Shinobi: Art of Vengeance (Hardcore) NG Full Run NO DEATH

Guess am I a certified Shinobi now...? Done on 03/06/2026 and uploaded June 15 Twitch VOD:   / 2787668847   Since the DLC came out, that brought me back to this amazing game. Besides the new levels, the new hardcore mode alone kept me locked in real good. And here's the result - I finally managed to beat the whole Story Mode (+ DLC levels) without dying at all in one session started by a fresh save file (new game), which took 4 hours. This game is long, so eventually I had to take a break for few minutes after the ENE corp stage. Through A TON of practice, attempts, and fails - I developed my optimal strats for the most of fights, including bosses. I was focused to finish the story mode and not die, so I skipped the elite squads, ankou rifts or anything that is optional HOWEVER I still have been collecting oboro relics and bit of backtracking to get the upgrades I really needed, such as health/kunai boosts, extra ninpo cells, and wind slash amulet. This was played on Shinobi difficulty (Hardcore) without assist options. And on top of that, I played the game with some of the restrictions: Even though the Shield and Berserker amulets you get almost at the end of the game - I've used none of them at all as I'm considering them too OP. Because of how "free" fast traveling is, you can basically cheese the "No Death" challenge run when you're on an unskippable fight and one hit from dying, you can still use fast traveling to restore hp/kunais and retry the same fight over and over until you win. I don't find it being a challenge or fun at all like that. So I've used fast traveling when I needed to get an item in some rooms, sometimes to fill up ninpo cells on free rooms, or just generally to move faster between the screens. So my restriction about fast traveling in this run is simple: Using fast traveling to restore stuff and/or move to a specific checkpoint is still fine but only when you can move the screen naturally. No fast traveling on an unskippable enemy / boss rooms. This way, you really have to play carefully when you're in a fight and there's no way back, and enemies take half of your hp with one or two attacks. You're definitely gonna need to master the bosses to play with these restrictions, because one failure gonna cost dearly and the frustration you'll get from a death will be no less when you're on later stages. Imagine you got to the Eggman fight (nearly the end game) just to die in its first seconds because he gave you bad rng with these dark energy balls. And I had that too. Fortunately, he was nice in this run, but you still have to be ready for when he uses dark balls and keep at least one or two ninpo cells for water ninpo just to get iframes when you feel like you won't dodge it. Btw you also get iframes from ninjutsu animation if that helps. A little breakdown for my fighting style for this challenge: Ninpo: My set was pretty much the same for the entire game - Wind Slash (often combined with the amulet) for a damage; Bomb to break armor; Water for safety; Thunder for execution and extend combos but I probably used it the least just because I have better options for execution chains (kunais) Amulet: For passive amulets, depending on situations I've been using either Piercing Kunai for execution chains or Wind Sculptor for a good damage - often against bosses; for combo amulets is Power Booster for the most part really, and a very little of Rage Regenerator on end game stages. Ninjutsu: I find Karyu and Shisui ones to be the most optimal, the other two isn't worth it tbh. I've been using Karyu A LOT and Shisui only once if I recall. Timestamps: 0:00 - Start 0:40 - Oboro Village 13:00 - Kozaru Boss 14:43 - The Chase 17:40 - Lantern Festival 29:30 - Arachno Tank Boss 31:08 - The Mountain 48:18 - Mandara Boss 50:18 - Tragic sequence... 51:07 - Neo City 1:05:04 - Kijima Boss 1:07:13 - Backtracking to get wind slash amulet 1:08:26 - Fish Market 1:24:44 - Octostar Boss 1:27:23 - Submarine Base 1:42:15 - Chiyo Boss 1:44:27 - One more backtracking to get upgrades 1:47:04 - Riptide 1:50:18 - The Desert 2:10:21 - Beastmaster Boss 2:11:59 - Mad Train 2:19:30 - ENE Corp Lab 2:35:24 - The Twins Boss 2:37:10 - Brb... 2:43:23 - The Kaiju 2:59:40 - Tenval's Heart Boss 3:01:07 - The Assault 3:09:17 - Kijima 2 Boss 3:11:52 - Ruse's Limbo 3:15:46 - Lord Ruse 1 3:17:57 - Lord Ruse 2 3:19:50 - City Streets 3:32:06 - The Mad Dog 3:40:42 - Goro Majima Boss 3:42:40 - Eternal War 3:53:18 - The Warlord 4:00:07 - Death Adder Boss 4:02:08 - Egg Zone 4:06:58 - Eggman Boss 4:07:50 - Gotta fill up ninpo cells before the final boss 4:09:12 - Eggman 2 Boss 4:10:58 - VICTORY!!! Streamed on Twitch:   / red_fire257   #shinobi #sega #nodeathchallenge