Ninja Gaiden Hurricane Pack 2 released

With the Tokyo Game Show closed and the Master Ninja Tournament presumably over (who won?), Tecmo has released the second Hurricane Pack of downloadable content for Ninja Gaiden via Xbox Live.

Free to owners of the original game, this is the content that the absolute cream of the Ninja crop were tackling in the final rounds of the Master Ninja Tournament, and by all accounts it's tougher than a granite Roy Keane, despite stocking you up with fearsome tools right from the get-go.

Here Ryu begins equipped with weapons and moves from the latter stages of the game, and early shopkeepers are stocked with powerful armlets and other items, which you'll need, because the weight of the challenge is multiplied and intensified to the extent that we've yet to encounter anyone who can beat Hurricane Pack Volume 2.

Split into various phases, it's challenge after foe-infested challenge, and many of your enemies - the focus of this pack - are either new or fight you in increasingly elaborate ways. Some reverse your attacks, and some are so frenzied that you'll have to endure slowdown to see more than a handful of them.

In other words, it's not for the faint of heart, and certainly not for anybody who gave up on Ninja Gaiden before the end. For anybody who fancies roughing themselves up some more though, you should be able to get hold of it on Live right now, and in addition to all we've mentioned there are some graphical and musical tweaks to take in, and of course the various changes included in Hurricane Pack Vol. 1, like a tweaked camera.

Oh, and if anybody manages to complete it, feel free to pop in here and gloat. You deserve it.