Hello everyone and welcome to the latest installment of the Weekly Contests!  Have you ever wanted to be a ninja?  Well, guess what?  You get to be one this week!  How cool is that?  And yes, you will get to do all of the cool stuff that ninjas do!  Well, yes, you get to wear pajamas all day like a ninja does, but I don't think that's what the outfit is actually called.  What's that?  Oh, yes, you get to use plenty of throwing stars.  And no, you can't throw them at pictures of your boss, your ex-girlfriends, your high school bully who took your lunch money and gave you noogies, wedgies, swirlies, and wet-willy's and knocked your books out of your hands in the hallway, or your angry, jerkoff neighbor who yells at you every time he finds dog poop in his yard and you explain to him that your dog doesn't poop that big and then he yells “bullshit” and then you throw some of your dog's turds at him to prove it and then he punches you in the eye and then you spend the rest of the night sitting on the couch with a bag of frozen peas over your black eye while watching reruns of Happy Days and thinking of petty ways to get him back, like raking all of your leaves into his yard or putting a big sign in his front yard that says “One Bad Neighbor” or letting the air out of his car tires or putting a banana in the tailpipe of his car or...sorry, I'm getting carried away here.  Where were we?  Oh yes, things you can do as a ninja.  Yes, you can do plenty of sneaking around.  And no, you can't hide in your closet and jump out suddenly to scare the crap out of your cats.  And yes, you get to use a big, sharp sword.  And no, you can't use it to cut sandwiches like this guy:



Oh yeah, and you get to use magic as well.  No, not pulling a rabbit out of a top hat or pulling a quarter out of your young nephew's ear or sawing your assistant in half type of magic.  I'm talking ninpo magic.  Look, I don't know exactly what it is, I just host the contests.  But you can use several different cool fire spells and clone yourself!  And those clones should be used to help you fight bad guys and not to go to work for you while you stay at home and play NES all day in your underwear while you guzzle Mountain Dew and eat bag after bag of Cheetos.  Look, you all need to take this very seriously because the evil lord Ashtar is looking to take over the world.  And if he does, we are looking at a disaster of biblical proportions!  I'm talking Old Testament, real wrath of God type stuff!  Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies!  Rivers and seas boiling!  Forty years of darkness!  Earthquakes, volcanoes!  The dead rising from the grave!  Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together...mass hysteria!  Need I say more?  I didn't think so.  Okay, now it's time to take on the evil Ashtar and his minions in Ninja Gaiden 2.  And for the record, it's pronounced gai-den, not gay-den.  Gai-den.  Ninja Gai-Den!  HAI!  Anyway, here are the rules:

• 5 lives only (you only get five lives total and must stop playing and take your picture after you die for the fifth time).
• If you are unable to acquire five lives (meaning you don't earn any extra lives), you are allowed to play as far into life “0” as possible.  Don't allow yourself to get a game over.
• No farming for extra lives allowed (you earn an extra life every 100,000 points)
• You may collect each extra life in the game only once
• If you roll the score, you must take your picture right before the roll and right after the roll
• If you beat the game, prepare to take your picture after beating Jaquio.  It disappears fairly quick after your bonus points tally up.
• Highest score wins
• Participation: 50,000

The contest ends Sunday, 5/27/18 at 11 PM NA time.  Your user name MUST be written or typed on a piece of paper and be in the picture for your score to be valid.  The entire TV screen, or computer monitor if you are playing on an emulator, MUST be in the picture for the score to be valid.  No partial screenshots will be considered or accepted.  No screenshots by hitting "print screen" on a computer will be allowed.  You must take a picture of your computer monitor.  There may be instances where this will be acceptable, but it will be at the discretion of myself and the contest organizers.  Also, the use of turbo controllers is forbidden, as well as any cheat codes, Game Genies, slow motion functions, or save states if playing on an emulator.  Also, we will only be using NTSC systems for the contests.  The use of PAL systems will NOT be allowed.  Good luck everyone and have fun  

1st	skinnygrinny	715,500
2nd	mbd39	706,000
3rd	arnpoly	385,400
4th	gutsman004	363,300
5th	Krunch	344,900
6th	bertsampson	254,200
7th	smick	165,000
8th	SilvertongueBullet	158,100
9th	Murray	140,600
10th	Seppatoni	96,300
11th	Yoshi	86,100
12th	laddersandcakes	76,600
13th	Mega Tank	65,800
14th	Ausden	62,900

I'm going to try and get to the end of this game. I probably won't have time to learn point pressing techs/locations.

I hate that ryu cannot turn around mid jump. I mean, c'mon, what kind of ninja is that?!?!!

65,800

This contest should probably be one life only because of the 1up loops.

Wooooooweeee. 1 life would be serious   and make point pressing better. 

i think you can no death this game, right? 

What do you guys think of progression trumps score? Score deciding ranks for all who finish the game. 

 

I made it to the final boss battle (I think). I got destroyed.

I've no-deathed the first Ninja Gaiden many times. I've only no-deathed NG2 once after putting in a few days of serious effort. Trying to get through this in one life while also focusing on point pressing would make it even tougher.

I still think that one life is the way to go. I understand why bimmy made it five lives because it's a pretty hard game, much harder than VPD.





 

There are three final bosses. The second form is the worst.


 

I figured there would be multiple forms. That’s how NG1 is.

I’m in act 7. He floats around throwing fireballs? 
 

Yeah he's the first form of the final boss. The second form is much more difficult and my least favorite boss in the entire trilogy.

 

I freaking hate stage 2-2. Doesn’t help that Ryu gets knocked back 57.5 yards when he contacts an enemy or enemy projectile. Double that if he is airborne.

Another issue with getting five lives is that the best strategy is to find a great point pressing location and burn four of them there... and that's insanely boring.

If these are the rules then I might just try to beat the game within the allotted lives and not worry about point pressing.

Shooters aside,i’ve preferred low scoring competitions over high scoring ones.

Ninja Gaiden 3 is probably the best for a high score contest because it doesn't have respawning enemies. Thus getting a high score is more about progress.
 

I'm starting act 5-1 and no deaths yet. But my score isn't great because I've refrained from point pressing.

I'm now at 6-1 and no deaths yet. This is why I wanted a one life contest, haha.

EDIT: I'm starting 7-1 and I've had one death in 6-2.

.... And my run fell apart in 7-2. Oh well.

 

706,000


 

We played this with 1 life rules back in 2010 and it was frustrating for a lot of participants, so that's why I didn't do it this time around. Five lives was chosen to give those less experienced with the game a chance to progress through the game and kind of even out the playing field a bit. While they are great games, the Ninja Gaiden games have always created rules issues since you can point rack until the timer runs out. While it makes sense for some games (and could work for this one), not every contest can be progression based.

EDIT: Never mind. Current rules are fine.

Dude. 7-2 is a biiiiiiiiiitch. 

I can just about run the run the rest of the game no problem until 7-2
 

The point pressing is so time consuming that if you fail a run it's like : "ok just wasted 4 hours... excellent."

Lol

But I do love a good grind!!!!

86,100

Here is participation at least. Im rusty at Ninja Gaiden II.

 

I like to have a specific weapon for the final bosses. Trying not to grab the wrong weapon makes that level even more annoying.
 

The wind/rain can be a pain.