Just in case the last one was too traditional for all you bedsit bloggers out there in tedium-land.

OF BLOCKS AND COUNTER MEASURES: A JOURNEY THROUGH NINJA GAIDEN (AND OUT THE OTHER SIDE AGAIN)
By Michael Zorg

A guard emerges from the shadows and slaps me in the face.

"Are you MAN enough?" he offers, roughly.

"Yes" I reply.

"NOT GOOD ENOUGH" he yells back, slapping me again. "Are you MAN enough to take any more?"

There was no way I would talk. He could slap me all he wanted. I had learned the importance of blocking and there was no way he could hurt me now. The secrets of my clan, the Hyabusa clan, would die with me if there was no other way.

"Tell me what you know about the Dark Dragon Blade"

"I know nothing"

I could see the anger building within him. He was almost at Master Ninja level, which would mean his slaps would get even harder and some I wouldn't be able to block at all.

"Your family knows about the Dragon Blade... YOU know about the Dragon Blade. TELL ME NOW or I burn the village!"

He could burn the village and I still wouldn't say. I knew from the high-resolution cut-scenes that ran at 50 frames a second that Ayane was safe. He could burn the village for all I cared.

He slapped me again. And again I managed to block, cleverly absorbing some of the essence his attack left behind to restore my health a little.

"TELL ME!"

It was a torturous time, just like Raskolnikov's journey through insanity in Fyodor Dostoevsky's fantastic novel Crime and Punishment, which I read all of at university.

My beatings went on for some 15 days (levels), with his slaps (by this I mean the game) getting harder each time but also being more satisfying to block (complete).

The graphics and gameplay are also great. 10/10.