Back in December 2003, I picked up the first volume of Shonen Jump's new manga series Naruto, by Masashi Kishimoto . Back then, I read it, liked it, but was insufficiently moved by it to continue with it. It was good stuff, but it was kids' stuff, and I had to make time for other things. I thought it would be somewhat successful, but not approach the level of something like Ruroni Kenshin or Ranma 1/2, other big Viz manga at the time.

Little did I know.

Fast forward to 2009, and while it's not quite the juggernaut it once was in the anime scene, Naruto, the tale of a boy ninja with a demon inside of him and his wacky adventures, has reached nearly 50 published volumes in the US, the anime sells  well on DVD, and there are a metric fuckton of video game adaptations, almost all of them fighting games. This IS a series about ninjas and their cool moves, after all.

Ubisoft Montreal, developers of Assassin's Creed and Prince of Persia, released something different for the XBox 360 in 2007- Rise of a Ninja has combat that's similar to a basic regular fighter, but the majority of the game is set up like an open world/sandbox. Yes, kids, it's Grand Theft Auto: Leaf Village.

Rise of a Ninja 's single player game covers episodes 1-80 of the animated series. A warning: over the 8-10 hours you'll be playing single player, the game hits on the bullet points of those episodes, and has a good picture of Naruto's overall arc, but it's choppy as hell. At least the basics are up front. Naruto Uzumaki was the son of the Fourth Hokage, legendary ninja leader of the Leaf Village. When Naruto was only an infant, the Nine Tailed Demon Fox savaged the land, and the only way to stop it was to seal the demon with in his son's infant form, at the cost of his own life. Orphaned (his mother's status remains a mystery), Naruto grew up being a general nuisance in Leaf Village. The whole town fears and disdains him, so like a lot of lonely kids he began acting out and pulling pranks to get attention. At the anime (and game's) outset, Naruto vows to win the respect of the town by becoming the next Hokage. Of course, since he's only a kid, he's got a lot of training to do. The game uses cut scenes from the anime for crucial events. Unlike a lot of critics, I liked the use of the cut scenes. They also highlight the problems the game has at choosing random chunks of the story- mainly the Team 7 missions- over 80 episodes- a lot of nuance and stuff with any character besides Naruto gets lost, especially the relationship between Sasuke and Sakura. And yet, when the story DOES come through, it's compelling, and Naruto's a likable, easily relatable character.

The mission structure is set around Naruto winning the respect of Leaf Village's 100 residents. At first, everyone in the village shouts insults and sneers when Naruto walks by, but the more successful missions he gets, the nicer everyone behaves around him. There's a fun sense of progression as everyone goes from nasty to nice.

In addition to the main story missions, there's plenty of side missions on tap: ramen delivery, ninja races, lovelorn villagers who need a bit of sexy jutsu, and hide and seek featuring Konomaharu Saturobi. The missions are fun initially, but there's very little variety, and the main missions give you enough stat boosts to carry you through the game, so around the halfway point you may get bored doing them, and only stick them out for the achievements. I found them to be pretty fun.

The world of Leaf Village is the real star of Rise of a Ninja. The graphics aren't quite mindblowing, but they're nicely detailed in a cel shaded style. Initially, Naruto doesn't have any jutsu powers, so the city feels almost immense when you start. The towers and byways of the village feel almost insurmountable. Precious coins and areas just out of your reach. One ingenious thing the game does is parse out the jutsu powers at just the right pace, so the more powers you get, the more you can explore the nooks and crannies of the village, and the outside lands. There's also the tree jumping minigame as you traverse between world sections. The game's controls are generally excellent, and once Naruto is fully powered the game hits that sweet spot that the best open world games have where just traveling from one mission marker to the other is exhilarating. Again, it's kind of a shame given the vastness and exporability of the world, there's very little to do except collect coins and do side missions.

The game's jutsu skill system is decently implementd, but it takes a while to get a hold of. You hold LT, then flick both analog sticks in two directions, and wait for it to charge. These jutsus help you move around the world and are essential to combat and they're of course taken from the show, with shadow clones, sexy jutsu, etc.

The game's fighting system, while not particulary deep, is intuitive and easy for a non-fighting game aficionado to adapt to. All combat in the game is done with fighting one on one- you'll be walking around the world and suddenly a rival ninja or thief will pop out. In addition to the use of the jutsus, there's extensive use of combos using the X and Y buttons, combined with specially timed use of the left analog stick. Eventually each character's rage meter will build, and you can trigger rage mode, which of course leads you to bust out even nastier moves than usual.

The game has an online mode which is pretty good: plenty of playable characters from the early era of the anime. The moves and jutsus are varied and different enough so that each character has an individual feel. Setting up a quick match or a tournament is easy and headache free, though I get my ass kicked often by the Naruto hardcore.

Naruto: Rise of a Ninja was the first game I bought for the XBox 360 when I bought one back in the fall of 2008. It's not perfect; it can get repetitive at times, the strange nature of the storytelling can get to you, and the final battle is one of the most anticlimactic things I've ever seen- it happened in the anime, yes, but the game builds to this endgame that's a) introduces an all new game mechanic used only for that battle) incredibly easy to beat. But overall, it's a pretty underrated game, and a hugely fun experience. I found myself really getting into the world of Leaf Village and wanting to finally learn more about Naruto Uzumaki and friends. Also of note, is the elements of open world and platforming that you can tell informed later Ubisoft Montreal games like Assassin's Creed II and Prince of Persia. If you're looking for a nice adventure to spend time with, you should definitely seek it out. BELIEVE IT!