Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (new From Software game)

[Child of Malkav]

 

[cvv]

Talk about the fucking devil:

Sekiro sold 2 million in 10 days, across all platforms.

I expected more to be brutally honest, seeing as God of War sold 3 million in just 3 days and it's a platform exclusive.

 

[BlackGoat]

Sekiro is a brand new IP tho

 

[toro]

Talk about the fucking devil:

Sekiro sold 2 million in 10 days, across all platforms.

I expected more to be brutally honest, seeing as God of War sold 3 million in just 3 days and it's a platform exclusive.

Console owners were desperate for a good game however Sekiro is for the long run.

Dark Souls 3 sold 3 million in 2 months therefore Sekiro seems to be bigger than that.

 

[cvv]

Sekiro is a brand new IP tho

That's prolly the main reason, yeah, but it's also a FromSoft game which helps with the brand recognition a lot.
Maybe people really were discouraged by all the racket about muh difficulty.

 

[Sentinel]

I don't get it. Why are you trying to spin this as a negative piece of news? It's literally their fastest selling game ever and will probably become their best selling one too.
There's no "people were discouraged".

 

[cvv]

I don't get it. Why are you trying to spin this as a negative piece of news? It's literally their fastest selling game ever and will probably become their best selling one too.
There's no "people were discouraged".

Because I expected at least come overlap with the God of War crowd. But maybe it's just those 3 million copies in 3 days just on PS4 that are fucking abnormal.

 

[Somberlain]

Dad of War is ART that pushes the medium forward while Sekiro is elitist garbage for basement dwelling "hardcore gamers" so obviously Dad of War sold better.

So sayeth the Game Journalism.

 

[Agame]

Played this a bit now.

I assume no one here cares about spoilers? So heres a mini review. I finally got my AH-HA moment on the second samurai general mini-boss. I was actually stuck on Drunken Joozoo, as I was waiting to get the flame weapon to fight the Ogre (didnt realize I somehow missed the fucking thing at the start of Hirata level...) At this stage I was not enjoying myself at all. Everything just felt clunky and bad. So I gave up on Joozoo and went back and killed the ogre, then fighting the samurai general things finally clicked, I was hitting all the right timings and dodges, and killed him quite quickly with only minor damage. Then in a few hours I took down Horsy boss, the Bull ( the Bull was REALLY easy, not sure if its meant to be?) Back to Joozoo and kicked his giant fat ass. And obviously a lot of exploration as things open up at that point.

I understand the combat now, but I still dont really enjoy it. Basically Sekiro is aggressive, twitch gameplay vs Souls methodical, patience gameplay, and I will just never enjoy that as much. Oh and the jumping, I cannot program my brain to jump in combat so any bosses/enemies with sweep attacks are fucking painful, which is most of them...

But this is fine, clearly some people love Sekiro gameplay who dont even like the Souls games. I applaud FROM Soft for trying something different. And obviously the level design, environments etc are typically stunning. Exploring the temple map is a highlight with all the vertical movement and hidden nooks and crannies. Unfortunatley from a lore/story perspective the game feels very "shallow" which is very surprising. And the whole "enemies respawning" mechanic has no internal consistency which is also disappointing, in Dark Souls it makes sense within the game world as everyone is undead and trapped in some kind of purgatory/limbo. But how can this be explained in Sekiro when you are clearly fighting human enemies? It also makes the impossible architecture seem very gamey.

Overall its a good game, just the combat is not my cup of tea. I do hope FROM do something crazy like sci-fi at some point. A metroid style game in 3D with their level/environment design would be great!

 

[Hassar]

Played this a bit now.

I assume no one here cares about spoilers? So heres a mini review. I finally got my AH-HA moment on the second samurai general mini-boss. I was actually stuck on Drunken Joozoo, as I was waiting to get the flame weapon to fight the Ogre (didnt realize I somehow missed the fucking thing at the start of Hirata level...) At this stage I was not enjoying myself at all. Everything just felt clunky and bad. So I gave up on Joozoo and went back and killed the ogre, then fighting the samurai general things finally clicked, I was hitting all the right timings and dodges, and killed him quite quickly with only minor damage. Then in a few hours I took down Horsy boss, the Bull ( the Bull was REALLY easy, not sure if its meant to be?) Back to Joozoo and kicked his giant fat ass. And obviously a lot of exploration as things open up at that point.

I understand the combat now, but I still dont really enjoy it. Basically Sekiro is aggressive, twitch gameplay vs Souls methodical, patience gameplay, and I will just never enjoy that as much. Oh and the jumping, I cannot program my brain to jump in combat so any bosses/enemies with sweep attacks are fucking painful, which is most of them...

But this is fine, clearly some people love Sekiro gameplay who dont even like the Souls games. I applaud FROM Soft for trying something different. And obviously the level design, environments etc are typically stunning. Exploring the temple map is a highlight with all the vertical movement and hidden nooks and crannies. Unfortunatley from a lore/story perspective the game feels very "shallow" which is very surprising. And the whole "enemies respawning" mechanic has no internal consistency which is also disappointing, in Dark Souls it makes sense within the game world as everyone is undead and trapped in some kind of purgatory/limbo. But how can this be explained in Sekiro when you are clearly fighting human enemies? It also makes the impossible architecture seem very gamey.

Overall its a good game, just the combat is not my cup of tea. I do hope FROM do something crazy like sci-fi at some point. A metroid style game in 3D with their level/environment design would be great!

Yea, my major complaint with Souls was that the combat seemed so basic but Sekiro seems a lot easier. It’s more akin to Ninja Gaiden or an action game in some ways. I think permanent death for you and/or the enemies could have intensified things but that seems like a bad idea with the reaction based combat (other players frame it as QTE combat but it is closer to the Souls parry mechanic with Bloodborne elements IMO). I think the combat might seem harder if the player was not familiar with other games but the game is fair and good for some fun, but I definitely see the holes in the system - being unhittable when executing assassinations and not having the enemies react before going back to their scripts after you’ve killed most of their squad dilute the vibe From was going for. It’s a very understated game which could be good or bad.

 

[Zerth]

For anyone that regularly use the Raven Mist feather prosthetic, how good it is?.

 

[sullynathan]

I expected more to be brutally honest, seeing as God of War sold 3 million in just 3 days and it's a platform exclusive.

God of War is infinitely more popular, more advertised and well known than everything FROM has and will ever make. Temper your expectations.

 

[cvv]

I expected more to be brutally honest, seeing as God of War sold 3 million in just 3 days and it's a platform exclusive.

God of War is infinitely more popular, more advertised and well known than everything FROM has and will ever make. Temper your expectations.

Before the 2018 GoW came out and was hyped up to all fuck the "Dark Souls" brand was much more of a household name. The new GoW was even called the Dark Souls of the franchise. So chill with your exaggerations.

 

[Child of Malkav]

Played this a bit now.

I assume no one here cares about spoilers? So heres a mini review. I finally got my AH-HA moment on the second samurai general mini-boss. I was actually stuck on Drunken Joozoo, as I was waiting to get the flame weapon to fight the Ogre (didnt realize I somehow missed the fucking thing at the start of Hirata level...) At this stage I was not enjoying myself at all. Everything just felt clunky and bad. So I gave up on Joozoo and went back and killed the ogre, then fighting the samurai general things finally clicked, I was hitting all the right timings and dodges, and killed him quite quickly with only minor damage. Then in a few hours I took down Horsy boss, the Bull ( the Bull was REALLY easy, not sure if its meant to be?) Back to Joozoo and kicked his giant fat ass. And obviously a lot of exploration as things open up at that point.

I understand the combat now, but I still dont really enjoy it. Basically Sekiro is aggressive, twitch gameplay vs Souls methodical, patience gameplay, and I will just never enjoy that as much. Oh and the jumping, I cannot program my brain to jump in combat so any bosses/enemies with sweep attacks are fucking painful, which is most of them...

But this is fine, clearly some people love Sekiro gameplay who dont even like the Souls games. I applaud FROM Soft for trying something different. And obviously the level design, environments etc are typically stunning. Exploring the temple map is a highlight with all the vertical movement and hidden nooks and crannies. Unfortunatley from a lore/story perspective the game feels very "shallow" which is very surprising. And the whole "enemies respawning" mechanic has no internal consistency which is also disappointing, in Dark Souls it makes sense within the game world as everyone is undead and trapped in some kind of purgatory/limbo. But how can this be explained in Sekiro when you are clearly fighting human enemies? It also makes the impossible architecture seem very gamey.

Overall its a good game, just the combat is not my cup of tea. I do hope FROM do something crazy like sci-fi at some point. A metroid style game in 3D with their level/environment design would be great!

Only 2 points I want to address.
1. The twitch, aggressive style combat was introduced in Bloodborne, maintained in Shit Souls3 and reaching maturity here, in Sekiro. I agree with you, I also prefer the slower combat from the DkS 1 and 2, but at least they varied it somewhat by adding a dodge/sidestep and jump for specific attacks, which makes the combat a bit more diverse and hard until you know the fight.
2. I assume you didn't progress enough into the game to understand why the enemies respawn, there is a lore reason for that and it becomes important later on. Not going to say more. Just keep playing, pay attention to dialogue, read item descriptions, you know the drill. Also 2 of the endings are directly about that whole......coming back thing.

 

[panda]

For anyone that regularly use the Raven Mist feather prosthetic, how good it is?.

I feel like it is a good tool for bad players, as myself.
If you still can't do correct move (jump vs evade) for red kanji then Mist is a lifesaver as universal dodge.
If you can properly react in time though, then it is not only useless but even harmful to a degree because special counter-moves do really high damage to posture.

In theory it allows you to move behind enemy and start hitting defensless back, but in practice it is better to just deflect everything (granted you good enough to do it of course).
So, again, Mist Raven becomes useful only if you are bad, which is really strange (interesting ?) design.

And it is rather situational too, e.g. i think i used umbrella way more often.
But i won game the with feathers tool as it allowed both to non-stop damage Genichiro(i had to back away after his jump move otherwise) and to dodge/counter some weird ass animation attack in Isshin's phase 2 which was too giving me problems otherwise.

btw i'd say Phase 2 > 3 > Genichiro > 1. Though overall amount of my deaths in phase 1 is comparable to all others combined, once i figured what to do(be aggressive) phase 1 became one of the easiest and fastest fights for me in the entire game.

 

[Child of Malkav]

I expected more to be brutally honest, seeing as God of War sold 3 million in just 3 days and it's a platform exclusive.

God of War is infinitely more popular, more advertised and well known than everything FROM has and will ever make. Temper your expectations.

Nobody's ever heard of Dark Souls sure.

Santa Monica studio developed the 3 GoW games before 2011, when the 1st DkS came out. Their games were popular enough and GoW 3 was very anticipated as the end of a trilogy and Greek story. The 4th one, in 2018, also was developed in like 5 years with a lot of resources at their disposal, which means polish. Also, the marketing and all that. Dark Souls wasn't played by too many people, some dropping after a few bosses, others for whatever reasons and claiming it's the hardest game ever. From Software doesn't have the resources and popularity of other , big, AAA studios. And Sekiro is even more divisive, with game journalists crying out for easy mode and such.

 

[Agame]

The twitch, aggressive style combat was introduced in Bloodborne

Righto, never played it. I sincerely hope we get a "not souls" game with more thoughtfully paced combat at some point in the future.

2. I assume you didn't progress enough into the game to understand why the enemies respawn, there is a lore reason for that and it becomes important later on. Not going to say more. Just keep playing, pay attention to dialogue, read item descriptions, you know the drill. Also 2 of the endings are directly about that whole......coming back thing.

I was going to put a disclaimer that I havnt got far enough in the story, and I assume it will be explained. But if it ends up being "Its all a dream or memories or some other bullshit Im gonna be fuckin pissed...

 

[Child of Malkav]

It's not a dream or a memory.

 

[Parabalus]

I really like how it has less RPG elements than the DSs, so you can't "outstat" enemies as easily. The world seems less open though.

 

[cvv]

I really like how it has less RPG elements than the DSs, so you can't "outstat" enemies as easily. The world seems less open though.

They have absolutely nailed the stat thing. I love it way more than being able to level by farming souls. I can imagine it makes balancing the world way easier and more consistent. Plus you can still grind for skills so they haven't done away with farming completely. Love it.

I'm not sure if the world is less open tho. The levels themselves definitely seem more straightforward. I think Ashina Castle and Hirata Estate are the only ones that fully use the From patented verticality and the maze-like architecture. The rest feel like nothing more than slightly wider corridors. Sad. But the world is nowhere near as linear, quite a few options once you slaughter the bull.

 

[Wunderbar]

2. I assume you didn't progress enough into the game to understand why the enemies respawn, there is a lore reason for that and it becomes important later on. Not going to say more. Just keep playing, pay attention to dialogue, read item descriptions, you know the drill. Also 2 of the endings are directly about that whole......coming back thing.

after beating the game I still don't know why trash mobs are respawning.
I understand about Guardian ape, mibu villagers and football ninjas from Fountainhead palace, but what about common ashina soldiers?

 

[toro]

2. I assume you didn't progress enough into the game to understand why the enemies respawn, there is a lore reason for that and it becomes important later on. Not going to say more. Just keep playing, pay attention to dialogue, read item descriptions, you know the drill. Also 2 of the endings are directly about that whole......coming back thing.

after beating the game I still don't know why trash mobs are respawning.
I understand about Guardian ape, mibu villagers and football ninjas from Fountainhead palace, but what about common ashina soldiers?

plot hole. deal with it.

I'm not sure if the world is less open tho. The levels themselves definitely seem more straightforward. I think Ashina Castle and Hirata Estate are the only ones that fully use the From patented verticality and the maze-like architecture. The rest feel like nothing more than slightly wider corridors. Sad. But the world is nowhere near as linear, quite a few options once you slaughter the bull.

the replay-ability is none-to-zero.

after 2 complete runs, I've started the game 3 more times but I always given up after 2-3 bosses.

 

[cvv]

2. I assume you didn't progress enough into the game to understand why the enemies respawn, there is a lore reason for that and it becomes important later on. Not going to say more. Just keep playing, pay attention to dialogue, read item descriptions, you know the drill. Also 2 of the endings are directly about that whole......coming back thing.

after beating the game I still don't know why trash mobs are respawning.
I understand about Guardian ape, mibu villagers and football ninjas from Fountainhead palace, but what about common ashina soldiers?

Afaik we actually don't know why the Ape, villagers and most of everyone else are respawning either. We only know that Sekiro resurrects because Kuro made him immortal with his divine blood. But what are those worm things inside people and animals and what's the deal with the villagers, that part of the lore is nowhere to be found.

 

[sullynathan]

Before the 2018 GoW came out and was hyped up to all fuck the "Dark Souls" brand was much more of a household name. The new GoW was even called the Dark Souls of the franchise. So chill with your exaggerations.

It's not like god of war as a franchise hasn't sold over 10 million more copies than dark souls as a franchise while having a gaming icon as the protagonist.

When you know the history of both franchises and how much money their owners spend on them, it's not surprising to see the resulting sales.

 

[Wunderbar]

2. I assume you didn't progress enough into the game to understand why the enemies respawn, there is a lore reason for that and it becomes important later on. Not going to say more. Just keep playing, pay attention to dialogue, read item descriptions, you know the drill. Also 2 of the endings are directly about that whole......coming back thing.

after beating the game I still don't know why trash mobs are respawning.
I understand about Guardian ape, mibu villagers and football ninjas from Fountainhead palace, but what about common ashina soldiers?

Afaik we actually don't know why the Ape, villagers and most of everyone else are respawning either. We only know that Sekiro resurrects because Kuro made him immortal with his divine blood. But what are those worm things inside people and animals and what's the deal with the villagers, that part of the lore is nowhere to be found.

water of immortality. Monks from Senpou temple were experimenting with it, thus creating Divine Child.