Instant awesome, just add... tanuki? Really?
- The (unnamed) Demon: Hahaha! I'm gonna dominate the world!
The (unnamed) Brother Tanuki: In your dreams!
[cue opening credits] - also what plot?
Tanuki Justice is a retraux action game designed based on arcade Run-and-Gun-style platformers from the past, released for the Nintendo Switch in 2021.
In an alternate version of Meiji-era Japan populated by andromorphic animals, an unnamed demon who wants to Take Over the World (how original) have unleashed his army into terrorizing the populace. It's up to the heroes, a pair of tanuki ninja siblings, to stop him.
Interestingly, this isn't the only video game with a tanuki ninja protagonist. Somehow.
Tanuki Justice contain examples of:
- 1-Up: Extra lives can be collected occasionally in-game, though they're usually well-hidden until you reveal them by throwing shurikens on certain targets. They are represented by a small blue-and-white icon of your character.
- Airborne Mooks: Giant birds are among the enemies you can encounter, from crows in the jungle to eagles near the waterfall, the latter capable of shooting their feathers like darts as a ranged attack.
- Amazing Technicolor Wildlife: Oh yes.
- For starters, the player 2 character and the sister of the heroic tanuki siblings is a pink tanuki.
- You fight a Dual Boss pair of proboscis monkey which are colored green and yellow. Meanwhile the lesser proboscis monkey mooks you battle early in the level are (correctly) white.
- You don't see many pink-feathered eagles in games, either.
- Battle Aura: When your power level hits maximum after you achieved a number of combos, your character will emit a fiery flaming aura onscreen while your attack power doubles. It usually lasts only for a few seconds, though.
- Brother–Sister Team: The main characters are a pair of tanuki siblings, one of each gender, battling the forces of evil. It's more pronounced in two player co-op mode.
- Climbing Climax: The third stage have you climbing upwards a waterfall by leaping from one platform to another, while avoiding falling objects, flying fishes popping out the water and other hazards before you reach it's very top to battle the giant tortoise boss.
- Creepy Centipedes: The boss of the graveyard level is a gigantic red centipede demon who attacks by popping in and out of the ground, and can even perform a Detachment Combat by separating it's head from the body while shooting projectiles from it's neck stump!
- Double Jump: You gain this ability by default, and can jump while in mid-air to reach ledges. It comes really handy in one level where you must climb a waterfall.
- Fighting Panda: Panda ninjas are another enemy in the game, one of them even serving as a boss who's a Mirror Match against you.
- Flying Face: This game have flying demon masks and flaming skulls as enemies which drains your life with a single touch, but are otherwise weak enough to be killed in one hit. The latter does have a Giant Mook version that soaks up plenty of hits though.
- Flying Seafood Special: Flying fishes are another hazard in the waterfall climbing stage.
- Gashadokuro: You encounter gigantic skeleton enemies who fling bone projectiles, two at a time, while making your way through the graveyard stage.
- Giant Mook: The game have a few larger-than-usual mook-level enemies showing up, that requires multiple hits before they go down. Including purple-skinned Minotaurs, humongous Gashadokuro foes, and flaming skeletal heads even larger than you (who's often accompanied by their smaller, regular mook counterparts).
- Kappa: While crossing bridges or on platforms above water, you'll be attacked by kappa enemies who pounces up from below.
- Maniac Monkeys: The second stage is set in a bamboo forest swarming with hostile Japanese proboscis monkeys who attacks in large numbers. Much of the level have you leaping around platforms on treetops while being assailed by these simians, and at the stage's end you fight a Dual Boss King Mook consisting of two gigantic monkey enemies.
- Mega Neko: The first boss is an andromorphic cat Magic Knight who attacks by creating energy projectiles shaped like ghostly cat-heads.
- Mirror Match: While most of the bosses are larger than you (in the case of the giant turtle, a kaiju taking up more than half the arena), near the end you fight the Panda Ninja boss, who's the same size as your tanuki protagonist, and spams shuriken projectiles just like you.
- Ninja: The most common and basic enemy type, by default. They appear to be tanukis as well, like your player characters.
- Our Minotaurs Are Different: Purple-skinned Minotaurs appears occasionally as enemies, who can deliver a Shockwave Stomp sending a row of ground explosions you need to jump over to avoid damage.
- Power Floats: The Demon Lord in his first form floats all over the place while summoning pillars of flames from the ground as an attack.
- Run or Die: When the big Sand Worm suddenly pops out at the start of the third level? Jump down the hole and keep going down. Or else.
- Samurai: Andromorphic dog samurai enemies appears early in the game as one fo the first enemies that takes multiple hits to kill. They also have the ability to launch Sword Beams with their katana.
- Sand Worm: The third level, set in an underground cavern, begins with a gigantic sandworm (whose lead literally takes up half the screen!) trying to devour you as you escape down a hole. You face smaller sandworms after escaping the big one (implied to be offsprings of the first), but while they're content with minding their own business without attacking you, they're still immune to all your attacks.
- Sequential Boss: The unnamed Demon Lord who leads the forces of evil, serving as the Final Boss, first fights you in a humanoid form (albeit one who can float all over the place and cast attacking spells). Defeat him and... you enter another realm where the Demon Lord returns as a gigantic serpentine monster who can summon projectiles from above and below you. The second stage doesn't have floors either, containing only widely-spaced platforms and you die instantly by missing a step.
- Spread Shot: You can collect a power-up that turn your flung shuriken projectiles into spreads of three or more at a time. Aside that, yellow ninja enemies are the only ones who can throw projectiles in a spread.
- Tanuki: Your characters are a pair of andromorphic tanuki siblings fighting the forces of evil. The title kind of spells it out though.
- Tengu: A winged tengu shows up halfway in the second stage as a Mini-Boss, attacking with his ability to summon tornadoes from the ground as he glides all over the place. However he goes down in just a handful of shuriken hits.
- The tanukis are back on the road for more justice...
