Others try to achieve Ultimate Ninja Storm's scale but miss out on what made it fun – think of how the One Punch Man game's city felt so pointless. Some do it well – like how Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot added RPG elements to decent success. Meanwhile, the success of Ultimate Ninja Storm seems to have inspired every other anime game to do the same. I really just did not want to re-live the Genin days. I thought the Boruto movie was charming but couldn't get into the series. I was also thrilled to have all of Konoha to jump around in. On the gameplay front, the squad-based arena battles were a revelation and felt like a refreshing break from the normal 2D fighter. And it was a treat to see how the games rendered new characters, transformations, and attacks as they were revealed in the story. Story-wise, each subsequent release mostly kept up with where I was in the anime/manga. And the Ultimate Ninja Storm games were a big part of it.