Naruto: Ultimate Ninja 3

Naruto: Ultimate Ninja 3, known in Japan as, is the third instalment of the fighting game series Naruto: Ultimate Ninja released for the Playstation 2.

Gameplay
The game has roughly 42 characters. It features a new story mode, more manoeuvrability for characters, and a much larger variety of music.

Naruto: Ultimate Ninja 3 also offers a different sort of story mode from Ultimate Ninja 2. This is called the Hero's History. It replays every major fight from the beginning of the series (Naruto vs. Kakashi-the training), to the end of Part I (Naruto vs. Sasuke-the final battle). Although it skips a lot of dialogue and transition scenes (scenes such as the Chūnin Exams preliminaries and most of the cut-scenes that one grew accustomed to in UN 2) are completely gone. It's a good way to get 'quick action' in the game for those who get bored easily of the endless tirade of cut-scenes in UN 2, and it is a good way to get a lot of unlockable characters.

Another interesting feature is called the Ultimate Path (Ultimate Contest in English version). This is an RPG style part of the game, which allows you to go on missions and unlock several characters, as well as learn different technique. Before the player can do this, however, the player have to enter into a tournament in which the player need to defeat many characters in order to get their crystals. After this is done, the player can roam freely and level up different characters which the player have unlocked.

Playable Characters
Parenthesis indicate character's Awakening Mode or Summoning Mode.

Trivia

 * There was an OVA of this game's crystal competition mode used to help promote the game.
 * In a fight, if the player plays as Anko with Orochimaru as the opponent, she will go into Stage 1 of Cursed Seal of Heaven if using her Ultimate Jutsu, Twin Snakes Mutual Death Technique, is successful.
 * Have a saved game from Naruto: Ultimate Ninja 2 on the memory card to when starting a new game, a confirmation message will appear on the blank screen just before the loading screen and main menu appears, stating that the player have earned 607 Ninja Info Cards and 50,000 ryō.
 * Minato (labelled the Yellow Flash in the game) is the only playable character that does not have a voice in this game.
 * During one of Sasuke's Ultimate Jutsus called "Falcon Drop", he does a four punch combo that finishes with a kick that sends the opponent flipping backwards. This actually was based off of what Naruto did to Sasuke in the anime during the Final Valley fight, and would also be later on slightly modified to be used in one of Part I Naruto's combos in the Naruto Storm series.