Ninja Games Online: Little Ninja Dash vs. One Panda and a Wall
Six straw hats, one pond at the bottom of a pit and a wall that now knows me by name. Polarzinho takes the studio ninja for a spin.
By Polarzinho ·
Polarzinho here, the panda who wears the Polar Games jersey, and today the topic is ninja games. Yes, this one is ours, and yes, I am hopelessly biased: if I gush too hard, feel free to send me back to the bamboo grove. Little Ninja Dash is a ninja platformer you play online in your browser: hold to slow time, pull back like a slingshot, and let go to turn your little ninja into a flying blade.
My setup was a mouse, a desktop browser and too much confidence. I cleared the first stage after more attempts than I'm comfortable admitting, pulled off a TRIPLE! in the second one, and then died on spikes the game had politely flagged with a red diamond. So yes, I got the full ninja experience, including the bonus chapter on public embarrassment.
A note on me: pandas were not built for stealth. We're round, black and white, and visible from orbit. Still, six guards went down in the first stage and I didn't die once, so the bar here is reassuringly low.
What makes a good ninja platformer game
Quick genre detour before the diary, because anyone searching for ninja games usually wants the same feeling: fast, precise and a little bit dangerous. My personal checklist has four items.
- Speed. The hero should cross the screen in a blink, not stroll like he's late for brunch.
- Verticality. Walls, high ledges, pits. Plenty of ninja games turn that into wall jumps. Here it turns into knowing when to go up before you go sideways.
- Timing. One clean strike at the right moment beats mashing every button you own.
- Weapons and powers. A new blade that changes how you play is a great reason to come back.
Little Ninja Dash takes those ingredients and swaps the usual button layout for a slingshot. There's no jump button and no attack button. The jump is the attack: fly through an enemy with your blade out and he goes down. That makes it a game about aim and decisions more than raw finger speed.
Meet the square ninja of Little Ninja Dash
Your hero is a square ninja with an orange headband, spiky yellow hair and a katana bigger than his self-esteem. The game opens with a tiny scene: him and a pink-banded ninja in a cherry blossom garden, little hearts floating up, until a red-masked ninja drops out of the sky yelling HIYAH!. After that, it's on you.
PolarzinhoThey were having such a nice evening. Hearts! Cherry blossoms! A sunset! Then this guy crashes the date. I was offended before I'd even touched the mouse.
According to the game page, there are 50 levels across five worlds: Garden, Ice, Lava, Clouds and Fortress. It's a single-player ninja game with no online mode, and your progress is saved right in your browser.
How to play Little Ninja Dash, step by step
The tutorial is two lessons long and nobody gets lost. First it says Pull back to aim, then Hold again in mid-air to change direction. The language menu has 14 options if English isn't your thing. Here's the whole loop:
- Hold the mouse button or keep a finger on the screen. Time slows down and an aiming circle appears around the ninja.
- Pull in the opposite direction of where you want to go, like a slingshot. The dotted line shows the arc of your dash, gravity included.
- Let go. The ninja flies like a blade and cuts whoever is in the way.
- While still in the air, hold again to aim again. You can chain several cuts without touching the ground.
- Cut every enemy. The number in the top-left corner shows how many are left, and the stage portal only opens when it hits zero.
- Grab the stars along the way and jump into the portal. Esc or P pauses.
PolarzinhoWith Assist on, the game paints an X on whoever's about to get cut. For a panda with chunky paws, that's basically a hug.
Worth knowing: the Assist option (it makes launches easier) is on by default, and every opinion I have about difficulty comes with it switched on.
Stage 1, First Cut: a diary of my mistakes
First blood (well, first ink)
Stage 1 is called First Cut. It has six guards in straw hats carrying spears, and the time goal is 0:26. The banner at the top is clear: cut them all to open the portal. The portal is a roped-off shrine at the far end, and it stays sealed as long as anybody's still standing.
My very first dash sailed right over the first guard. Over him. He just stood there watching while I celebrated a hit that never happened. I only noticed because the counter still said 6. Lesson one: the counter never lies. The panda does.
PolarzinhoThat was the moment I truly felt like a ninja. It lasted about two seconds. Then I fell into a hole.
Me, the pit and the wall
The last guard of the stage stands next to the portal on top of a cliff. Between him and the rest of the level there's a pit with a tiny pond at the bottom. Every time I aimed up and to the right, I smacked into the wall, the ninja went dizzy with little stars spinning over his head, and slid back down.
PolarzinhoFifth time on that same wall. At this point the wall and I were in a relationship. Not a healthy one.
The fix was to think in two moves. First, a straight jump up, pulling the mouse straight down, just to get above the edge. Then, once I was up there, a second dash sideways, well away from the wall. It worked: +100 and the counter at zero.
The scoreboard of shame (and pride)
With the portal open, one short hop and done: STAGE CLEAR!. I finished First Cut with 1,250 points, 1 of 3 stars, a C for style, a 4x combo (the goal was 4x, so that one's checked) and zero deaths. My time was 2:15. The goal was 0:26. Yes, I read that correctly. No, I don't want to talk about it.
PolarzinhoZero deaths! We're not discussing the time. We're discussing the zero deaths. Thank you.
Stage 2, Single File: a TRIPLE and a spike
Stage 2 is called Single File, and it means it: right at the start there are three guards lined up on the same platform, red banner and all. The stage has ten enemies and a 0:32 goal. I aimed straight, Assist put an X on all three, and I let go.
PolarzinhoThree in one swing. I did a little victory roll on the carpet. Pandas are excellent at rolling.
Then the stage gets busier: wooden scaffold towers with platforms up top, a guard on each floor, and a row of spikes sticking out of a wall. The game warns you, too: when your aiming arc runs too close to the spikes, a red diamond pops up on the path.
I saw the diamond. I grabbed the star right before it, +50. And then I kept flying straight into the spikes, because the arc was already locked in and I was busy celebrating the star. The ninja blinked and I was back at the start of the stage, with all ten guards standing again, including my three friends from the line.
PolarzinhoThe red diamond was right there, warning me politely. I ignored it the way I ignore my alarm clock. Same result.
Worlds, skins and ninja weapons you can unlock
Five worlds and a boss at the end of every map
Each world has its own look and stage names. I peeked at the first stage of each one, all still locked for me: First Frost on Ice, Ash Road on Lava, First Wind in the Clouds and The Courtyard in the Fortress. Every map ends at a gate with a BOSS sign. I didn't reach any boss, so I'm not going to make up how they fight.
Ten looks paid for in stars
Looks are bought with stars. I started as Orange Fox and saw the whole list: Jade Wind costs 3 stars, Turquoise Wave 6, Blue Storm 9, Night Raven 12, Golden Moon 16, Silver Wolf 20, Desert Sand 24 and Lilac Gaze 28. The tenth one, The Princess, shows a lock and a skull icon instead of a price, so it must ask for something else.
PolarzinhoOne star. I own one star. Jade Wind costs three. I'm two stars away from being a fashionable panda.
Five special blades paid for in points
Weapons use a different currency: the points you earn in stages. Besides the starter katana, there's Flame Blade for 6K, Frost Blade for 20K, Thunder Blade for 30K and Venom Blade for 40K. The Apocalypse Blade has no price tag: you get it by beating World 4. The game page says you fire a blade's special power with F, J or K, but with my 1,250 points the Flame Blade is still far off, so I haven't tried it.
Ninja game tips, courtesy of my many crashes
1. To go up, go up first
Aiming diagonally at a high ledge almost always sent me into the wall. What worked was a straight jump up, pulling straight down, and the sideways cut only after I was above the edge.
2. Line them up
The best scores come from several cuts in one dash: the DOUBLE! was worth +300 and the TRIPLE! +600. Before you let go, look for a straight line that runs through more than one straw hat. Assist marks every guard who's about to fall with an X.
3. Chain cuts in the air for combos
Every cut in a row bumps your combo, and the counter in the top-right corner shows x2, x3, x4. In Stage 1 the goal was 4x, and I only made it because I aimed again in mid-air right after each cut instead of waiting to land.
Who Little Ninja Dash is for (and where it got me)
If you like fast ninja games but want a second to think before you strike, this is for you. Aiming in slow motion gives you that action-movie feeling, and Assist holds your hand while you learn.
Now, the bits that made me huff. The arc takes some learning: dashes drop with gravity, and it took me several tries to figure out how much pull a climb needs. And dying on spikes before a checkpoint sends you back to the start with everyone alive again. That hurts, especially right after a TRIPLE!.
Ninja games FAQ: quick answers about Little Ninja Dash
Is Little Ninja Dash free?
Yes. It's free to play in your browser, with nothing to download.
Does Little Ninja Dash have an online mode?
No. It is a single-player game with a campaign, and your progress is saved in your browser.
Can I play it on my phone?
Yes. Same controls: hold, pull and release with your finger. I played on a computer.
Can I turn off the blood?
Yes. In Settings, switch Slash from Blood to Ink and the cuts turn into dark splashes.
Little Ninja Dash pros and cons
Ready to cut some straw hats?
My record is one finished stage, one star and a messy fight with a wall. Open Little Ninja Dash here on Polar Games, play right in your browser and try to finish First Cut in under 2:15. Shouldn't be hard.