Never Surrender is the new Nick.com game. I am not much of a gamer but I got really into the Super Samurai game, I am not so crazy about the previous Samurai game. So I decided to try this one out.
Unlike the Super Samurai game, you can have two Rangers at once but you only get to play one. You select your Ranger and then you have to select your partner. Once you accumulate cards and pass a level, you get more cards for your Ranger. So far there is 3 cards per Ranger.
I forget how many levels there are, I think it is 5. Unlike Super Samurai game, you don't get to pick the level. Also you can't pick Easy or Hard. Each level just gets harder. This is a detergent for my grand-nephew Jaiden as he is only 3 and looses a lot on the harder levels. And when you lose, it doesn't say "Game Over"---it says "Continue."
Up arrow makes you go up the screen. There is no things you have to jump except for in level one where you jump boulders. To jump press the Letter "Z." The green bar represents your life level. The Blue level represents the use of the "X" key. In Super Samurai, it was "Z" that had to be filled and it called your zords. So using X makes a dual attack between the two rangers. If you lose your partner, the X key is useless.
Your enemies are Green Loogies with axes, White Loogies with lasers and big giant Red Loogies with big axes. One bad thing is that you press "Spacebar" to attack but it alternates from your weapon to the Mega Blaster. Even when having the card of your weapon, you still have the Mega Blaster. There is no real way to keep one weapon. When you get close to an object or villain, your personal weapon appears. From far away shots and pressing Spacebar makes use of the Mega Blaster.
Pressing down on the Space Bar does call for the Mega Blaster. When you get a zord card, it just provides a strong blast from your Mega Blaster with an animal symbol. So the first card you can get is the weapon card, then the zord card and the final is dyanamic card, which costs the most points. When a villain goes down, you collect Gosei Morphers that provides points. Also you can pick up a "Health Box" to increase your green bar. Your partner can disappear after being beaten but there is no status bar to your partner and there is no way you can save them other than having your life bar up.
You can also smash things around like trash can, hot dog stand, newspaper bin and etc. to gain points.
It is hard to smash things when you use your zord card because it mostly calls your Mega Blaster. You don't call zords and the monsters don't become big, which my nephew does not like. He liked that part in the Super Samurai game. There is three main villains, one level doesn't have a main villain. There is Sacarba, the Monster of the Day of the first episode, Creepox and Vrax. Vrax appears on the last two levels. Vrax is hard to beat. You get a life bar of the villain to see but he doesn't really react and interact with you like the Loogies do. They just keep attacking.
Like Super Samurai, playing the Blue Ranger is hard for short range attacks because he has a bow. The Blue Samurai Ranger had a bow that was only good to shoot at villains for far away. Playing this Blue Ranger, the Bowgun up close to a villain doesn't pack much of a punch. Same goes for Pink's Phoenix Shot.
When you pass a level, you can enter the shop. Most of the time, you get around less than 2000 points and only can afford the cheaper cards. I do not know what happens yet if you get all the cards. When you get one card, it later says "Sold Out." If you don't have enough coins, it says that.
1000 points gets you a weapon card, a zord card is 1200 points and a Dynamic card is 2000 points. It is easier to get cards and things in this game than in Monkey Quest. I got an overload of the same color helmet or shirt but still haven't been able to get certain colors. Anyway, I digress. The dynamic card deals with an attack having to do with your weapon in some way.
All in all, it is a good effort game, but I don't like how your weapon alternates from where you are and some times its hard to gauge. I also don't like how you can't help your Partner ranger out. My nephew doesn't like that the monsters do not grow and you can't play the Megazords. He currently has a thing for Megazords. I do like that the duo attack called upon the "X" key has feathers in it, inspired by Goseiger---they were Gosei Angels.
UPDATED 2/25/13
Now they put a choice of Easy, Medium and Hard. Also, you can choose a new game. Plus, when you get the dynamic card, any Ranger you picked would have an Earth dust effect before. But now with Red and Pink, you get fire and Blue you get water. Black and Yellow Rangers gets black puffs of smoke now.
