VGChartz's Evan Norris: "Ninja Usagimaru is the definition of a sleeper: low price, niche genre, little to no fanfare. Well, consider this your wake up call. Fans of puzzle platformers will find in Usagimaru a hidden gem with a healthy amount of content and some truly devilish puzzles. The graphics are humble and the story undercooked, but in terms of puzzle design and art direction, Usagimaru is a clear winner."
Like its predecessor, Ninja Usagimaru: The Mysterious Karakuri Castle is a simple, but difficult game that leaves little margin for error. Each room contains a puzzle that must be completed in a specific way, and deviating from that formula will trap the player. When this happens, the level must be restarted from the beginning.
Chalgyr's Game Room writes:
Ninja Usagimaru: The Karakuri Castle is a cute little 2D puzzle platformer for the 3DS. For those unaware, karakuri means “trick’, or “mechanism”, often used to refer to karakuri puppets, which were made using gears and mechanisms in order to perform gestures that would entertain people. The basic premise of Ninja Usagimaru is that you are a ninja returning to your village of apparent bunny people, when the local deity informs you that the villagers have all been kidnapped by various mythological Japanese creatures. Now it is up to you to go rescue them, with a little assistance from the aforementioned rabbit god.
Justin checks out this puzzle game with a ridiculously long name.
