While Ninjala isn’t quite a household name like Fortnite, the free-to-play multiplayer title on Nintendo Switch has reached two impressive milestones recently: it’s been downloaded seven million times from the Nintendo Switch eShop, and it’s just celebrated its first anniversary.
With its vibrant visuals, melee-focused combat and some noteworthy collaborations that would make other franchises teem with jealousy, Ninjala has established itself as one of the most popular online titles on Switch – no easy feat considering Nintendo’s console isn’t really a hotbed of competitive multiplayer gaming and that Ninjala is a brand-new IP.
But what does the future hold for a game that sees you play as bubble-gum blowing ninjas? In an exclusive interview with TechRadar, we spoke to GungHo President and CEO Kazuki Morishita and Ninjala Director Motoki Kaneda about Ninjala’s plans moving forward, why collaborations work so well within the game, and whether the company considers Ninjala a success.
Pon pon pon
Collaborations have become commonplace in the gaming industry, and while historically they’ve involved crossovers with other games, we’re now seeing music stars, anime and even real life footballers like Son Hueng-Min enter the gaming space for the very first time.
Ninjala has managed to attract some marquee names for collaborations, such as the J-Pop sensation Kyary Pamyu Pamyu and the popular anime Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, but what can fans expect to see next?
“We’re planning many more collaborations that will surprise our players,” says Morishita-san. “For selecting collabs, we mainly collaborate with IPs that we personally like. From those IPs, we carefully choose the ones that we think our players would also enjoy. We then check for the best timing on when to collaborate with that IP.”
Ninjala’s crossovers have certainly been diverse, and Morishita-san believes that Ninjala’s mix of a fictional world and modern era is advantageous in bringing more collaborations to life. “We can collaborate with pretty much anything,” Morishita-san explains.
An effective free-to-play formula
In-game events and themes are important at not only retaining players but attracting new ones to free-to-play titles like Ninjala. But unlike some Nintendo Switch games, Ninjala is truly free-to-play as it doesn’t require a Nintendo Switch Online membership, something which Morishita-san believes could have added to the game’s appeal.
“That may be a factor, but as it is a PvP game, we wanted as many people to play without any obstacles as possible. Having it [Ninjala] free-to-play was good for us and for the players,” says Morishita-san.
Seven million downloads and counting
Most people would consider seven million downloads for a brand-new IP a success, but Morishita-san is admirably reluctant to brand Ninjala a homerun just yet.
“We can’t say for sure that Ninjala’s been successful at this time, but we’re happy to celebrate our first anniversary and continue to gain active players,” Morishita-san says. “I believe that we’ll be able to say that Ninjala is a success after we grow and develop the IP in different forms and it becomes a game that’s loved by many players for a long period of time.”
We’ve already seen Ninjala branch out into media forms beyond the game, including an anime series on YouTube which portrayed the background of each in-game character. And it sounds like we could see more spin-offs like this in the future.
“The 3DCG anime that we created shows the events and conspiracies that arise in the world of Ninjala,” Morishita-san says. “We plan to actively expand this new side of the story through various forms of media.”
Now more than ever, it’s the community behind a game that can dictate how successful it can be in the years to come. The good news is that GungHo is actively listening to fans of Ninjala as the team will be implementing one of the most highly requested features soon: voice chat support.
“We’ve received many requests from our players, and we plan to implement voice chat soon. We’ll share more details once everything is confirmed,” says Morishita-san.
Morishita-san wants the Ninjala community to “continue to send us feedback” and reassures fans that GungHo is working hard to “fulfill as many requests as possible”, something which Kaneda-san says is in effect by delivering on voice chat support.
“As mentioned earlier, we receive many requests about voice chat support, and it’s scheduled to be implemented in a future update,” explains Kaneda-san. “We also receive quite a lot of requests about playing Featured Battles in Room Battles or implementing a Visual Lobby.”
The key takeaway is, then, that Ninjala’s community is being heard and the development team is doing everything it can to facilitate the most popular requests where possible.
What does the team at GungHo think of the Nintendo Switch OLED?
The Nintendo Switch OLED might not have ticked all the boxes that some players were hoping for, but one new addition will have caught the attention of online competitive players: a dedicated LAN connection port. And it hasn’t gone unnoticed by the devs at Ninjala, who also believe the OLED display will make Ninjala look even better when played in handheld mode.
“The new LAN connection port is great, since it provides a more direct connection. But above all, the bigger screen will make the vivid colors in Ninjala look even more beautiful. I will definitely want one for myself,” admitted Morishita-san.
Gumball machine
Ninjala seems like it has a bright future ahead, then, but fans will have to wait and see exactly what’s next. The good news is that it sounds like GungHo has a lot of exciting things in the works.
“We have so many things that I’d like to share, but for now I can only say that we’ll continue to release more updates with new ways to play and experience Ninjala,” says Morishita-san. “We’ll also have many more collabs, so please look forward to them.”
Ninjala is available to download for free from the Nintendo Switch eShop.