It's no secret that Ninja Gaiden has been insanely difficult since the series began in the late 80s. Though contemporary games have pretty much gotten easier through the decades to appeal to bigger audiences, the series hasn't let up not one bit. The same goes for Tomonobu Itagaki's Team Ninja lead reboot of Ninja Gaiden for Microsoft's original Xbox in 2004. The game was critically loved and sold good enough to warrant a sequel for the Xbox 360 in Ninja Gaiden 2.
Ninja Gaiden 2 wasn't a revolutionary step in the action genre that its predecessor was but, it was just as hard. In fact, felt unfairly so at times. One of the earliest boss fights is against a fiery and demonic armadillo that's hard on its own merit but there's one catch. If the player doesn't hold the block button after defeat, instant death came from its own self destruct sequence. Yes, blocking protects series ninja Ryu Hayabusa from a nuclear sized blast. Many spent countless hours perishing from an already hard boss battle by not pressing one button afterwards. Around Chapter 12, Hayabusa is tasked with taking two of those fire demon armadillos down. Itagaki seriously have a wicked sense of humor.
Here's some tips on how to defeat two of the fiendish mammals.
Item Management: A task in itself, try to save as many Herbs of Spiritual Life, Grains of Spiritual Life and Devil Way Mushrooms as possible. Most importantly having a Talisman of Rebirth can go a long way in any boss battle.
The Right Weapons: The best weapons to handle these two bosses are between the standard Dragon Sword or Eclipse Scythe. Hopefully either one of them have been upgraded substantially enough to deal efficient damage. Both are good for different playing styles. Safer players will undoubtedly gravitate to the Dragon Sword while riskier ones understand the power the Eclipse Scythe can deal.
Keep Moving and focus: This makes sense for anything boss battle in Ninja Gaiden 2 but even more so here. Don't try to fight both at once, isolate and focus on one armadillo.
Block: Don't forget to block as soon as each armadillo is defeated because if not, all that hard work will be in vain.
Have any of your own suggestions to deal with this boss? Comment.
Watch the boss battle below:
