Shadow Dancer: The Secret of Shinobi

Moby ID: 10854
Genesis Specs
Buy on Genesis
$128.97 used on eBay
Buy on Windows
$0.99 new on Steam
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Description

A.D. 1997, New York City

Having vanquished the evil crime empire, Neo Zeed, the ninja master Shinobi and his combat ninja skills were not heard from for some time. But a new threat arose, in a reptilian form that lived on vicious instinct alone. The colossal monster moved slowly and quietly, and its attack was relentless. The souls unfortunate enough to survive became hostages, and mass panic swept the streets.

It remained only for Shinobi to take action. His weapons were stealth and quickness of attack, his only allies facing overwhelming forces. Relying on Ninja weapons and magic, Shinobi fought on, assisted by his faithful dog.

Shadow Dancer: The Secret of Shinobi is similar to Shadow Dancer for home computers, and consists of five missions containing three stages each. However, there are a few differences between the two. For example, in this Sega Genesis/Mega Drive exclusive, the stages are different, and you rescue hostages rather than disarm bombs. Each mission ends up with you fighting a boss, and when you defeat each (except the final one), you also participate in a bonus stage where you must shoot all ninja flying towards you.

Some of the enemies are also quite different. Some of the lizards, which appear in later missions, leave a "lizard coin", which you can collect for bonus lives.

Spellings

  • シャドー・ダンサー ザ・シークレット・オブ・シノビ - Japanese spelling

Groups +

Screenshots

Promos

Credits (Genesis version)

16 People (13 developers, 3 thanks)

Program
Character Design
Graphic Design
Assistant Graphic Design
Game Design
Music Composer
Supervisor
  • Kankan
  • Tantan (as Tantan)
  • Hayhay
Test Player
Thanks to
  • Arcade 'Shadow Dancer' Staff
  • Arcade 'Shinobi' Staff
and ... Special Thanks to
  • All Players

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 82% (based on 26 ratings)

Players

Average score: 4.0 out of 5 (based on 40 ratings with 6 reviews)

The one time you thought you dodged a shuriken...

The Good
The game comes from the Shinobi series, starting from Shinobi in 1987. 5 stages, Easy controls & a good chance to get more retries makes the game looks easy and hard at the same time. With a dog that you can use, you can easily utilise him to disable one opponent while you kill others in a 4-on-1 fight situation. Power-ups helps to kill the ninjas, armored men & armored lizards in one hit. The bosses have life points that you must reduce in order to kill them. For easy mode, they have 6 points, and it increases depending on the difficulty. Try hard mode and you'll see colourful ninjas everywhere in the game.

The Bad
Some might complain on the game's one-hit-KO issue, and some might complain with the dog being a nuisance, but I'm seriously cool with it. The only issue here is that he does not have the double jumps, also remember the 1-time-use ninpo (the ninjutsu skill) restriction. Why would a ninja with an athletic build and great abilities have these restraints put on him?

The Bottom Line
A game worth playing to test your avoiding and technical skills. A must-go for this legendary game.

Genesis · by Ruz Kessler (1) · 2011

Shinobi comes out of retirement & is a brittle old man.

The Good
This is a good Shinobi game, much better than the arcade rendition of a similar name (which is a different game all together). The bosses & bonus stages are fun & challenging. The dog never got in my way or troubled me. The stages look great. The bridge stage is a lot of fun. The statue of liberty looks great. At one point you have to fight 3 ninjas & a helicopter at the same time!! That is awesome & obviously deadly.

The Bad
This game is incredibly hard. I'm talking 1 hit death & lose all your lives in the first 2 minutes hard. I only absolutely needed to use the dog twice in the whole game. In the arcade game you need him a lot. He's still useful here but not necessary. The spin-wheel boss (#4) is very confusing as to how to attack it. There is a stage where shadows block your view & ninja's attack you in the dark. This is really cheap & incredibly hard.

The Bottom Line
Better than the arcade game & even harder. Stage, boss, & graphic variety keep you glued. You may have to unleash all of your cheating powers to beat this one.

Genesis · by Emperor MAR (2598) · 2013

Decent game in the classic, 1987 Shinobi gameplay format

The Good
I'm pleased that this Shinobi game(actually different to the arcade Shadow Dancer, released a year prior) retained the background/foreground gameplay of the original Shinobi(an idea that may have originated in Namco's Rolling Thunder, Dec. 1986). It allows for defeating enemies with ninja-like stealth i.e jumping into the foreground/background behind your opponent and using your sword or an unarmed strike. Of course in this game, you can also command your dog to attack and immobilize an opponent, which takes some precision, as some opponents can defend against dog attacks, you have to wait till they're off-guard. Another nice addition is your mid-air strikes e.g if you time the button-push right, you'll flying-kick opponents who come near you while in mid-air.

So I think the game plays well, there are some decent bosses, the graphics and animation are good, the music is pretty good(Keisuke Tsukahara).

The Bad
It seems pretty short compared to other Shinobis, suddenly the game was telling me I was at the final boss. Arcade Shadow Dancer technically only had four stages, but it was probably longer with all the sub-stages. The final boss is really hard to beat, but even so he's not very impressive, mostly just sitting on his throne, sending ninjas at you. A better finish would've been a two stage, final boss battle, like arcade Shadow Dancer.

The Bottom Line
Better than Revenge of Shinobi(Super Shinobi) or Shinobi III (Super Shinobi II), truer to the original Shinobi and Shadow Dancer at the arcade. Ultimately disappointing, but worth playing right through once, at least.

Genesis · by Andrew Fisher (697) · 2018

[ View all 6 player reviews ]

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Katakis | カタキス.

Wii added by Charly2.0. Windows, Linux, Macintosh added by Foxhack.

Additional contributors: j.raido 【雷堂嬢太朗】.

Game added November 2, 2003. Last modified February 4, 2024.