Naruto is still going strong after the manga series ended in 2014 and as the anime enters its fourteenth year of production. The Naruto Shippuden games keep going as well, with Ultimate Ninja Storm 4 releasing this February in the United States. And now there’s news on the next Naruto game, the iOS exclusive Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Blazing. Planned for release in Japan by the end of 2016, Ultimate Ninja Blazing looks to be a free-to-play RPG with a focus on multiplayer and unlockables. And it appears to follow Naruto, Sakura, Sasuke and the rest in the pre-time skip era of the series.
Now, straight out of Japan, there’s some gameplay footage of Ultimate Ninja Blazing, played by some of Naruto’s biggest fans. Take a look:
Will Ultimate Ninja Blazing get a release date in North America? There’s no word on it yet, though the game’s co-publisher is Bandai-Namco, which normally brings over the console Naruto games. It’ll be interesting to see if the same can be said for Naruto’s next iOS release, as that’s a very different market for the franchise. I suppose it couldn’t hurt if Naruto fans let Bandai-Namco know on Twitter and Facebook that there’s interest in the game.
This new gameplay footage comes ahead of the simulcast of the next Naruto Shippuden, episode 467 “Ashura’s Decision.” Some fans are already wary of this new installment, as last week’s “The Tumultuous Journey” was judged by some diehards as too full of filler, and they are rightly worried that this next episode will be just as guilty of not moving the plot forward. I suppose we’ll have to wait and see when the simulcast of the episode debuts on Crunchyroll in a matter of hours.
If you can read Japanese, you’ll find a little more information about Ultimate Ninja Blazing on the official web page ahead of the 2016 Japanese release.