, this game is at least entertaining enough to provide some enjoyment on that front—though it may not be worth your $40. It's a lot like the Dragonball Z Budokai series, the first installment in particular; Naruto: Clash of Ninja has very little to offer as a fighting game, but there's a decent amount of fun to be had for those who appreciate the license.