You know, there’s such a thing as trying too hard, and Madbricks’ Mexican Ninja walks a pretty thin line between being tongue-in-cheek funny and being a little obnoxious. It’s humour is hardly subtle, with bosses like “Crack Panda”, and a reliance on “beans make you fart” jokes, and I can’t honestly tell whether it pulls it off or not. Luckily, it’s quite fun to play, so it might not ultimately matter that much.
It takes place in Nuevo-Tokyo, a city in which the Narcos and Yakuza have joined forces and taken over as the Narcuza, though you’ll fight as many enemies in flying tanks or that resemble huge mutated animals as gangsters. It’s all so deliberately, knowingly daft, and if you’re the sort of person who likes that madcap, over-the-top humour you’ll have a ball. I found some of it amusing, and some it a little exhausting, but you can’t fault that Madbricks have picked a path and fully committed to it.
Mexican Ninja is a side-scrolling roguelite beat-em-up that mixes Streets of Rage combat with roguelite progression. Each run in the demo begins with you selecting two abilities from a pair of shrines before heading into one of two functionally identical stages, whereupon you’ll be attacked from multiple angles by a variety of enemies. Combat feels decent and punchy, but I found it hard to dodge enemy attacks sometimes, and there’s something off about the damage feedback.
For example, any time I found myself smacking more than a couple of enemies at once, one of them would always manage to sneak an attack through that I couldn’t see coming. Maybe that’s a skill issue, and I did play a lot of the demo on the Steam Deck, but it was still a little annoying.
You’re so weak and slow at the start of a run, and it takes some time to accrue enough money to upgrade yourself to a noticeable degree. With no block or parry you can only dodge, which doesn’t always feel good in a 2.5D environment or when surrounded by enemies with quicker reflexes than you.
With such a small sample to get one with, it’s hard to say whether or not Mexican Ninja will do enough to stand out in a crowded genre. Its blend of silly humour and colourful graphics will make it an instant crowd-pleaser from outside, but it needs a little work where the combat balance is concerned if it wants to truly make the cut.
Mexican Ninja is developed by Madbricks and published by Amber Studios, and is due for release in 2026 on PC. You can download the demo on Steam now.