After 7 years since the last game in the series, NARUTO X BORUTO Ultimate Ninja STORM CONNECTIONS arrives as a sort of best of the best moments of this popular work by Masashi Kishimoto, to remind us how eventful this Bandai Namco franchise has been. It may not seem like it, but at one point, Bandai Namco and Cyberconnect2’s Naruto games were coming out annually and always seemed to find reasons for another release.
With the manga and anime ongoing, it was easy to come across new events that were not covered in the previous game, leading to a peak of 4 games in 5 years. After a two-year break, Ultimate Ninja Storm 4 arrived in 2016 and after the Road to Boruto expansion in 2017, we had no more news in this series, until now. After all these dormant years, the Ultimate Ninja STORM series is back to remind us of the golden times.
The manga ended in 2014 and the anime in 2017, which helps to understand why the video game adaptations have been on hold since around the same time. Currently, fans of this universe can only follow new adventures in the Boruto manga, as the anime has already ended. This leaves Bandai Namco with a challenge: how to bring back the series without focusing solely on Boruto? The answer is a best of, a look at the best moments of Naruto, with an extra touch of Boruto.
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After Generations and Revolutions, we have Connections, a new non-numbered game that does not focus on introducing new content compared to the previous ones, but rather presents another look at the best moments already adapted. Naruto x Boruto Connections features 4 main modes, a Story mode, Bonus Story, Free Battle, and Online Battle, where you can play with the widest range of characters ever seen in a Naruto game, including debuts.
Naruto x Boruto Connections features over 130 characters, a number higher than Revolution, making it the largest cast ever seen in a Naruto game. This includes characters from the early episodes of Naruto as a child to Boruto, such as the Kara members: Jigen, Delta, Koji, and Boro. It’s an impressive roster that differentiates the various versions of Naruto for you to play with your favorite moves or Ultimates. It is one of its biggest highlights and probably the only difference, as everything else is too familiar.
The entire single-player content can be completed in less than 10 hours, which is not surprising considering its simplicity. The Story mode is a recap of the best moments in each narrative arc of Naruto. Amidst some cutscenes taken directly from the anime, you will have the opportunity to battle and recreate the best fights of the series, including some boss fights, such as Shukako, Kurama, Madara, or Kaguya Ootsutsuki, not to mention the various battles between Naruto and Sasuke throughout the series.
Most of these chapters are played in about 30 minutes and have served as the basis for story modes in full games, now summarized here without any map exploration, just chapters with scenes and fights. Many of the mega showdowns have also been simplified, but still manage to convey that energy we love in Naruto and remind us why we have played 7 Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm games in about 9 years.
The extra episode with Boruto follows the same rule of simplicity. It is a series of cutscenes, as if it were a movie created with the game engine, in which you only play the battles and do not have the exploration moments seen in the story modes of previous games. Here, the main difference is that you have an original story created for this mode, along with the possibility to battle with any character (in Story mode you are restricted by events in the manga/anime). This is because the original story created focuses on the use of a virtual reality game that allows Boruto to choose any character to fight.
The original story is interesting enough to keep you following the mode until the end, but do not expect something that will excite you. It is a narrative focused on a new character who wants to carry out Pain’s plan, but with an approach that involves a video game. It is a look at the current state of society and the role of video games/social networks in manipulating how the world runs or how we think, but with the Naruto and Boruto setting, meaning ninjas and an imminent world war.
All of this is presented with the same gameplay you already know and has not changed over these past years. Despite some refinements, Cyberconnect2 went back to the vault to bring back everything they had already done to present it without major innovations, which along with the aesthetics reinforces the sense of familiarity. It is a fast-paced combat experience, with high simplicity, some depth, but nothing that will require much from you. Achieving S ranks may require you to replay some fights, but a series veteran will have no problems with virtually any fight.
The controls focused on a single button to attack, with directional variations dictating visual differences, along with Chakra management for movement, remain at the core of the Naruto x Boruto Connections combat. The little depth comes from the combat pace, that is to say, from dodge and defense management, and not hammering the buttons to take advantage of when the opponent is vulnerable to attacks. Simply put, you should not continuously spam the attack button to the point of being open to attacks.
The visual component also reinforces the déjà vu feeling as the recreation of the “interactive anime” aesthetic means something very close to what we already saw in the previous game, seven years ago. Improvements in performance and resolution help, along with other graphical enhancements, to achieve better visual quality, but if at one point you feel that the graphics are superior to the previous one, at another you find yourself questioning if there are really any improvements. It is the first game in the series with native versions for the latest consoles, and that makes a difference, but not much.
After 7 years, Naruto’s return is done in a humble way and practically devoid of ambition. This look back at the best moments results in a lack of real news (the Boruto mode doesn’t have enough substance to carry that weight and responsibility), where only the around 30 characters never before present in a series game arouse curiosity. Bandai Namco included some game service concepts, such as character levels to obtain customization items, log-in bonuses, and incentives to play more and more, but it is difficult to understand what to make of Naruto x Boruto Connections.
NARUTO X BORUTO Ultimate Ninja STORM CONNECTIONS is a love letter to all fans of this universe who, after so many years, began to miss a game in the series. However, it is a title that is difficult to position, and it might even be better to look for the Trilogy or Ultimate Ninja Storm 4 for a better and greater Naruto experience. The new characters are the only real curiosity in a package that is too familiar.
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