Played three hours straight of Sega Ages Shinobi, enjoyed (almost) every second of it. Given its heavy debt to Namco’s Rolling Thunder I was worried that it wouldn’t be all that exciting, but I was wrong!
The faster pace, wealth of attack options and shorter but more plentiful stages make for a very different experience, one with more variety and one that ultimately gives you more breathing room to dodge projectiles and enemies while rarely feeling unfair.
The only time the game felt unfair was in the second level of mission 5, there’s no way to tackle those flying ninjas without learning where they appear, not very fun.
M2 added Ages mode which gives you an extra hit and automatically powers up your shots. I tried this after watching the credits roll on Arcade mode and this seemed almost too easy - didn’t have much trouble clearing the entire game on a single credit! The arcade game, however, I’m struggling to get past mission 3 on a single credit.