Naruto Shippūden: Ultimate Ninja 4

Naruto Shippūden: Ultimate Ninja 4, known in Japan as, is the fourth installment in the Naruto: Ultimate Ninja (Narutimate Hero) series, and the first in the Accel game series. The game was released on April 5, 2007 in Japan and on March 24, 2009 in North America for the Playstation 2. It was released on May 1, 2009 in Europe and May 7, 2009 in Australia. It is the last of the Playstation 2 Naruto games in North-America (Due to Ultimate Ninja 5 not being realesed on North-America).

In addition to elements that were established in previous Ultimate Ninja games, Ultimate Ninja 4 offers several new aspects to combat. When two opponents clash, they will begin a series of high-speed attacks, appearing as a pair of blurs flashing across the stage. The winner is determined by a game similar to that of Rock, Paper, Scissors. There is also the addition of "Awakening Jutsu". When certain conditions are met, a character may trigger their Awakening Jutsu. These techniques are more powerful than the standard Ultimate Jutsu and, as the name implies, "awakens" a character's powers (i.e. Naruto's tailed fox form, after which he is surrounded by the fox's red chakra).

The game features a "Master Mode", an RPG-like mode that takes place before the storyline of Naruto Shippūden. In this mode, players are able to experience the main Shippūden story, but before that they must complete an original storyline called The Black Shadow. The storyline is fairly long, and at the end of it they have to defeat the Black Shadow himself to move onto the main Shippūden storyline. The Shippūden plotline in this game ends halfway through the Rescue Gaara arc (approximately up to Episode 17 of the Shippūden anime), after which it moves onto a free mode where you can complete various missions and tasks, and can also look for tokens called Pieces of Memory, which are needed to unlock Hero Mode fights and cutscenes.

Playable characters
Some characters are playable in both their pre- and post-timeskip forms. All characters have one or more different forms, such as cursed seals, that can be activated when special conditions are met.


 * Naruto Uzumaki (timeskip, demon fox)
 * Sakura Haruno (timeskip)
 * Kakashi Hatake
 * Shikamaru Nara (timeskip)
 * Rock Lee (timeskip, drunk)
 * Neji Hyūga (timeskip)
 * Tenten (timeskip)
 * Might Guy
 * Gaara (timeskip, Shukaku)
 * Kankurō (timeskip)
 * Temari (timeskip)
 * Chiyo
 * Itachi Uchiha
 * Kisame Hoshigaki
 * Deidara
 * Sasori
 * Jiraiya
 * Tsunade
 * Sasuke Uchiha (cursed seal)
 * Hinata Hyūga
 * Chōji Akimichi (Super)
 * Ino Yamanaka
 * Kiba Inuzuka
 * Shino Aburame
 * Shizune
 * Konohamaru Ninja Squad
 * Hanabi Hyūga
 * Asuma Sarutobi
 * Kurenai Yuhi
 * Anko Mitarashi (cursed seal (only when fighting Orochimaru))
 * The First Hokage
 * The Second Hokage
 * The Third Hokage
 * The Yellow Flash
 * Orochimaru
 * Kabuto Yakushi
 * Kimimaro (cursed seal)
 * Sakon (cursed seal)
 * Tayuya (cursed seal)
 * Kidōmaru (cursed seal)
 * Jirōbō (cursed seal)
 * Zabuza Momochi
 * Haku

Game-only characters

 * is the first boss in Master Mode, and is a giant wolf-like monster with five eyes, two snouts and six legs. It only talks in Katakana in the Japanese version.
 * , a young girl. In order to heal her terminally ill mother, Aoi becomes a human sacrifice to the Black Shadow, but actually went to kill the demon so that she could retrieve a leaf from the Tree of Life that would be able to heal her mother.
 * , Aoi's mother. She was dying of an incurable illness before Naruto and her daughter, Aoi, saved her by obtaining a leaf from the Tree of Life.