This game is greater than the sum of its parts. Team Ninja understood the assignment with broadening nioh to a bigger audience and have crafted a very fun game, with a streamlined open world, classic-team-ninja-but-good story, and unsurprisingly, incredibly satisfying combat.
It’s nioh evolved at its base, with a splash of all of the team ninja classics (NG, SoP and wo long especially) and elements of bushido blade combat presentation, persona style character work, bioware style limited divergent story arcs, classic (often campy but generally endearing) JRPG storytelling and Ubisoft open world design.
This Frankenstein of a game works because it shamelessly steals the best aspects of so many titles that preceded it and executes them adequately. Team ninja also clearly emphasized respecting player time; so much of the gameplay has been distilled to prioritize fun or convenience. Load times are short, traversal options are fun and fast, little backtracking, no boss runs, etc. This isn't to say there aren't brutal boss fights or encounters to kick your teeth in; just that the game rightfully focuses on it's best parts (challenging fights and story beats) rather then tedium. They also have moved away from the oppressive and dark art direction of nioh and wo long, naturally, as they tackle a historically grounded setting.
I am not shocked at the surprisingly high user review scores (8.5 on metacritic as of this review) for this game, after beating it. I'll avoid commentary on the middling critical reception to this game.
COMBAT
The combat is truly satisfying. There is a heavy emphasis on spacing and stamina management ala nioh, with wo long style combat arts (e.g. ashes of war) and a host of supplementary tools and ranged weapons. Playing on the hardest difficulty (twilight, then midnight), eschewing the many, many resources to make the combat more accessible and easy, the game demands sekiro style strings of perfect parries, with combat optimization being fairly opaque and varied.
The plentiful combat arts and moves all have niche uses. Maximizing your offensive output relies on using stance and weapon swapping (gale, a stance swap attack, restores stamina) and storing and popping stamina at the right time via a new ‘ki pulse’ system, to string together relevant combat arts (stance 1 -> combat art that knocks back, gale, stance 2 -> combat art gap closer attack, ki pulse to restore stam and dash away or continue combo etc.) Most combat arts have timed button presses or holds to influence the attack string. There is so much interactivity, just like all team ninja games. Enemies have different recovery times and super armor depending on how long the preceding combo you parried was (and how fully) and their next move, meaning you can’t use the same combat arts in every situation; optimizing each window after a specific attack or combo is part of the fight learning process.
The best part of the rock paper scissors stance system is that you are constantly forced to switch between different stances, with different move sets, charged attacks, combos, damage, stamina costs, parry timings and movements.
The abundant defensive options mean most fights feel fun, even on the back foot against aggressive enemies. Obviously parrying is a major focus but each stance has different parry attacks. They are attacks too- so missing your parry can dynamically impact the fight by still hitting or flinching an enemy, stepping you closer into a combo, etc. Some combat styles parry with more forgiving timings then others at the expense of weapon damage. Some parry twice in quick succession on one button press. Some have a movement component, so whiffing your parry might dash you into or out of danger. Parries aren’t the only defensive tool. Interrupt a charging enemy with a pistol shot, ala bloodborne. Grapple hook an enemy out of the air to interrupt jump attacks. Steal an enemy consumable as they go to heal or buff with your hook. Jump over sweep attacks and sekiro kick into a jump attack, sidestep thrusts instead of parrying to safely start your own combo into a mid-combo enemy back or side.
With all this discussion about skill cap and combat complexity let me assure you can also play this game much more casually. There are a ton of tools, including literal difficulty options, AI summons, powerful consumables, and plentiful side content to overlevel challenges, for people who just want to have fun in a compelling world and decent story. You can kind of play the way you want, even if that involves button mashing or not engaging with the more complex combat systems. Props to team ninja for offering these options.
While I could go on and on about the clear legibility/visibility of attacks, great bosses, fair multi-opponent AI, etc. let’s not neglect other important gameplay considerations.
NON-COMBAT RELATED GAME STRENGTHS
-Character creator, outfits and weapon skins, transmog system are all top tier
-RPG mechanics (dialog options, skill tree, home base mechanics, bonding events, etc.) all feel well integrated and organic. Systems synergize well, and player power progression is noticeable and meaningful
-Content heavy – while I’d argue focusing on the main story and character side quests is the best way to experience the game and avoid burnout or pacing issues, if you like collecting, checklists, number goes up, etc. like most people there is a lot to do and get in this game.
-Music and sound effects are amazing
-Blade twin story conceit is clever and well done
-World space feels grounded and believable… distinct from GoT, which was surreal and fantastical
-Novel setting- the cultural conflicts, style and technology of the era feels fresh
-Accessibility options everywhere
-NG+ is typical team ninja, with expanded loot pool and tweaked boss movesets etc.
-William + Ryu from previous team ninja titles have tasteful cameos
-With few brief + mild exceptions the framerate was rock solid on performance mode
-same sex romances feel like a nice, inclusive touch for a period piece game from a japanese dev
WEAKNESSES
-English voice acting can border on cheesy at times; japanese is solid
-Story is classic team ninja; seems designed for people who already know all the events and is both too thorough and too expositionally light at different times, with too many characters
-Stealthing is undercooked; clearly the emphasis of the game is on sword fighting and things like leashing and stealth AI can feel simple and jank at times. There aren’t complicated enemy patrol routes or vision field overlaps or whatnot...
-Some difficulty spikes; not as serious an issue as there are 900 utilities to help players who want to avoid challenging content, but for the average player a few bosses will seem surprisingly difficult
-Horse animation and auto run feature are both rough
-Enemy variety is predicated on weapon and move set, which is generally diverse, but visually you are fighting random Japanese guys for basically the entirety of the game, even if from a gameplay standpoint these enemies manifest as different challenges- natural byproduct of the historical grounding
-Team ninja ARPG loot system persists; use loot filters or ignore gearing to retain your sanity
-Graphics are solid but not ground-breaking
This game is fun personified... with a bit of of jank, a bit of cheese but utimately all of the disparate design elements work well together to make something great.
