Review by David Jenkins - Even as Japan's influence on the technical side of the games industry diminishes, the cultural influence will never die.

Not while pretending to be a ninja or samurai remains such an entertaining alternative to normal daily life.

Ostensibly a very different approach to today's Afro Samurai, ultimately this ends up suffering from many of the same combat and pacing problems.

We're a little hesitant to criticise this game too much as it is all the work of one James Silva.

Apparently he won some sort of Microsoft game design contest (and $10,000), but if that's the case, we're a little concerned as to how stern his competition could've been.

Or perhaps the judges just hadn't seen a 2D scrolling beat 'em-up before, because that's all this really is.

Clearly influenced by Castle Crashers developer The Behemoth's work, this presents you with a series of enclosed rooms into which teleport various hard to kill bad guys for you to disembowel.

In fact they're so hard to dispatch it's easy to lose interest, especially as some standard attacks seem to be doing more damage than finishing moves.

In reality though, all you're really doing is chipping away at a health bar.

It may be a matter of taste but we didn't like the murky, indistinct graphics, whose endless spurts of blood fail to really titillate.

What's more disappointing though is that the over-long battles and slippy controls means combat often devolves into mindless button bashing - for which you are rarely punished.

Especially once you realise how effective rolling is as a defence.

As the game continues, you do unlock additional weapons and magic abilities - but they only briefly re-energise your interest in proceedings.

The game's only real original idea is letting a friend lend you a hand as co-op characters that can be controlled via a Guitar Hero or Rock Band guitar.

This is far less fun than it sounds though, in a game that shows its amateur roots all too visibly.

IN SHORT: For a game that won an amateur game design contest, this lacks in both imagination and implementation.

PROS: It's good to see Microsoft encouraging fan-made games. The guitar-based co-op is a nice, if flawed, idea.

CONS: Dull, repetitive and poorly paced combat - where even minor battles drag on interminably. Bland, murky graphics.

SCORE: 3/10 Out: Now (Online)