page_title: Rachel (Ninja Gaiden)
section_title: Design, gameplay and promotion
hierarchical_section_title: Rachel (Ninja Gaiden) / Design, gameplay and promotion
caption_attribution_description: English: Offiical cosplayers of the Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 characters for Tecmo Koei.
context_page_description: Rachel is fictional character from the Ninja Gaiden series of video games by Team Ninja and Tecmo. She was introduced in the 2004 action game Ninja Gaiden, where she is a demon/human hybrid who serves as a supporting non-playable character and an ally of the protagonist Ryu Hayabusa. Rachel is playable in Ninja Gaiden Sigma and Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, as well as in Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate, Dead or Alive 5 Last Round, and Dead or Alive 6, and as a guest character in Musou Orochi 2 Special and Warriors Orochi 3 Hyper. The character has been mostly well received, especially noted for her sex appeal.
context_section_description: Team Ninja's Yosuke Hayashi said that when they "were designing new features for Ninja Gaiden Sigma based on feedback from users, the number one request was - make Rachel playable!" This happened even despite the original director and Team Ninja's first boss Tomonobu Itagaki's stance against making Rachel, and the female characters in general, playable in Ninja Gaiden, which was carried into Ninja Gaiden Black and the original Ninja Gaiden II. He also said in 2007: "Obviously, we love the character Rachel, and within the Ninja Gaiden world she plays a really important part, and I'm glad that she's as popular as she is." In 2009, Yosuke called her "a very important part of Team Ninja's games, now and in the future." Dead or Alive 6 director and producer Yohei Shimbori said he is "personally keen" to include Rachel as DLC in this game. Eventually, Rachel was announced to be part of Season 3 Pass DLC.
  Regarding the process of turning Rachel into a playable character for Ninja Gaiden Sigma, Hayashi (who directed the game), stated: "As you know our goal with [Ryu] Hayabusa is to make the coolest action game character. So what we're saying now is that if Hayabusa is the coolest male action-game character, and the best-controlling, fastest action-game character, then let's make Rachel the best female action-game character. As you know, there are other action games coming out for PS3 with female lead characters, but I can guarantee you that Rachel is going to kick their asses. We've tweaked everything so that she plays differently than Hayabusa, but is still fast and controllable and feels—I don't have a better way to put it—female. Her actions aren't as calculated and aren't as efficient as Hayabusa's. She has a certain elegance to her that's explicitly female, and so just going in there and playing with her and seeing how she controls, it's obvious that we're going to have a really great character on our hands." A female motion capture actor was employed to create the character's movement. Sigma 2 animation director Sosuke Wakamatsu said they wanted Rachel to be "sexy and powerful".
  In Ninja Gaiden Sigma, she is playable for about 20% of the game in her own extra missions, including one in the demo version of the game, Rachel is controlled in a similar way as Ryu but has different attacks and animations and wields the Great Hammer, a powerful weapon designed to eliminate fiends. She can also use a grappling weapon resembling Scorpion's projectile and Link's hookshot, and use sorcery to create a powerful shockwave. The player is able to customize the character's defensive and offensive capabilities by swapping her earrings, which works in similar way as with Ryu's amulets. The game also allows the player to change Rachel's unlockable hairstyles, including long- and short-haired brunette options. Downloadable content (DLC) for Sigma includes a set of survival mode missions called "Rachel Master" and coming with an additional hairstyle. Her addition was the most publicized new feature in the game. In Ninja Gaiden Sigma Plus, Rachel gains several alternate costumes, such as a business suit.
  In Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, she is also a playable character, wearing the same "S&M-style leather outfit" as she did in the original version of the first game as well as some new alternate costumes available via DLC and in Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 Plus, including one as part of GameStop's pre-order bonuses. She is also available in the multiplayer co-op modes, including self-contained "Team Missions" with their own rules. GamesRadar described this "deadly dominatrix" as "a berserker-style character, the most destructive of all three" alternative playable characters (her, Ayane and Momiji), in part to her "stupidly powerful machine-gun." As in the case of other female characters in the game, Rachel's bust answers to the motion sensing Sixaxis controller.
  
  In Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate/Last Round, Rachel is a heavyweight power-type fighter of a weight class is similar to that of Leon's. Her fighting style is also reminiscent of Spartan-458's in Dead or Al
caption: Rachel's and Momiji's models at Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 E3 2009 exposition
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