Those who know the name 'Cave' will associate it with its bone-crushing bullet hell shooter catalogue – produced strictly for only the most devout otaku and sadomasochists alive. Cave generally likes to be tough by nature, but now the Japanese developer is looking to tread safer ground with the release of Xbox Live Arcade title Nin2-Jump, a game concerned with simple platforming and score-beating, rather than manic bullet hell madness.

The game is a straight-forward affair of jumping from ledge to ledge, collecting items along the way and avoiding a cast of bothersome monsters that pursue you at every tightly-spaced turn. At first, playing on the defensive is key, forcing you into dodging each invading enemy that creepily hovers in obstruction of your path. Later on, however, you're able to fight back and considerably speed up the action. Not only is the switch from avoiding to attacking a lot more fun, but it also introduces a combo system that encourages chaining together attacks in order to increase your score multiplier. Whilst this system is never expanded upon greatly, its simplicity does make the most over-bearing of situations seem somewhat manageable if you're paying close enough attention.

Notwithstanding the problem of trial and error that arises from time to time, the vast majority of stages are sadly devoid of any significant challenge at all – only the last few stages of the 50 present in the game test for any cerebral application of the skills learned. The end of each world is also punctuated with pattern-heavy boss battles that are fairly unremarkable thanks to their reliance on cheap, screen-filling attacks and often unfairly timed movements.

Although many of the traits of Cave's traditional offerings have been left to the wayside, Nin2-Jump still brings forth all of the expected Japanese influence that helps to create its own unique imagery. The visual style is like that of a storybook and is represented as the projection of a child's whimsical imagination. Amusingly crude shadow puppets of ninjas and monsters bob up and down the colourful backdrops as a row of silhouetted kids excitedly cheer in unison at the bottom of the screen. It's charming if nothing else, especially when your character – the aptly named 'Ninja' – suffers a brutal and horrific decapitation when things go awry. Granted, some may find the seemingly kid-friendly vibe to be poorly offset by these sudden images of Ninja's gushing red blood, but it's the kind of cartoon violence that is more playful than it is offensive.

The main attraction of Nin2-Jump is a brief stint through the adventure mode, which can easily be run through in a single sitting. For those so inclined, leaderboards are also supported for both the adventure and score attacks modes, ensuring that even the most ardent of speed-runners will feel right at home with the game's emphasis on getting through each stage as quickly and as unscathed as possible. I personally felt no strong desire to return the game after hitting the end point, but the constant layering of new abilities per world made the journey there interesting enough to still be enjoyable.

As a competently made yet limited platformer, Nin2-Jump is a blue collar experience at best. Its distinctive art style carries enough of the platforming's dead weight to remain satisfying in spite of the main's game brevity. But, seeing as how it is reasonably priced at 400 Microsoft Points and all of the proceeds go towards Japanese disaster recovery, it's still pretty easy to endorse Nin2-Jump, and commend Cave for donating so generously.