Ninja Legends Coming Out of Early Access with Archery Update
We are excited to announce that Ninja Legends is coming out of Early Access with an Archery Update!
The small slice of archery in Ninja Legends has always drawn outsized attention, and we're now happy to introduce this Archery Update that will make ranged Ninja skills a much bigger part of the game. This update also represents work towards our long-term goal to provide a complete Ninja experience in VR.
We have six unique levels categorized into Archery Defense and Archery Targets. David provides an overview of each in the Dev Log. Here are some quick notes as well.
Archery Defense
I -- Use your bow from the rooftops to protect the dojo from an onslaught of enemy forces. This represents a prequel to the Ninja Legends story.
II -- A challenging rooftop shooting gallery that precedes Archery Defense I chronologically. Prevent sprinting enemies from exiting through the Torii Gate.
Special stop-time exploding arrows can be charged and fired as well in Archery Defense.
Archery Targets (4 Unique Challenges):
I -- Set pattern of targets near the waterfall scored for time and accuracy.
II -- Tight quarters challenge in the pagoda that mixes marksmanship, dodging and deflecting.
III -- Straight on timed targets in the courtyard.
IV -- 360 degree timed and sometimes hidden targets in the bamboo forest.
Bonus: Bow to Base Game as Primary Weapon
We are also bringing the longbow into the base melee game. Rapid fire bow action on the ground against swarming enemies really refreshes story mode. We have been pleasantly surprised by how much we (and testers) enjoyed this mode.
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We've had a lot of amazing beta testers from this community who have help us fine-tune these levels. Thank you! Your feedback and encouragement have been invaluable! We intend to continue work on the archery mode to add Archery Defense III and more enemies in the "Defense" levels overall. We hope you all enjoy the update!
Ninja Legends Boss Balance Updates + PAX Announcement
Ninja Legends recently launched on Quest and the resulting influx of players and feedback helped us evaluate the state of the game. As a studio, we are now splitting our time between building new features for Ninja Legends and reacting to feedback from our players. We wanted to let you know that we’ve read every piece of feedback that we can find on Reddit, in the reviews, and in our Discord. Yesterday, we released an update to address a couple issues we’ve seen.
The first change is to adjust how level 9 plays (Bamboo Forest Clearing). There are a lot of mechanics introduced in this boss fight and we have improved how they work with the goal of making it more understandable. In addition, our resident Ninja Coach has put together a video to talk over how it’s done:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xH3hsGO_Po
Second, the level 12 - Shadowy Showdown boss fight is too long, with that level being nearly a minute and a half longer for people to complete than the other levels. We’ve tweaked the pacing of the fight to pull it more in line with the other levels.
We’d also like to announce that we have been selected for the Indie Mega Booth at PAX West from Aug 30 - Sept 2. Come by and say hi if you are going to be there!
As mentioned before, in addition to tweaks and bug fixes, we are aiming at a significant content update announcement soon, so stay tuned! As always, please share your thoughts and feedback!
Ninja Legends Scoring System
This post is about scoring! The scoreboards are starting to fill up, and we've received a few questions about scoring works. So here we are. The image provides a good summary, and here's restatement of it in text.
How is the score calculated?
Score Formula
+ Time Component
+ Quality Component
+ Block Component
- Damage Received
Total Score
Time Component
This one is straightforward. Faster is better. Each second that ticks off will cost me 200 points.
Quality Component
This category has a great deal of depth, and I will only scratch the surface here.
One sentence version: The more damage you deal, the higher your score will be.
Longer version: Each enemy type has an assigned amount of health and to defeat them you have to deal damage >= health. The key here for scoring is that you can deal more damage to an enemy than they have health and that differential while unnecessary for beating the level does count towards your score. How is damage calculated though? It's a combination of hitting the enemy in the right place and delivering a high quality strike. Defining a high quality strike is the part of this that could go on for many pages, but here we will say that it's mostly intuitive. If I swing or stab my weapon with good speed and proper angles and treat it like its real world counterpart, I'll deliver a high quality strike. We have placed a damage dummy in the lobby so you can check the quality of your strikes. Hit the dummy, and it will report back a number up to 120. The other part of the damage equation is hitting the enemy crit point(s). These vary by enemy type and aren't revealed obviously in the gameplay. Here are the crits for the enemies in the dojo.
We will share some more enemy visuals later on highlighting crits, but for now I can say, "when in doubt, attack the head."
Block Component
Each block gets you 150 points. But don’t spend extra time issuing unnecessary blocks because remember that each second costs you 200 points.
Damage Received
This component is unique in that it varies by difficulty mode. Each hit I take subtracts from my score. The penalty increases for each difficulty mode. On "Ninja" difficulty each hit I take decreases my score by 2000 points.
So there you have it. To maximize my score I need to be efficient, powerful and defend well. We’ll leave to you to figure out the optimal strategy.
Ninja Update: Improvements to assist 360 degree play!
Better experience for managing 360 attacks
We heard from the community about some issues with 360 play, and we agreed that we needed to improve it. Let us know what you think of this change.
The change: we added arrows in Novice and Ninja difficulties that will direct you to enemies that are about to attack. We changed the snap turning to work with the arrows, making it so that if you snap turn in that direction it will turn all the way to the enemy that is about to attack. To turn on snap turning go to the settings. On Vive clicking the touchpad on the given hand will snap you in that direction, or flick the joystick on Rift.
Additional changes and bug fixes
Improved projectile deflection for claws and gauntlets. This will help a lot when you reach level 10!
Fixed some graphical issues with ninjas that leave a shadow when dodging.
Fixed rare problem with enemies that spawn and immediately jump into battle.
Fixed some bugs around secret modes (large player, tiny enemies).
Fixed some UI bugs when switching back and forth between challenges and story mode.
WIN $100 in Steam Gift Cards!
Here's how to enter:
1) Download Ninja Legends
2) Finish level 6 ("Escape the City") on NINJA difficulty and earn at least 1 STAR
3) Take a screenshot of the level summary and post it on our Steam Community page under the Official giveaway thread
We'll pick 2 winners ($50 each) on Monday (7/22)
Live stream happening now!
We'll be streaming for a few hours today in celebration of the launch. Hop into live chat if you have questions.
Ninja Legends is available now!
Thank you for checking out Ninja Legends! We couldn't be more excited to get this into the wild. We're happy to engage with you here, and we're also on Discord! We'll be doing some live streaming to celebrate the launch and be on the lookout for a launch week tournament!
Click Image to Join Discord
NInja Legends to enter Steam Early Access in July!
We are excited to announce that Ninja Legends is coming to Steam Early Access in July (scheduled for July 11)! Full launch to Quest, Rift and Viveport will come in August!
Set in feudal Japan, Ninja legends pits players against swarms of cooperative enemies attacking from 360 degrees as they attempt to recover the stolen Shadow Scrolls. The intuitive combat is fun to pick up but hard to master. Wield Katanas, Claws, Staff, Gauntlets or Naginata and pair with Shadow Bow, Ropedart and more special abilities.
Checkout the gameplay trailer here: https://youtu.be/TRohKbYr5tA
Stay tuned for more trailers and fun stuff as launch approaches (+ Quest beta opportunities).
For more news and updates about the game and team:
Discord: https://discord.gg/GSsFh2k
More weapons! (+ news and notes)
Beta3 - Musashi was a huge success, and we are thankful to everyone who played and gave feedback. We are now preparing for launch! Here's a selection of improvements from the last batch of work.
Stabbing|Impaling
Players often have had the inclination to stab. We took some time to ensure that we could integrate this move seamlessly into the gameplay.
Weapons
Gauntlets Punch your way out of any situation!
Naginata The reach of the staff with a blade at the end.
Odachi & Wakizashi Try a traditional samurai style with a longsword in one hand for reach and power and the companion blade in the other for close quarters.
Additional Changes
Enemy and Level Polish - Enemies have been fine-tuned aesthetically and behaviorally.
- Levels have been tuned to appropriately escalate the challenge as you accumulate legendary ninja skills.
Shadow/Weapon Ability Tutorial and Sandbox - Each time you discover a new weapon or ability you get a chance to learn it before returning to battle.
Voiceovers - The new polished audio keeps you fully immersed.
UX Improvement Menus and core gameplay UI elements have been polished.
What's next?
The game is currently going through a rigorous QA process that will take a few more weeks. We'll post an update in the coming weeks once we lock down a release date.
- Ninja Legends Team
Announcing a new Beta: Musashi! Join Discord to get Beta Key
Beta3 (known as Musashi going forward) will be ready to go this Friday, May 3rd. Invite your ninja friends! We have a limited number of beta keys left and will be tapering it down as we near our release.
Take a look at some of the exciting updates we have for you in Musashi:
12 More Scenes
1 more special ability
Shadow Jump
4 Boss Battles
10+ New Enemies
Difficulty balancing. Easy and Medium have been made easier.
More Mixed Reality Support. Special hud for LIV play.
Music Improvements. Music intensifies with the action.
Helmeted Practice Mat to practice swinging hard.
Minimal Story Elements. Text preceding levels will let you know what's going on.
Blocking fix. Some have mentioned the overhead block not registering sometimes. We believe that is fixed.
Special ability tutorials
First Time User Experience Improvements
Health bar explainer
Art polish on enemies and scenes
Note for existing key holders: All previous progress will be blown away. Since we are adjusting the level and unlock progression, we are resetting user progress because otherwise things would break.
