Ninja Gaiden (2004 video game)

Ninja Gaiden
European cover art
Developer(s)	Team Ninja
Publisher(s)	WW: Tecmo[a] EU: Eidos Interactive (PS3)
Director(s)	Tomonobu Itagaki
Producer(s)	Tomonobu Itagaki
Designer(s)	Masanori Sato Noriaki Kazama Katsunori Ehara
Programmer(s)	Takeshi Kawaguchi
Artist(s)	Kenichiro Nakajo
Writer(s)	Masato Onishi Daisuke Suzuki
Composer(s)	Ryo Koike Wakana Hara Makoto Hosoi
Series	Ninja Gaiden
Platform(s)	Xbox PlayStation 3 PlayStation Vita Nintendo Switch PlayStation 4 Windows Xbox One
Release	March 2, 2004 Xbox NA: March 2, 2004 JP: March 11, 2004 EU: May 14, 2004 AU: May 28, 2004 Black Xbox NA: September 20, 2005 JP: September 29, 2005 EU: October 21, 2005 Sigma PlayStation 3 JP: June 14, 2007 NA: July 3, 2007 EU: July 6, 2007 AU: July 13, 2007 Sigma Plus PlayStation Vita WW: February 22, 2012 JP: February 23, 2012 Sigma (Master Collection) Nintendo Switch, PS4, Windows, Xbox One WW: June 10, 2021
Genre(s)	Action-adventure, hack and slash
Mode(s)	Single-player

Ninja Gaiden^[b] is an action adventure hack and slash video game developed by Team Ninja and published by Tecmo for the Xbox. It was released in March 2004. Set in the futuristic version of the 21st century, players control Ryu Hayabusa, a master ninja, in his quest to recover a stolen sword and avenge the slaughter of his clan. It was inspired by Tecmo's Ninja Gaiden series, and is set in the same continuity as Team Ninja's Dead or Alive fighting games.

Tecmo developed Ninja Gaiden for five years, targeting a western audience. The game's violence created difficulties obtaining content ratings, and it was censored in some regions. Making use of the Xbox's internet connectivity, Tecmo promoted Ninja Gaiden with a series of international online contests; record-breaking numbers of players competed for places in the live final held at the 2004 Tokyo Game Show.

Ninja Gaiden was critically acclaimed and sold 362,441 copies in North America in the first month of release; however, Japanese sales were poor. Team Ninja released two packs of downloadable content, which were also incorporated into a reworked version, Ninja Gaiden Black (2005). In 2007, Ninja Gaiden was ported to PlayStation 3 as Ninja Gaiden Sigma, with extra content and graphical improvements; this was released on the portable PlayStation Vita as Ninja Gaiden Sigma Plus. Ninja Gaiden was followed by Ninja Gaiden II (2008) and Ninja Gaiden 3 (2012).

Ninja Gaiden Sigma was released for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Windows, and Xbox One as part of the Ninja Gaiden: Master Collection on June 10, 2021.^[1]

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