Senran Kagura Shinovi Versus Review

Senran Kagura Shinovi Versus pits ninja girl schools against each other to see who is the strongest! For all the fanservice and ridiculousness, it has its solid moments.

Senran Kagura is back in Shinovi Versus, but back but this time it's switched platform from the Nintendo 3DS to the PlayStation Vita. Ninjas, boobs and lots of clothing being torn apart, what could go wrong right?

Story
If you've played Senran Kagura Burst for the Nintendo 3DS, this game continues on a few months after. For the sake of those who have no idea what I'm talking about? Essentially there are two rival ninja girl schools, the good ninja reside at Hanzo Academy and the bad ninja from Hebijo Academey, who fight it out to death only nobody actually dies as they all bond over the course of the game and realise that good and bad are not so different, but in the final battle the Hebijo Academy is burned to the ground and the evil Shinobi are forced into exile.

NINJA GIRLS!!

Fast forward to Shinovi Versus, two more schools have been added to the mix, effectively doubling the roster of girls you can fight as. Hebijo gets rebuilt, a new elite ninja squad replace the old and a second good ninja school called Gessen appear as well. At the start of the game you can select between Hanzō, Gessen and Hebijo and once you beat all 3 campaigns, a forth opens up with the renegades from old Hebijo.

The story for each school all cover the same event, but told from different perspectives. The overall theme is there's a Shinobi Battle Royale with all the schools challenging each other, as well as all the two new schools trying to track down the exiled students from the old Hebijo academy. While the story is mainly a throwaway excuse to have school girls punch each other's uniforms off, I still found myself enjoying the individual characters backgrounds and the overall theme of the game itself.

As well as story mode, there is also a mode called Shinobi Girl's Heart, which has you tackle 5 stages of increasingly difficult opponents. This mode focuses on one of the girls and plays out a like a side story which is more useful for levelling up your favourite characters. There's also a lot of trophies attached to this mode if you're into that sort of thing. Image

Gameplay
Gone is the side scrolling level design of the 3DS game, as Shinovi Versus is more of an arena based brawler. Levels are never too big to warrant having to explore much, but are varied enough that you don't end up seeing the same locations over and over. Also with each girl having specialty skills, some work better in large open battlefields whereas some are better in the cramped hallways of the schools.

Literally all out war.

Combat mainly involves hammering the square button which is your main attack and then occasionally throwing in a triangle press for your heavy attack. If you manage to hit a combo correctly you can send opponents flying and a press of the dash button has you chase down the enemy for a further pummeling, be warned though as the same thing can happen to you! Pressing down on the D pad has you unleash a burst of energy which pushes everyone around you backward and gives you a bit of breathing room. The overall goal though is to beat your opponent to the point where you either deplete your enemies health bar, destroy the clothes they're wearing leaving them in their underwear or if you finish a battle using a special move, you can even remove bras and panties, although don't expect full nudity, all the naughty parts are censored with flashes of light.

Every character has their own levelling system which unlocks new moves and extended combos, as well as having 3 different fighting types you can also separately level up. The individual fighting styles are based on how you decide to fight. Flash type is when you fight in your regular school uniform, this is your default outfit at the start of every battle, Yang type is battling in your Shinobi outfit, pressing L during a fight will have you change into your other outfit and will fill your health gauge up, perfect for if you're trapped in a corner with low health. Yin is the final type, hold R to guard, you put both thumbs onto the touch screen and pull your characters shirt apart, leaving you to fight in your underwear. This mode gives you unlimited combos and raises both your attack and speed, but at the cost of your defense. In both Yin and Yang modes, you also have access to super moves that you can't use in your flash form.

Combos and special powers.

There's also local and online multiplayer offering four different game types, free for all, team deathmatch, strip matches and Understorm. The first two are obvious as to what happens there, strip match is also pretty self explanatory, beat each other until all your clothes are shredded away. Understorm has the skies raining panties and it's your job to collect the most. Also if you defeat other players, they drop everything they're carrying and you can then scoop up all the lingerie for yourself. All game types can be played with up to 4 players and if you can't get other people to play, you can always fill spaces with CPU opponents and adjust their difficulty level to however you like. Multiplayer seems to be a lot more frantic than single player and the camera can be a bit problematic what with shinobi's dashing around all over the place, it's hard to keep track of other players.

Graphics and Sound
Graphically the game looks pretty great, all the main characters are well modelled and while it is just cheap fan service, the clothes ripping looks good with each outfit having different ways of shredding apart. The effects used on weapon attacks look flashy and hitting a launch combo has a distinct green hue and accompanying sound cue, so you can do follow up dash combos easier and the short cutscenes in matches that play before an outfit change or a special attack are neat additions.

As well as all the in game visuals, there's a lot of unlockable artwork that is up used in the still frame cutscenes, these usually have a lot of written dialogue over the top of them, so it's good to be able to view that on its own. There's also a ton of different outfits to get to customise your fighter of choice, as well as plenty of accessories that can be positioned on your character to wherever you want.

The girls of Gessen Academy.

All the dialogue in the game has been kept in its original Japanese dub and subtitles are provided for those that does understand the Eastern dialect.

Final Verdict
Senran Kagura is essentially fan service, with practically every character being a huge breasted girl and the whole point of fighting is to destroy all the clothes your opponent is wearing. The story isn't partially amazing and neither is the combat, but it's still a fun game to play in short bursts and if you're a fan of boobies, well you can't really go wrong on that front.

Story 7/10
Gameplay 7/10
Graphics/ Sound 8.5/10

Final We Know Gamers Score 7.5/10
Agree with what I've said? Maybe you have a different opinion? Let us know in the comments or catch me on twitter - @ChaosRiotZero

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