Tiny Ninjas Review

We at Purple Phoenix Games love Kickstarting games. We probably do it more than we should, but I am sure we are not alone in this. I, myself, have backed 59 games or game-related products to date (as of February 2019). Not all of them have been that good (I’m looking at you Shadow Days, IncrediBrawl, and A Duel Betwixt Us!), but some have been simply amazing. Where does this game about dueling ninjas rate? Pretty dang good.

So this one is a riff off the old regular deck of cards game “War.” In War you simply blindly compare cards from your personal deck and the highest number wins… essentially. In Tiny Ninjas, however, that concept has expanded this very familiar game and made it really sexy. Well, as sexy as you can make a game with chibi-esque ninja artwork.

There is still comparison of strength, but you take turns being the attacker and the defender. As the attacker, you decide how many of your hand of 5 cards you wish to play this round, resolve their effects, and then you become the defender. On defense, you are able to use only the cards you didn’t use as the attacker, whereas the attacker refills their hand back to the hand limit of 5 cards. Uh oh. Did I plan well enough to have plenty of defense, or will my hit points be depleted?? This is essentially the game’s skeleton.

Each card has a special attack or defense ability and sometimes it requires you to roll one of the two dice that comes with the game to determine strength or proc abilities. We all know that once dice are invited to the game a certain amount of luck is also introduced. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing here. I like a small amount of luck in my games. For me, it’s just another little wrinkle to be applied to my perfect strategy.

But let’s talk about those dice. The dice themselves are really great quality, and the stamping is great, and the icons on the dice are really really good. But I have problems with the card iconography that corresponds with the dice. On the cards, icons are printed in a variation of a circle. The circle looks a certain way if you are to use the white die. And then the circle looks differently to indicate usage of the red die. But then there are circles that correspond to the ink colors of the white and red dice that are also different but the same. That irks me just a bit because I think there could be other ways to do that. I found myself constantly looking at the reference card (which, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR INCLUDING THIS) but maybe that’s just me and my preferences. After a while I caught on and it didn’t impede my enjoyment of the game any longer, but it was annoying at first.

I have not mentioned any of the other components because, frankly, they are really really great. The ingenious box-becomes-the-game-board idea is wonderful, the life trackers that hang out on the sides of the dice tray are great, the dojo sensei trackers, the cards and art on them are all top notch. For such an affordable package, you really do get quite a production.

I have no other qualms about the components, or the game play. It’s truly a fun experience. That said, Purple Phoenix Games gives Tiny Ninjas a stealthy 15 / 18. Don’t let this one sneak under your radar!