Swclark777

Words cannot describe how disappointing this game is. There are good ideas here - absolutely none of them are executed well. From the bland combat, which front loads all your abilities in the first three or so hours, to the progression system which oddly depends on you upgrading weapons you will never ever use to get stronger, to the the approximately 5 enemy type variations, everything is a let down (not to mention the cringe voice acting). If that weren’t bad enough, the game wiped all of my progress on the final zone, just because. I had been dragging myself across this finish line, but I will never touch this abomination again.

There’s some Good stuff here, but it doesn’t matter due to crashes at inopportune times. This is exacerbated by the now-notorious lack of checkpoints in the game. You can run through dozens and dozens of enemies, all of which can kill you in one or two hits, timing your blocks perfectly, but it doesn’t matter if the game crashes which sets you back to your previous checkpoint, which can be halfway across the map, only to have fight through those same enemies again. This happened to me twice today, when I was in full view of a new checkpoint, only to have to spend another 40 minutes each time to get to the above mentioned checkpoint. If your gonna make a souls-like with barely-there checkpoints, you best be sure your software works to the letter. Maybe I’ll pick it up again one day, but I can’t be bothered to at the moment even though I was nearing the end.

Needs a lot of work. You’ll basically fight the same spiders and mushrooms for 50 hours while constantly running out of ammo. Story’s dope though.

I was a detractor who had nothing good to say about this game prior to release, and I would gladly retract all of them now. After 20 hours, I can say this game is a blast, my fears were unfounded, and I regret judging the game unfairly.

Incessantly boring for the first two to three hours, almost like it’s trying to be. Get marginally better after that, but by ten hours in you’ve seen everything the game has to offer, and it’s not much. The combat is a total disappointment, and superficially an attempt is made to mix it up, but it clearly is more for show than to provide any real substance. Trials was far superior.

Does anyone have an edit button in the writer’s room? Anyone?!!! While exploration is fun, poor decisions regarding Red XIII, inexplicably bad traversal systems, and an over abundance of poor minigames, seriously holds this game back.

A perfect game - incredible narrative, nuanced characters, and mind blowing battles, this is the game of the year. I doubt we’ll ever see another RPG on this level again.

I don’t know which QA said this was ready to go, but I have never played a buggier game than this. Ever. You can’t even play 30 minutes without it crashing. Meanwhile, there’s a battle in which you’re FORCED to play turn-based, which takes **** forever. You can never finish that battle because the game constantly crashes. So. Best of luck with this awful trash.

I adore this game. It’s not Nioh or Ninja Gaiden, but it is a breath of fresh air. No one does combat like Team Ninja. Many of those reviews, from critics and players alike, criticizing story elements are misguided, as the “flaws” they cite are often purposeful. I find the combat to be more varied, more responsive, and require more skill at higher levels than that of Elden Ring. Those claiming this game is terrible are merely review bombing it, and either haven't played it, or had preconceived notions about it prior to playing it. Anyone telling you that this isn't a blast to play is lying to you.

Eh, I don't know what Kool Aid everyone's been drinking, but it clearly didn't work on me. This is an above-average open world game, but it isn't without its faults. Particularly notable are the repetitious use of dungeons and enemies that really start to wear on you during the second half of the game. The combat also is unrefined, with many bosses glitching out, one particular battle saw a formidable opponent getting stuck in a tree and spontaneously combusting. Moreover, as melee class, battle is entirely dependent on i-frames, there's a lack of responsiveness to the process of combat, that sees luck play more of a role than skill in that sense. Stranger of Paradise surprisingly does combat much better than this game. While I would recommend it, and I don't consider it too hard for the average player, I can't do so without at least acknowledging that it runs out of ideas in the later parts of the quest.

There are many problems with this game that were not perfected prior to launch. The addition of the new burst counter, as well as Yōkai shifts in general, ultimately is unwelcome. The original game didn’t need them, and their inclusion simply makes the combat feel less precise and more spammable. Disappointed.