If you are a die hard Naruto fan don't even read this review just buy it now...10/10. Everyone else read on.
-You like beautiful epic cinematic combat the likes of which has never been seen in a game. Seriously it looks better then the TV show or the movies sometimes.
-You cry when you accidentally flip past Naruto on North American TV and want to punch the English voice actors in the throat and would love a game with the original Japanese voice cast with English subs.
-You don't like games where you have to memorize a bunch of button combos for every character you want to use in order to stand a chance.
-You really really really really like the hidden leaf village. Because you are going to see a lot of it.
-You like unlocking things. The game starts very bare. You have to unlock a lot of things.
With all of that being said, if you are not a Naruto fan, there is a good chance you would rate this game 7-8 max. Maybe even lower if you are a die hard classic fighter fan or HATE repetitive "collecting" tasks.
Personally, I own every Mortal Kombat game. I enjoy Marvel VS Street Fighter too, but I wouldn't consider myself a hardcore arcade fighting fan. I really like the fact that Naruto is simple to play. It allows anyone who picks up the game to stop worrying about playing technical and start playing strategic. Which I really like.
The fighting is epic beyond words. It's so seamless, beautiful and cinematic. The graphics and smooth game play are defiantly the shining gem in this game. The fighting is so true to the anime and will be the key factor that brings everyone back to this game. It's just a crazy, fast, simple, sexy looking and fun fighting game with a TON of content / Characters / Specials.
The Bad News:
Story mode, which is required to unlock content in the game is very weak in some areas. The best part of this game is the fighting. Period.
The problem is that the fighting is buried among you playing a ton of repetitive mini games and menial "missions." It gets to the point where you sometimes forget that you're playing a really fun fighting game and start to think you're playing a really sh!tty Mario Party...by yourself...with a Naruto theme.
You spend a lot of time running around the hidden leaf village (which looks awesome and amazingly accurate) collecting scrolls. Thousands of scrolls.
Yes i just said THOUSANDS.
I'm not even 10% done story mode and I have probably collected close to 3000 scrolls. It gets old really fast and it's mandatory. This is not like hidden packages in GTA. You need to do this to unlock important things.
Now the Mini-Games i talked about are pretty cool mini games. They look great and play well. One is running up a massive tree in a time attack or sometimes a race. Along the way you get boosts and power ups in a very simplified Mario Kart kind of way. The other mini game involves jumping and flinging yourself through the Forrest just like they do in the anime when they travel long distances. I think this scene looks visually awesome.
Here's the problem with the Mini-Games. There's too much of it. Sometimes you have to do 2 or 3 mini games and go find crap in the village missions before you get to fight someone. You have no choice. You must complete things like this in a specific order to advance the story and be able to fight.
This makes the Mini-Games a pain. They are made worse by the fact that every time you change from the village, to a fight, to a mini game etc. you have to load the game. Mini Games just increases the number of times I have to LOAD. They should have just been fun OPTIONAL bonus games that perhaps allow you to unlock EXTRA content. Instead of being forced on you ALL THE TIME.
It starts to feel like your a kid who has to eat all your vegetables before you can have your favourite desert. And the whole time you're cramming that bitterness down your throat you are muttering to yourself
"when I grow up I'm going to have cookies for dessert every night."
JUST GET TO THE FIGHTING ALREADY!
I would have actually rated this game a 9.5 or 9.8 if the game played like a classic arcade fighter. Where you fight a battle. Get to watch a cool cut scene / story snip-it. and then go right back to fighting.
The hidden village looks AMAZING but it's such a novelty. I thought it would be a great part of the game when I saw the footage.
I personally can not wait to be done story mode, have all my characters, and just play quick fights till my thumbs bleed. The fighting is awesome. STOP MAKING ME PLAY MINI GAMES AND COLLECT SCROLLS TO GET TO IT.
So there you have it. I hope you found this review fair and in-depth. I hope it gives you a good idea of what to expect. It really comes down to your personal preferences and what you were looking for in a Naruto / fighting game.