Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (new From Software game)

[typical user]

I'm almost done with the game. The difficulty curve is strange in my opinion. I struggled with Genichiro who has some stupid combos with his thrust and swipe perilous attacks. For some reason the devs decided that both perilous indicators should be in the same color and located on YOUR character so you have to focus on what the boss is doing except you have to watch yourself because enemies give you no time to prepare for Mikiri or jump. Then I fought the Guardian Ape who has pretty straight-forward second phase, The Owl I have killed in first try, the second time monk with 3 phases in 4th try? And for the ending the game decides to place bosses with 3 or 4 different phases and none can be bypassed with stealth execution. That Demon of Hatred is pure AIDS, most of his attacks have stupid range and cover good chunk of battlefield and they take 3/4 of your HP, take in example his fireball spam.

I thought Headless or Shichimen Warriors were bad, but these just require specific prostethics and divine confetti. I hope I don't have to farm Sen for the fire shield.

 

[Villagkouras]

Demon of hate is optional, I skipped the fight, I'll probably do it in a rerun.

As for the mikiri/jump thing, when unsure just jump back, it always works until you become more confident to react properly.

 

[Sentinel]

Actually jump sideways, because many thrust attacks have a gap close element that will hit you if you jump backwards.

 

[Hassar]

I'm almost done with the game. The difficulty curve is strange in my opinion. I struggled with Genichiro who has some stupid combos with his thrust and swipe perilous attacks. For some reason the devs decided that both perilous indicators should be in the same color and located on YOUR character so you have to focus on what the boss is doing except you have to watch yourself because enemies give you no time to prepare for Mikiri or jump. Then I fought the Guardian Ape who has pretty straight-forward second phase, The Owl I have killed in first try, the second time monk with 3 phases in 4th try? And for the ending the game decides to place bosses with 3 or 4 different phases and none can be bypassed with stealth execution. That Demon of Hatred is pure AIDS, most of his attacks have stupid range and cover good chunk of battlefield and they take 3/4 of your HP, take in example his fireball spam.

I thought Headless or Shichimen Warriors were bad, but these just require specific prostethics and divine confetti. I hope I don't have to farm Sen for the fire shield.

Definitely agree about the difficulty curve. It is pretty high at Lady Butterfly, even with the tutorial hint, but I honestly think it dips for quite a few bosses before becoming ridiculous.

The perilous system is just bad. I think the developers took the lazy way out there. They realized that the animations are not clear enough to signal these attacks as they would in a fighting game so had to create a simplified element to serve as the indicator. And I still think Sekiro’s sword is fundamentally underpowered in a way that undermines combat that is supposed to be lethal - I think what happens is that instead of the boss enemies being so tough that you can barely get an actual hit in, you just have to go through whittling down their health and posture bars, which are irritatingly tied together.

 

[Hassar]

Saw all endings, done with the game for now.

Yes, the game is too hard for my liking. It demands more competence, reaction speed and consistency than I can reliably provide. Sometimes, it wasn't fun.

That aside, I did like the combat and I liked the seamless stealth (except for how long it takes for alerted enemies to stop looking for you). The gameplay, setting and level design fit together well. Wish there were a couple more areas.

I liked the story well enough, but it never quite gripped me. Characters are ok, but some of the weakest in a FROM game. However, I do like that they moved away from traditional Dark Souls storytelling (I've grown a bit tired of that).

Performance has been mediocre. Camera is abysmal: never before has a game camera given me so much trouble, so often. I'm really surprised it's so bad.

In spite of the negatives, I really liked the game overall. Will buy the DLC for sure though I don't know if I'll be able go through it.

Hall of infamy:

Daddy Owl ~50 tries
Genichiro/OG Isshin ~35
Owl/Madama Butterfly ~25
Armored warrior & Lone Shadow in the shrine ~20

I like hearing detailed reactions from people when they beat it. I agree with your main critiques - the story was alright but I honestly can tell you that I’ve read “Lone Wolf & Cub”, “Blade of the Immortal”, watched numerous Kurosawa movies, etc etc...this game just never seemed to use the setting and potential to their utmost. Th competence the game demands never rewards you for demonstrating that same competence. I think if you have mastered an enemy to perfectly parry their attacks to the point you can get in their guard, it should be a One Hit Kill opportunity for you mastering their pattern and leaving them open. The posture mechanic, their phases, and their health bars detract from that.

Any thoughts on your favorite boss fight?

 

[The Vanished One]

Any thoughts on your favorite boss fight?

Probably Guardian Ape. Inventive, unique, had the right amount of challenge.
I think I would like Saint Isshin and Father Owl just as much, if not more, but they took me very long, which dampened my enthusiasm.
Demon of Hatred was also fun, but I had the umbrella to block his attacks for whenever I failed to outrun them.

 

[Child of Malkav]

https://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/bflh4q/centipedes_getting_fried/

 

[Multidirectional]

Beat Isshin yesterday morning. I was finally free to take a good long break from this game. So naturally I started a fresh, non NG+, playthrough right away. LOL EZ GAEM. Most bosses and minibosses are going down on first or second try so far. Granny did take 4 tries though, gotta respect the lady. Seven Spears cunt down in first try, didn't even take any damage. I am already up to 7 gourd flasks and near Genichiro fight now, expecting a good time with that. Seems like second run is what I needed to make game fully click for me. I was too butthurt during first run. Good thing butthurt does not preclude gitting gud.

 

[Rivmusique]

First DLC trailer released, Tomoe looks great:

Spoiler

 

[typical user]

Demon of hate is optional, I skipped the fight, I'll probably do it in a rerun.

As for the mikiri/jump thing, when unsure just jump back, it always works until you become more confident to react properly.

Yeah but it prolongs fights meaning more opportunities to fuck up. You can defeat Genichiro way of tomoe in just 20 seconds without a hit if you counter his perilous attacks and use Ichimonji. Same for first phase of Isshin Ashina. Plus jumpkick opens opportunities for aerial prostethic or combat arts like again Ichimonji. It's too good opportunity to damage enemy posture and regain your own to jump away and chip their health and wait for other openings.

 

[Sentinel]

https://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/bflh4q/centipedes_getting_fried/

Ho lee shit. When she puts the centipede in her mouth I cringed so fucking hard I couldn't look at it. Do japs eat these things? Or is she chinese?

 

[toro]

Long post (near the end).

Spoiler

Fountainhead exploration is dangerous

Ninja down.

Dragon down

Demon of Hatred down. It took me 30 minutes because I fucked up a couple of times.

 

[toro]

And now for something entirely different: Owl (Father) 2.0 is arguably the hardest fight from the game (with Demon Bell and charmless).

I honestly don't know how to rank them but Owl (Father) 2.0 and Genichiro 2.0 are simply an different level of insanity: you cannot use your muscle memory in these fights.

This statement is strange but the thing is: you can memorize their moves but they have up to 3 different followups for each move. There is no 100% way to cheese them.

Good luck memorizing patterns Good luck cheesing them with prosthetic arts because they will eventually demolish your posture and your health

Basically the only way to fight these is to actually react to all their moves and parry like a motherfucker.

For you viewing pleasure, watch this masochist beating Owl (Father) with Demon Bell, No Kuro's Charm, No Martial or Prosthetic Arts. The actual fight starts at 2:10.



Now, I suffered cause of this fight but I found a complete new respect for the game.

Honestly, I feel like winning Sekiro Fuck Isshin.

 

[toro]

 

[Sentinel]

There's the model swap with the frog that's pretty hilarious. Sekiro's moveset coupled with the frog model is 10/10

 

[Child of Malkav]

https://www.sekiro.jp/news_detail_190422_01.html

Our sincere thanks go out to everyone playing Sekiro™: Shadows Die Twice.

We plan to release an update that includes improvements to strategic approaches and addresses several bugs. Please read on for details.

Target Platforms

PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC

Release Timing

April 23rd, 2019　10:00 JST

April 23rd, 2019　03:00 CEST

April 22nd, 2019　18:00 PDT

Release Notes

Improvements to Strategic Approaches

• Adjusted the efficiency and Spirit Emblem cost of the following to encourage usage and diversity of approach:
  
  • Prosthetic Tools: "Lazulite Sacred Flame," "Loaded Axe" series, "Sparking Axe," "Lazulite Axe"
    
    
  • Combat Arts: "Ashina Cross," "Dragon Flash," "One Mind," "Floating Passage," "Spiral Cloud Passage," "Mortal Draw," "Empowered Mortal Draw"
    
    
  • Items: "Spiritfall" series
    
• Reduced the Posture damage dealt by the first hit of the Combat Arts "Senpou Leaping Kicks" and "High Monk" as it was causing more damage than intended in certain cases. Posture damage dealt in the latter-half of the combo has been increased.
  
  
• Increased the Poison build-up dealt by the Prosthetic Tool "Sabimaru" against enemies that were intended to be weak against it.
  
  
• Increased the drop rate of "Divine Confetti" for Fencers in Ashina Castle.
  
  
• Adjusted loading screen tips and tutorial text, as well as adding new text.
  

Other Fixes

• Slightly reduced Posture and Vitality of Blazing Bull in order to improve game pacing and balance time in combat.
  
  
• Lowered the price of information sold by Anayama the Peddler.
  
  
• The Chained Ogre inside Ashina Castle is now Red Eyed.
  
  
• Fixed a bug where "Gokan's Sugar" and "Gokan's Spiritfall" were not mitigating player Posture damage taken while guarding or deflecting enemy attacks.
  
  
• Fixed a bug where system crashes could cause save data to become corrupted on PC.
  
  
• Fixed a bug where certain enemies would sometimes stop attacking the player.
  
  
• Fixed a bug where certain actions could not be performed after reconfiguring the controls.
  
  
• Fixed certain bugs that were allowing the player to access unexpected areas, which could result in becoming unable to obtain items or make further progress.
  
  
• Fixed cases of certain text being displayed incorrectly.
  
  
• Improved stability.
  
  
• Improved performance.
  
  
• Other various bug fixes.
  

After applying the update, the version notation in the bottom-right of the title screen will display as follows:

App Ver. 1.03

We hope you continue to enjoy Sekiro™: Shadows Die Twice.

 

[toro]

Fixed a bug where certain enemies would sometimes stop attacking the player.

Haha ...

 

[Multidirectional]

Slightly reduced Posture and Vitality of Blazing Bull in order to improve game pacing and balance time in combat

So.. they are making one of easiest fights in the game easier? That's cool.

 

[Nathir]

Nerf to high monk? Wtf, it was my favourite skill to use. Why even balance a single player only game? What is even the point.

 

[Child of Malkav]

They only needed to extend durations of sugars, divine confetti, spiritfalls and reduce the spirit emblems costs so that you actually are encouraged to experiment and play around with these tools......speaking of which, how about making the prosthetics, you know one of the draws of this game, actually good and useful? Eh?

 

[Multidirectional]

They only needed to extend durations of sugars, divine confetti, spiritfalls and reduce the spirit emblems costs so that you actually are encouraged to experiment and play around with these tools......speaking of which, how about making the prosthetics, you know one of the draws of this game, actually good and useful? Eh?

They should've made the shitty "increase max emblems" skills give at least +3 emblems instead of +1. With all 5 upgrades you would end up with 30 emblems, a nice double of what you start with. Right now these are skills to be acquired only when everything else you need is done. And why the fuck some of them cost more skill points than others when all of them give only a measly +1? I hate it when they make boring upgrades like this in a game that doesn't even have many of them to begin with.

 

[Child of Malkav]

They only needed to extend durations of sugars, divine confetti, spiritfalls and reduce the spirit emblems costs so that you actually are encouraged to experiment and play around with these tools......speaking of which, how about making the prosthetics, you know one of the draws of this game, actually good and useful? Eh?

They should've made the shitty "increase max emblems" skills give at least +3 emblems instead of +1. With all 5 upgrades you would end up with 30 emblems, a nice double of what you start with. Right now these are skills to be acquired only when everything else you need is done. And why the fuck some of them cost more skill points than others when all of them give only a measly +1? I hate it when they make boring upgrades like this in a game that doesn't even have many of them to begin with.

Or simply reduce the cost. Make all prosthetic uses cost 1 emblem. It may seem OP but after you finish the game once, you fly through it afterwards, at least make it more fun. And the stupid sugar/confetti duration lasting only 01:30 mins with the upgrade. Like.....WoW had stat buffing potions that lasted 2 hours and persisted through death. Just saying. Maybe they get a hint.

 

[Matador]

"Reduced the Posture damage dealt by the first hit of the Combat Arts "Senpou Leaping Kicks" and "High Monk" as it was causing more damage than intended in certain cases. Posture damage dealt in the latter-half of the combo has been increased."

Nerfing one of the few useful and fun combat arts. In 3 years when I come back to the game I'm going to leave the combat art slot empty, no real point in using any and throwing you out of rhythm for no reward.

At least is easier to farm divine confetti now, but it should last longer, at least the skill should give you a longer duration boost.

What's the point on having skills when they are underwhelming and boring? The skill point upgrades only giving 1 extra SP when a lot of tools consume more than 1 per use is another example.

If they want the player to only use the sword and parry with L1 and attack R1 just remove skill trees and give the player the miriki counter from the start and left the game that way.

 

[ghostdog]

So I've been replaying Dark Souls and I've been debating about getting this game.

As I understand it this one is more of an action game than an RPG, right? More similar to let's say metal gear rising revengeance than Dark Souls?

Can you make very different builds? Are there different weapons that play with different styles?

Is there sufficient exploration like DS, or is it more straighforward?

 

[Biscotti]

- Exploration is about the only thing that's left from Souls games, and even then it kinda fluctuates between linear sections and more open ended areas that have branching paths leading to different areas.
- Combat is its own beast, it's different enough from Souls games, but not comparable to Platinum/Capcom action games.
- No different builds and little replayability, you just have your sword and different prosthetics you can find: Think of them like sub weapons in Castlevania, except once found you can freely switch between for the rest of the game.
- There's skills you unlock by gaining skill points from defeating enemies, but it's not a case where you have to build your character, most combat arts are pretty useless, and I'm sure you get enough skill points to unlock everything eventually anyway.

That said, I don't think I've reached the halfway point of the game yet, so I'm not an absolute authority on this.