XBOX-HQ.COM - Master Ninja Tourney : 1st Round Controversy

Master Ninja tourney mired in controversy. The crooked figure skating judge at the 2002 Olympics, a woman golfer wanting in the PGA tour - what's good competition without a little controversy?

The first round of the Ninja Gaiden Master Ninja Tournament is officially over, and ninja masters are fuming. Players who connected Ninja Gaiden to Xbox Live were able to upload their best scores in a chance to win a trip to the Master Ninja finals in Europe, but in a public relations snafu, the tournament posted rules just 10 days prior to the end of the First round. Many were shocked to read that only the top three scorers would advance to the second round; most believed the top one hundred scores would qualify.

Hardcore contestants like Scott Mann, also know as Windersquall, felt cheated. "there is simply no way for me to play through it again by the deadline and post a top three score," he lamented on Tecmo's official forum. "A bittersweet end to something I have spent 260 hours of playtime practicing for."

And the controversy doesn't end there. Just days before the end of the first round, 22 year-old Ryan Martoni - who goes by the handle Taibhse - uploaded a backbreaking score of 26,819,978 sending the Ninja Gaiden community ito a tizzy. "My theory is that he hooked his Xbox hard drive up to a PC and edited the save file," snapped Gaiden fan Snapdragon, who challenged Martoni to explain how he achieved such an unbelievable score. Martoni so far has divulged little insight into his play strategy, claiming that he isn't even sure himself how he tallied 26 million points.

"I wasn't even paying attention to my score until about Chapter 12 when I slipped and hit the white button," Martoni professed, who logged 56 hours on the game, a relatively modest hour count. Meanwhile, other top ranking players spent hundreds of hours choreographing near-perfect runs. Many suspect both Martoni and the Microsoft-sponsored tournament to be a sham.

Shortly after the end of round one, a few planned changes to the tournament came to light -though they're unlikely to curb any resentment amongst the Ninja Gaiden elite. The finals, originally scheduled to take place at M$'s X04 event in cannes, have been relocated to the Tokyo Game Show in Septemeber, a better-attended and high profile even. Finalists - possibly more than three - will compete, and a winner will be crowned on the site at a press event. A new environment and enemies exclusive to the tournament are also said to be in teh works for the second and third rounds, which are slated to include more prizes than before, and many even be opened up to the public, although this information could not be confirmed by Tecmo at the release of this story.

But back here in the present, resentment still abounds. "this was one of the worst-run videogame tournaments I've ever seen," Snapdragon said, who plans to cmpete anew in round two starting on July 12.More info at: http://www.xbox.com/en-us/ninjagaiden/masterninjatournament.htm