Sekiro Shadows Died for First Impressions

[CritialGaming]

Other than that, VaatiVidya has a pretty good collection of tips. [https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=zT35HWy_qvQ]

Well shit, the thing I was most excited about was the removal of i-frame, turned out not only did they not remove them they added them to jump too and increased enemy tracking.

Yeah I thought it was mostly about physically having to be out of an attack?s path to avoid damage, but it?s like they simply reconfigured what they?re applied to. I haven?t really noticed what they work with though.

 

[EvilRoy]

Other than that, VaatiVidya has a pretty good collection of tips. [https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=zT35HWy_qvQ]

Well shit, the thing I was most excited about was the removal of i-frame, turned out not only did they not remove them they added them to jump too and increased enemy tracking.

Yeah I thought it was mostly about physically having to be out of an attack?s path to avoid damage, but it?s like they simply reconfigured what they?re applied to. I haven?t really noticed what they work with though.

It seems like its some kind of "contact time" system, where you get iframes, but if you touch something for too long you lose them. So like, an iframe will save you if you only contact a spear for a split second mid dodge, but if you were to dodge in the same direction as the spear the extra split second you stay in contact means you got stabbed. Contrast DS where you could dodge in the same direction of an attack and make it through if you timed the extent of the iframe period right, even if that meant the Smough had his hammer halfway up your butt during the better part of a dodge.

Speaking of, I finally got a taste of unintentional FROM hilarity which significantly improved my mood. I really wish I recorded it somehow. The headless went to do his "rip your heart out" grab, but I was turned away from it and sort of stumbling forward because of the fog. It truly looked like he reached his hand up my ass and dragged my heart out. Its been quite a while since I've laughed so hard I dropped my controller.

It was the first time I saw that grab, so I had a moment of just... "what's that move... whoa WHAT. WHAT."

 

[CritialGaming]

I am likely the game a bit more and more each time I play as I'm still learning the ins and outs of combat. I still really hate the lock-on system and fighting multiple enemies. I'm pretty sure that option of not locking onto the next enemy after killing one does completely nothing because it still locks on to the next enemy for me when disabled.

VaatiVidya has a pretty good collection of tips. [https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=zT35HWy_qvQ]

Sekiro seems like it does much of what Dark Souls was always supposed to be about, learning each enemy and deliberate combat. You can't just dodge and spam R1 so you have to actually learn enemy attacks and animations. The fact that you have to be far more careful with hitting R1 means it accomplishes what Souls was always trying to do, which is make you consider each and every attack and animation you perform. Thus, Sekiro is better deliberate combat even though its far faster paced than Souls.

Well shit, the thing I was most excited about was the removal of i-frame, turned out not only did they not remove them they added them to jump too and increased enemy tracking.

I don't get the hatred of i-frames, I very much doubt there's a single good action game that doesn't have i-frames. That's because it's so very hard to make super accurate hitboxes along with perfect tracking of those hitboxes. Even in the most polished looking games where you see the enemy and where the enemy is in the game code can be 2 completely different places let alone the exact coordinates of the enemy's sword and your character's ducking head or whatever. You really do need i-frames to get games like this out the door and combat feeling anywhere near good. Sure I'd prefer the perfect scenario of not needing i-frames, but it just isn't feasible.

What?s funny is I somehow think that in games with more deliberate face-off style melee combat lock-on is more of a necessity than iframes ?should? be technically. It?s definitely due to my layman?s level of understanding game development, but I just don?t see why it should still be so difficult to implement a system where solid physical game assets either connect with other solid physical game assets, or they don?t. I?ve always wondered why hitboxes can?t be assigned to just the actual character model or game assets themselves instead of a blocky box surrounding them? Why is collision data still so tough to process in real time when so many other far more resource-intensive assets are handled on mobile-level CPU?s found in the consoles barely breaking a sweat; sometimes even at 60fps?

On the other hand, in games where you have to be zeroed in on an opponent to make the most of the combat system, there seems to be no way around a lock-on system. Otherwise you kinda have to slop the design (or at the very least generalize it) so you can just hop around like in Arkham games without really considering if you?re squared off enough for certain attacks to connect like they should. Or like in the old God of War games or any hack n slash without lock on where you could block attacks that were coming from behind without even needing to face that direction. The lock-on seems inevitable to be more precise with current input devices. I?m guessing the way FROM does it as a stick click system vs hold is most likely to keep all the shoulder buttons free for other functions. Some of the skills in Sekiro are meant to handle multiple enemies which helps too.

It almost seems self-fulfilling when trying to play without lock-on at all as to why it?s actually needed in these types of games. Sure it?s possible, but it simply doesn?t feel the same or yield the same exacting results.

 

[RaikuFA]

I?ll wait till I find a used copy.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

So, I accidentally killed the purple Ninja in the memory. So far that fucker has been harder to me than all of the mini-bosses and actual bosses, so while fighting him for like the 25th time I thought "huh, I wonder what he's hiding back there anyway" so when I was about to die I said "fuck it" and ran around the building to see what he was protecting.

I opened the door (which I believe you might have invincibility during), grabbed the item, saw that it was a prosthetic upgrade and went "yoink," took it and jumped off the cliff into the water. Shortly thereafter I heard the sound of a death and suddenly received 319 exp. The man in the purple pajamas had ended his life.

Either the Ninja is scripted to automatically kill himself if he fails in his mission to protect the prosthetic upgrade, or he followed me off the cliff into the water before realizing he couldn't swim. I didn't see what happened, all I know is that he's dead.

 

[CritialGaming]

So, I accidentally killed the purple Ninja in the memory. So far that fucker has been harder to me than all of the mini-bosses and actual bosses, so while fighting him for like the 25th time I thought "huh, I wonder what he's hiding back there anyway" so when I was about to die I said "fuck it" and ran around the building to see what he was protecting.

I opened the door (which I believe you might have invincibility during), grabbed the item, saw that it was a prosthetic upgrade and went "yoink," took it and jumped off the cliff into the water. Shortly thereafter I heard the sound of a death and suddenly received 319 exp. The man in the purple pajamas had ended his life.

Either the Ninja is scripted to automatically kill himself if he fails in his mission to protect the prosthetic upgrade, or he followed me off the cliff into the water before realizing he couldn't swim. I didn't see what happened, all I know is that he's dead.

He followed you off the cliff. But don't worry he's a normal enemy later so you'll get plenty of chances to learn how to fight him

 

[CritialGaming]

snip

Games tend to use rounded or square shapes within the character models to dictate hit boxes because of the technically requirements that would be forced on the game's systems to uses the actual character model as the hit box. Then you'd have situations where you take full damage because your character's pinky got clipped.

As technology has improved, these hit boxes have gotten tighter around the character frame and follow animations much better, but there are allotments that have to be made for the sake of the game's operation and player experience.

That being said I think I am not at the point where the combat is clicking with me. Things are still quite hard, but I'm starting to learn how to quick adapt to what the enemy is doing and react correctly. The is also the first FromSoft game where I find myself using all the extra bits. Usually In a souls game, I take a shield and a sword and fuck the rest of the items in the game period. Here I cannot.

I'm actually using Sugars, and shinobi tools (firecrackers are the best thing in the game 100% don't even try to argue it), and they are taking a hard fight into a hard but much much shorter fight and thus reducing the time available to fuck it up and die. I'm now like 6 main bosses in and about 10 mini bosses down give or take.

Once again my opinion on the game had turned as I "learned to play" or "got gud-ish" and as things make more sense I'm actually tempted to get the game on Ps4 (I'm playing on PC) to go back and repractice the earlier fights with my better understanding of the combat to properly prepare myself for the end of the game as well.

 

[CritialGaming]

So, I accidentally killed the purple Ninja in the memory. So far that fucker has been harder to me than all of the mini-bosses and actual bosses, so while fighting him for like the 25th time I thought "huh, I wonder what he's hiding back there anyway" so when I was about to die I said "fuck it" and ran around the building to see what he was protecting.

I opened the door (which I believe you might have invincibility during), grabbed the item, saw that it was a prosthetic upgrade and went "yoink," took it and jumped off the cliff into the water. Shortly thereafter I heard the sound of a death and suddenly received 319 exp. The man in the purple pajamas had ended his life.

Either the Ninja is scripted to automatically kill himself if he fails in his mission to protect the prosthetic upgrade, or he followed me off the cliff into the water before realizing he couldn't swim. I didn't see what happened, all I know is that he's dead.

Huh, I did pretty much the same damn thing, but only because I got distracted by a treasure carp below. Didn?t get that lucky to have him follow me to his death though (pretty sure he doesn?t hara-kiri just because the player runs off). I have seen videos of npc running off of cliffs to their death, so it?s mildly comforting to know the Wolf has a distinct advantage at least where there?s water.

 

[CritialGaming]

snip

Games tend to use rounded or square shapes within the character models to dictate hit boxes because of the technically requirements that would be forced on the game's systems to uses the actual character model as the hit box. Then you'd have situations where you take full damage because your character's pinky got clipped.

As technology has improved, these hit boxes have gotten tighter around the character frame and follow animations much better, but there are allotments that have to be made for the sake of the game's operation and player experience.

That being said I think I am not at the point where the combat is clicking with me. Things are still quite hard, but I'm starting to learn how to quick adapt to what the enemy is doing and react correctly. The is also the first FromSoft game where I find myself using all the extra bits. Usually In a souls game, I take a shield and a sword and fuck the rest of the items in the game period. Here I cannot.

I'm actually using Sugars, and shinobi tools (firecrackers are the best thing in the game 100% don't even try to argue it), and they are taking a hard fight into a hard but much much shorter fight and thus reducing the time available to fuck it up and die. I'm now like 6 main bosses in and about 10 mini bosses down give or take.

Once again my opinion on the game had turned as I "learned to play" or "got gud-ish" and as things make more sense I'm actually tempted to get the game on Ps4 (I'm playing on PC) to go back and repractice the earlier fights with my better understanding of the combat to properly prepare myself for the end of the game as well.

Thanks for the info. I?m actually doing the opposite - started on PS4-s and just installed the Steam version last night. I?m especially curious about the differences playing on a projector with 67ms input lag and wireless DS4 vs a monitor with DS4 plugged into my tower. I?m guessing the drunkard will be quite a bit less trouble on the latter lol.

 

[CritialGaming]

Thanks for the info. I?m actually doing the opposite - started on PS4-s and just installed the Steam version last night. I?m especially curious about the differences playing on a projector with 67ms input lag and wireless DS4 vs a monitor with DS4 plugged into my tower. I?m guessing the drunkard will be quite a bit less trouble on the latter lol.

Why was the drunkard a problem in the first place? You can stealth kill all his minions, stealth down one of his health nuggets and then use the npc alley to distract him while you beat his ass.

 

[CritialGaming]

Thanks for the info. I?m actually doing the opposite - started on PS4-s and just installed the Steam version last night. I?m especially curious about the differences playing on a projector with 67ms input lag and wireless DS4 vs a monitor with DS4 plugged into my tower. I?m guessing the drunkard will be quite a bit less trouble on the latter lol.

Why was the drunkard a problem in the first place? You can stealth kill all his minions, stealth down one of his health nuggets and then use the npc alley to distract him while you beat his ass.

Well he was only my third mini boss in the game and I wasn?t aware you could stealth him as his back is against a fog wall. I also didn?t have anything to deal with the shield dudes. The ally never lasted long; only enough to get maybe half his bar down. Also like I said, the added input lag I?m dealing with from my projector isn?t helping me read & react to the bosses.

Anyways, here?s an interesting DF feature [https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=50nW6Hfelxc] on the evolution of FROM?s game engine. Amazing it all started with the glorious Demon?s Souls.

 

[PsychedelicDiamond]

Started it yesterday and I'm just as surprised by how much it doesn't feel like Dark Souls or Bloodborne. For one it actually has responsive controls. And I am aware that it's an intentional decision in these games to have a certain delay between input and animation and that you're supposed to commit to your movements but that deliberate feel always seperated them from most action games. Sekiro is faster and and has a lot more movement options. I mean, holy shit, there's a jump button, seems like From really got a bit crazy there. The greater verticality does add a lot to the core gameplay and wonder if the level design is gonna make full use of it. As of now it seems to, but the first few areas in From games always tend to be the best part of the game.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

On the other hand, in games where you have to be zeroed in on an opponent to make the most of the combat system, there seems to be no way around a lock-on system. Otherwise you kinda have to slop the design (or at the very least generalize it) so you can just hop around like in Arkham games without really considering if you?re squared off enough for certain attacks to connect like they should. Or like in the old God of War games or any hack n slash without lock on where you could block attacks that were coming from behind without even needing to face that direction. The lock-on seems inevitable to be more precise with current input devices. I?m guessing the way FROM does it as a stick click system vs hold is most likely to keep all the shoulder buttons free for other functions. Some of the skills in Sekiro are meant to handle multiple enemies which helps too.

It almost seems self-fulfilling when trying to play without lock-on at all as to why it?s actually needed in these types of games. Sure it?s possible, but it simply doesn?t feel the same or yield the same exacting results.

It's not that lock-on doesn't work for 1v1 fights, it's that it sucks for fighting multiple enemies at a time, which you do unless you're doing 100% stealth. Pretty much all other games do lock-on for you basically and your character will attack in the direction of the enemy that you're pressing the left stick towards. Whereas in From games, after you kill your locked-on enemy, the game feels like it just randomly determines the next one, then you go to attack the next one in priority completely missing him. The problem with blocking in From games without lock-on is that when you hold L1 to block, your character doesn't switch to strafing like in every other game. It just seems From doesn't want to take the time to upgrade their systems to modern equivalents.

 

[Casual Shinji]

It's not that lock-on doesn't work for 1v1 fights, it's that it sucks for fighting multiple enemies at a time, which you do unless you're doing 100% stealth. Pretty much all other games do lock-on for you basically and your character will attack in the direction of the enemy that you're pressing the left stick towards. Whereas in From games, after you kill your locked-on enemy, the game feels like it just randomly determines the next one, then you go to attack the next one in priority completely missing him. The problem with blocking in From games without lock-on is that when you hold L1 to block, your character doesn't switch to strafing like in every other game. It just seems From doesn't want to take the time to upgrade their systems to modern equivalents.

Not to mention that clicking R3 also functions as re-centering the camera, making for awkward situations where you want to lock on to an enemy that's at your side, but because the camera is just off centre enough it instead shifts the view away from the enemy and towards your back. I got fucking killed due to this with purple ninja guy.

And this right after Devil May Cry 5 came out which has a perfectly functioning lock-on. I could understand Demon's Souls and even Dark Souls lacking in polish here and there, but with how popular Fromsoft has become in gaming and how much backing they're obviously getting (Sekiro is published by Activision, for god's sake), the rusty implementation of a lot of their mechanics is becoming more and more of a thorn. There's not even the excuse now of it being an action RPG, as it is a full-on action game.

 

[CritialGaming]

Started it yesterday and I'm just as surprised by how much it doesn't feel like Dark Souls or Bloodborne. For one it actually has responsive controls. And I am aware that it's an intentional decision in these games to have a certain delay between input and animation and that you're supposed to commit to your movements but that deliberate feel always seperated them from most action games. Sekiro is faster and and has a lot more movement options. I mean, holy shit, there's a jump button, seems like From really got a bit crazy there. The greater verticality does add a lot to the core gameplay and wonder if the level design is gonna make full use of it. As of now it seems to, but the first few areas in From games always tend to be the best part of the game.

Yet actually the map ?freedom? doesn?t really open up until around the half way mark.

On the other hand, in games where you have to be zeroed in on an opponent to make the most of the combat system, there seems to be no way around a lock-on system. Otherwise you kinda have to slop the design (or at the very least generalize it) so you can just hop around like in Arkham games without really considering if you?re squared off enough for certain attacks to connect like they should. Or like in the old God of War games or any hack n slash without lock on where you could block attacks that were coming from behind without even needing to face that direction. The lock-on seems inevitable to be more precise with current input devices. I?m guessing the way FROM does it as a stick click system vs hold is most likely to keep all the shoulder buttons free for other functions. Some of the skills in Sekiro are meant to handle multiple enemies which helps too.

It almost seems self-fulfilling when trying to play without lock-on at all as to why it?s actually needed in these types of games. Sure it?s possible, but it simply doesn?t feel the same or yield the same exacting results.

It's not that lock-on doesn't work for 1v1 fights, it's that it sucks for fighting multiple enemies at a time, which you do unless you're doing 100% stealth. Pretty much all other games do lock-on for you basically and your character will attack in the direction of the enemy that you're pressing the left stick towards. Whereas in From games, after you kill your locked-on enemy, the game feels like it just randomly determines the next one, then you go to attack the next one in priority completely missing him. The problem with blocking in From games without lock-on is that when you hold L1 to block, your character doesn't switch to strafing like in every other game. It just seems From doesn't want to take the time to upgrade their systems to modern equivalents.

I?d rather not have lock-on act like sticky cover for you since that detracts from the flow of normal movement. I think it works better in games where you?re fighting in environments that are more or less arenas though. Same kinda goes for automatically strafing on block. Works better in more controlled environments where there?s no danger of making a wrong move. In these games I?d rather have the option of free movement and lock-on for combat-centric actions as it?s never been a big problem to me just flicking the stick if I want to target a different enemy. It?s supposed to default to the next closest but maybe for instance the one behind and to the right is causing more problems.

 

[Fappy]

Coming in late (after finishing the game), so these are more final impressions than first. Some very light spoilers ahead.

Pros:
- The combat system is well realized and polished. Dueling has never felt more authentic in any video game I have ever played.
- Intuitive platforming in a From game (wtf?).
- Some incredible/memorable bosses, especially the main story human ninjas/samurai you fight.
- The mini bosses were a really good way of pacing the difficulty spikes. It was fun learning how to fight them all and that many were unique encounters.
- The posture system is cleverly implemented overall (it does have flaws as I will explain in the Cons section).
- Brilliant atmosphere and cool level design.
- I actually really liked the story as simple as it was (plotwise, anyway).
- Monkies!
- Has the best set piece boss in From history. It actually did gimmick bosses well for once.

Cons:
- The Prosthetic Tools overall felt underwhelming. They all had their niche uses, but outside of niches they often felt like a waste of time. Also, the ammo system made them far too limiting once you unlocked the more powerful upgrades. Bloodborne already did this system better with Silver Bullets as you could sacrifice HP for more ammo. Also, farming them was annoying if you got stuck on a boss.
- Confetti. Just fuck Confetti. Transient Curse from DS wasn't ever this obnoxious, especially if attempting to fight Headless minibosses early. Speaking of Headless, From should know everyone hates Tranquil Walk of Peace by now, lol.
- Some bosses felt out of place. Specifically, the Bull, Big Monkey (phase 1 specifically/mate), and the Demon of Hatred. These bosses (the Demon especially) felt like they belonged in Bloodborne or Darksouls, and in many cases required a 100% different playstyle to overcome as opposed to every other boss in the game. The Demon is literally a Bloodborne boss without dodge i-frames or rally, and was the only actually difficult ones of the ones mentioned here.
- Many of the unlockable special attacks felt... pointless? It could just be that many are too niche or simply unbalanced, but I found a couple of them that were just far better than the rest, especially for bosses (Ichimonji, nuff said). This led to the Skill unlock system feeling a bit underwhelming.
- Posture recovery was awkward at times, especially at mid HP range. When the best option to collect yourself in a duel is to straight up run from the boss so you can hold L1 and regen it kind of breaks the immersion. It would have been nice if there were more reliable ways to recover posture in the midst of a 1-on-1 fight. Why Ichimonji recovers a chunk of Posture on a whiff is... weird design, lol.
- I am pretty sure mid-air deathblows (where you leap up at airborne enemies for a 1-shot) are straight up bugged and don't queue properly when the conditions are right.
- OST was a bit forgettable outside of a few tracks
- Running during boss battles did some really strange things to Boss AI on certain fights. It's almost as if Sekiro runs TOO fast for them. A few of the larger bosses can be easily cheesed by keeping extreme distance and then dash attacking during recovery frames.
- Dragonrot felt like a pointlessly punishing mechanic that is easily mitigated late game. That, and losing sen/XP felt like an unnecessary holdover from the Souls games.
- As someone who loves the Soulsborne-style games, and therefore is a big fan of highly challenging gameplay, I actually found Sekiro a little too hard. Most of the game was perfectly manageable, but I accidentally did stuff way out of order without knowing it so there was a random huge difficulty spike about 10 hours in. Once I got past that area and returned to where I was supposed to be I stomped everything for the following 10 hours, haha. Then the final few hours of the game ramp up to insane difficulty. I don't know, I guess I am torn about this point. I learned from mistakes, adapted and prevailed, but I can't help but think there were a few fights that were just simply overtuned.

I don't mind that there is only really "one playstyle" as this is not an RPG nor a true Soulesborne game. That said, I kind of wish the skill system and tools offered more viable ways to mix up your gameplay. Maybe there are some ways to do it that I haven't discovered for myself and I will be on the lookout for that in NG+.

I know that is a long list of Cons but that is only because I tend to be more detailed with complaints, lol. Overall it is a fantastic game that gave me a healthy mixture of grief and joy. I would recommend it to anyone that can stomach the difficulty, as there are a lot of fantastic and awe inspiring moments.

 

[CritialGaming]

Coming in late (after finishing the game), so these are more final impressions than first. Some very light spoilers ahead.

Pros:
- The combat system is well realized and polished. Dueling has never felt more authentic in any video game I have ever played.
- Intuitive platforming in a From game (wtf?).
- Some incredible/memorable bosses, especially the main story human ninjas/samurai you fight.
- The mini bosses were a really good way of pacing the difficulty spikes. It was fun learning how to fight them all and that many were unique encounters.
- The posture system is cleverly implemented overall (it does have flaws as I will explain in the Cons section).
- Brilliant atmosphere and cool level design.
- I actually really liked the story as simple as it was (plotwise, anyway).
- Monkies!
- Has the best set piece boss in From history. It actually did gimmick bosses well for once.

Cons:
- The Prosthetic Tools overall felt underwhelming. They all had their niche uses, but outside of niches they often felt like a waste of time. Also, the ammo system made them far too limiting once you unlocked the more powerful upgrades. Bloodborne already did this system better with Silver Bullets as you could sacrifice HP for more ammo. Also, farming them was annoying if you got stuck on a boss.
- Confetti. Just fuck Confetti. Transient Curse from DS wasn't ever this obnoxious, especially if attempting to fight Headless minibosses early. Speaking of Headless, From should know everyone hates Tranquil Walk of Peace by now, lol.
- Some bosses felt out of place. Specifically, the Bull, Big Monkey (phase 1 specifically/mate), and the Demon of Hatred. These bosses (the Demon especially) felt like they belonged in Bloodborne or Darksouls, and in many cases required a 100% different playstyle to overcome as opposed to every other boss in the game. The Demon is literally a Bloodborne boss without dodge i-frames or rally, and was the only actually difficult ones of the ones mentioned here.
- Many of the unlockable special attacks felt... pointless? It could just be that many are too niche or simply unbalanced, but I found a couple of them that were just far better than the rest, especially for bosses (Ichimonji, nuff said). This led to the Skill unlock system feeling a bit underwhelming.
- Posture recovery was awkward at times, especially at mid HP range. When the best option to collect yourself in a duel is to straight up run from the boss so you can hold L1 and regen it kind of breaks the immersion. It would have been nice if there were more reliable ways to recover posture in the midst of a 1-on-1 fight. Why Ichimonji recovers a chunk of Posture on a whiff is... weird design, lol.
- I am pretty sure mid-air deathblows (where you leap up at airborne enemies for a 1-shot) are straight up bugged and don't queue properly when the conditions are right.
- OST was a bit forgettable outside of a few tracks
- Running during boss battles did some really strange things to Boss AI on certain fights. It's almost as if Sekiro runs TOO fast for them. A few of the larger bosses can be easily cheesed by keeping extreme distance and then dash attacking during recovery frames.
- Dragonrot felt like a pointlessly punishing mechanic that is easily mitigated late game. That, and losing sen/XP felt like an unnecessary holdover from the Souls games.
- As someone who loves the Soulsborne-style games, and therefore is a big fan of highly challenging gameplay, I actually found Sekiro a little too hard. Most of the game was perfectly manageable, but I accidentally did stuff way out of order without knowing it so there was a random huge difficulty spike about 10 hours in. Once I got past that area and returned to where I was supposed to be I stomped everything for the following 10 hours, haha. Then the final few hours of the game ramp up to insane difficulty. I don't know, I guess I am torn about this point. I learned from mistakes, adapted and prevailed, but I can't help but think there were a few fights that were just simply overtuned.

I don't mind that there is only really "one playstyle" as this is not an RPG nor a true Soulesborne game. That said, I kind of wish the skill system and tools offered more viable ways to mix up your gameplay. Maybe there are some ways to do it that I haven't discovered for myself and I will be on the lookout for that in NG+.

I know that is a long list of Cons but that is only because I tend to be more detailed with complaints, lol. Overall it is a fantastic game that gave me a healthy mixture of grief and joy. I would recommend it to anyone that can stomach the difficulty, as there are a lot of fantastic and awe inspiring moments.

In regards with your Pros:

-I feel like the combat is pretty freaking good. However I feel like the game doesn't do a good enough job of teaching it to you before starting to kick your dick in. Souls never told you anything, but Souls didn't expect you to master it's combat to get through it. Sekiro requires you to have a mastery of juggling your tools, items, and the 4 different defensive motions, all on TOP of also knowing your offense.
-Platforming is great, though there is some noticable janky here and there especially when ledge grabbing is required.
-I disagree with the mini bosses. While some are pretty straightforward, I feel like they ramp up far too quickly and would have preferred if they were mini versions of the upcoming bosses (perhaps focusing on 1 aspect of an upcoming bigger fight to prepare you for the bigger fights ahead). At least in the early areas. Later on, I have no problem of all bets being off.

In regards to your Cons:

-Dragonrot is a stupid fucking idea. Especially in a game in which they expect you to die a shit load, AND also make the sure to the Dragonrot obscure and missable.
-The unlockable skills seem pretty much designed for the player to only ever unlock one of them, because any number of them can break some of the fights. Shadow Rush comes to mind as a skill that just breaks Owl's AI and trivializes the fight.
-Again about the mini bosses. I wanted them to help teach you combat, but some of them are just WTF, Bull and Ogre teach you nothing of value. Additionally too many of them are reused, as if they just ran out of ideas and wanted to keep road blocks in the way of your progression. Early mini bosses feel too cluttered and spreading them around better might have helped the reuse of them.
-As for the overall difficulty. I am not sure that the default difficulty is as much of a problem as the game's failure to teach players the fighting mechanics properly. However the end game does just go fucking off the deep end in terms of how perfect the game expects you to be.

As I stated earlier (and I'd love feedback from you since you beat the game already) I feel like the stealth gameplay end up hurting the game in the long run because the game promotes players to not fight face to face against the fodder enemies. Which means you have a SUPER easy core gameplay loop as you dart around and backstabbing the shit outta everyone.

Then you hit a mini boss which is not only your first taste of real combat but also too tightly tuned to be helpful in teaching you. I hate the idea of you just have to figure it out for yourself, especially with combat as (i dunno if deep is the right word but certainly complex at least in terms of the muscle memory instantly expected of you) deep as this is. Sure there are kind of pop ups, but the dodge pop up happens as you walk into Lady Butterfly's room and that is NOT enough time to teach you how to deal with that boss.

 

[EvilRoy]

Coming in late (after finishing the game), so these are more final impressions than first. Some very light spoilers ahead.

I know that is a long list of Cons but that is only because I tend to be more detailed with complaints, lol. Overall it is a fantastic game that gave me a healthy mixture of grief and joy. I would recommend it to anyone that can stomach the difficulty, as there are a lot of fantastic and awe inspiring moments.

Dang dude, you ripped through this thing. That's a pretty solid compliment on its own.

I'm still early in the game, but I find myself starved for the kind of DS boss that makes me pucker - difficulty is present and feels decent, but I want beautiful nonsensecrazy bosses - DS I got one or two usually within the first few hours. Any hope for this game, or is it samurai patrol time?

 

[Kwak]

How does it compare to Nioh?

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

How does it compare to Nioh?

I would say that basic enemies are a bit easier here than in Nioh because they're so easy to stealth.

Mini-bosses and bosses are for the most part much harder than most of the bosses in Nioh. Nioh gave you more combat options, and more ability to cheese bosses and enemies if you were having trouble with them (just apply slow to anything you're having trouble with and it's an easy win), whereas the combat in Sekiro has fewer options, but is much more precise and difficult. There's no cheesing your way through this game, you actually have to get good, really good.

I hated Nioh's loot system, and that doesn't exist in this game. The areas in Sekiro are also much better structured than Nioh's levels so far.

There's also no armor in Sekiro, I haven't found any weapons other than the starting sword so far (although I'm pretty sure there are a few in the game), and there's no leveling system. So if you're slamming your head against a boss you can't grind for a few levels, or try a different weapon and armor combo and see if it works better. You just have to git gud and beat the boss.

Truth be told, I really wanted to like Nioh, but I ended up never finishing it because I just hated the inventory system and got tired of looking at the inventory screen for half an hour every time I completed a level, so I'm enjoying Sekiro more so far just because of that. The enemy designs aren't super interesting so far though, and the combat is very difficult.

There are things I like and dislike about both games, and I really like the combat systems in both of them, but I think I'll actually finish Sekiro even though I'm chipping away at it pretty slowly. I have no intention of going back to finish Nioh.