Alex Kidd in Shinobi World

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Alex Kidd in Shinobi World

Developer(s)	Sega
Publisher(s)	Sega
Series	Alex Kidd series
Release date(s)	1990
Genre(s)	Platform
Mode(s)	Single player
Platform(s)	Sega Master System
Media	Cartridge

The game's title screen

Shinobi Kid Screenshot

Shinobi Kid with Original Level 1 Boss "Mari-Oh"

Alex Kidd in Shinobi World is a video game developed by Sega.

The final game to be released in the Alex Kidd Series, Alex Kidd in Shinobi World is a parody of the Sega game Shinobi. It features Alex Kidd and was released in 1990 for the Sega Master System. As the title suggests, Alex Kidd is essentially thrust into the hero's role in a Shinobi game. Alex Kidd's abilities in this game are different from his other games, besides jumping.

In the game, Alex Kidd has to rescue his girlfriend, a native of Shinobi World, from an evil ninja named Hanzo. A good ninja fuses into him and gives him his powers.

[edit] Original Version: Shinobi Kid

Very recently, images and articles on the internet have begun to surface that again like Alex Kidd in High-Tech World, Alex Kidd was not originally intended to be the star of the game, but in fact an original character called Shinobi Kid.

An article from Issue Four of "S - The Sega Magazine" (March 1990) had the following statement about Shinobi Kid...

Along wih the price redution, Sega announced that there will continue to be new titles released for the Master System, and many were on display. As well as games already featured in S there were new up-and-coming titles such as Ultima IV, Golfamania, Shinobi Kid, Assault City, Slapshot plus Super Monago GP and Simple Fighter (both announced but not shown) and R.C. Grand Prix from Absolute Entertainment, although none of the previous third party licenses (Activision, Parker Brothers, Epyx) plan to release new titles for the Master System.

Of these, Shinobi Kid was about the best. The tune is from Shinobi, but the Character is a small kid. He has some of the same moves and a new power: instead of walking through the screens, he can grab the occasional lamp pole or bar and start spinning faster and faster around it. Pushing the button releases him and he flies across several screens, knocking out any bad guys alongs the way. The screen scrolls horizontally and sometimes vertically downward into a maze and then back up to ground level. At the end of each level, after he rescues all the tied-up hostages, he must fight the end-of-level boss. One is called Mari-Oh (as a sideswipe at Ni****do's Mario character). Defeat Mari-Oh and he shrinks down in size and disappears.

Apart from a few sprite character changes and some graphical alterations to the first level, the games appear to be identical. but no Images or Sprites of Shinobi Kid remain in the Shinobi World ROM.

No reasons has ever been given to why Shinobi Kid was replaced with Alex Kidd. Obvious suggestions would be to appeal to gamers more with a known IP license, or again if Shinobi Kid was designed to be for the Japanese release of the game.

[edit] Trivia

The first boss, Kabuto, was originally going to be named Mari-Oh, as a parody of the Nintendo character Mario ("Oh" in Japanese meaning, "King", King Mari). Despite the name not going through, Kabuto still shares many of his would-be counterpart's qualities; his main attack is shooting fireballs, and he shrinks after taking a certain amount of damage.

Rumor has it that Sega also originally intended Alex to appear in several games parodying their own licenses in a bit to re-invent the character, with Golden Axe and Phantasy Star on the top of the name list. Unfortunately, Sega's success on Sonic The Hedgehog put an end to this plan.