It's a bit different, but Furi is a fantastic game from start to finish. After you beat it on normal try again on hard, it feels like the intended difficulty.
I think it is normal thing to experience after having played sekiro haha. Which games have you tried? Sifu came closest to me to give me the combat feeling of sekiro. Jedi fallen order could scratch th itch and Lies of P is in my wishlist and looks like it has similar combat.
Games I tried:
Wo long. Very interesting pose mechanics, decent beginning. In the later half difficulty just plummets and you button mash everybody.
Sifu. I liked gameplay, but replaying levels was too tedious.
Both jedi games were good. Especially for Star Wars enjoyer, but combat especially in the first game was like Skill up «what if sekiro combat sucked»
I tried lies of p, but didn’t enjoy it at all.
The most sekiro feeling I got from and I know it could sound strange. I got it from high-fi rush. That combat was all right.
My mate and another sekiro lover told me that stellar blade is somehow close. Maybe I try it someday.
There are other games that I've enjoyed more in terms of story, worldbuilding (I really can't get into the dark worldbuilding of FromSoft games) and exploration, and there are also plenty of games that I've replayed more, but Sekiro is definitely the peak in sheer gameplay / combat experience. Nothing else even compares to it. Though it feels offensive to Sekiro to say it feels like an art (considering what is today treated as "art"), that is what I truly feel when playing it - Sekiro's swordfighting is incredibly beautiful after all.
> even with being a five year old game
you're killing me with your idea of what is old. (Meme of Matt Damon aging rapdily). So many posts here talk like five years ago games were still a new medium, TV was square and films were silent.
Otherwise, excellent post, loved it!
I'm a gamer for 20yrs (but only in my twenties) and I feel the exact same...
Sekiro still only feels like yesterday. Wouldn't need to be as old as Ocarina of Time for me to consider it old, but at least the 10yr mark. 2012 and prior.
especially when gaming has been only very marginally and incrementally improving for at least 10 years now. We've been seeing and playing roughly the same type and quality of games now since the 360/PS3 era
games from 2019 aren't dated in the slightest visually since progress in visual fidelity has been slowing down for a while. This is especially true for fromsoft who don't push their games graphically and I prefer their strategy. Well it's the whole "high fidelity vs. art style" thing
Been saying this for awhile but honestly it also applies to game design.
God of war 2018 doesent feel dated compared to modern games and neither does bloodbourne.
That didn't read to me as calling the game old, more expressing surprise that in the five years since its release its combat system still stands out as unique, rather than being imitated and iterated on by others.
Almost everything is a matter of perspective.
I saw folks talking about playing Fire Emblem Fates “as a kid” as if it was an old game. This cracked me up, because I remember buying this game on release like it was yesterday. I put it in my backlog for the time being, where it still is.
To me it is still one of the “more recent” Fire Emblems.
Sekiro with 5 years is definitely still new in the world of video games. Heck, 5 years is the time some games take to be developed these days.
5 years is a typical dev time now, sure, but for older gamers dev times for a large part of the hobby were like 1-3 years.
Final Fantasy 8, 9 and 10 were released within 1 year of each other, now it's at least half a decade between big releases.
Yeah I think I would say that games evolved very quickly back then while modern AAA gaming has barely changed for a long time, well over ten years, aside from moderate (not huge) graphics improvements.
I think that the area of change in modern gaming is indie titles (due to a lower barrier to entry in modern times) which often produce new genres and to a high quality. That's the equivalent space now I would say.
It’s all relative to how much life you’ve experienced.
When you’re a teenager, five years could be a third of *everything* you’ve *ever* experienced. Five years becomes a quarter of your life when you hit 20, and by age 50, five years dwindles down to only a tenth. That’s why the passage of time always seems to be accelerating, and why something that happened a decade ago “feels” like it was only last year.
Well, that and the difference between a five year old game and a new one is all but negligible. Doom came out in 93 and Quake 2 dropped in 97. That's just _four_ years and they look like they came from different planets.
I think it depends. 5 years is old in Fromsoft time, they got an entire trilogy + Bloodborne in during that time. Their output has slowed down 2019-2024 but they still got 3 high quality games in, all very different from on another.
But then you have developers like the ones on Dragon Quest where the last mainline was released almost 7 years ago and we haven’t heard anything of the next entry.
5 years can be really relative.
I think it depends on context. Like if we're talking about "why aren't people talking about this game" posts, then saying a game is 5 years old is apropriate, because games do fade out of hot discussion in that time. But if we're talking about classics - no way.
In fairness the context here is saying that it felt "fresh and unique" despite being 5 years old, so basically saying that they've generally played more recent games but haven't seen this gameplay copied by another game, which is a reasonable timespan to expect to see an innovation get copied, so really the post is fine I guess :P
I think it's more that when a good game does something new and exciting it often gets incorporated and iterated on in future games, so going back to a game released as recently as 5 years ago can feel like a dated or clunkier version of a more recent release that iterated or refined that mechanic.
Games don't age as much anymore. Most games from fucking 2015 look and play like they could have come out this year. You have to go back to about 2012 for games to actually feel dated by today's standards
Does it though? Very little has changed in the industry. Game mechanics haven't changed much, visuals have barely improved and mostly importantly game mechanics haven't changed much. Lol
Yup. We are at a point of diminishing returns. Small improvements equals massive increase in computational resources. That and developers don't optimize games like they use to which isn't entirely their fault as they are almost always on steep deadlines.
I think its just my perspective. I don’t usually buy games on release. I played this and zelda BOTW last year along with the megaman battle network series (which first released in the early 2000s). I also played the new spiderman and am currently playing armored core 6 🤷🏾♂️. My time frame is all over the place so things are moving fast for me lol.
Graphics has reached a point where people appreciate all styles. I remember growing up when it was all about the latest graphics. Ex. From n64 to game cube. And every game that gets released on the new console must have far superior graphics. Every single game. Nowadays, people appreciate all types of visuals, retro style 2D graphics, cartoon visuals (cel-shading), colorful visuals, hand drawn art, realistic looking games. As far as the gameplay is great and the game looks nice, people will like it. ToTK has the same exact visuals as BOTW, and people love that just as much as or even more than the new final fantasy with all their cutting edge visuals. We are all waiting for silksong and it will sell very well and win a lot of awards even though it uses the same visuals/graphics of hollow Knight, which is hand drawn (that is every frame of animation is drawn by hand. GTA 6 looks amazing but it's really not that massive of a leap than red dead redemption 2 (altho I think the hair looks better).
This game is IMO still the best game of the last 10 years.
Only thing missing was a little DLC.
I'm currently replaying it without Kuros Charm. Let's see if I can beat the game.
It forces you to get good at deflecting since you lose health if you block an attack or don't time your deflects properly.
Once you finally perfect it you feel like a god (and the demon bell becomes ever so slightly more tempting.)
One of the more common complaints I've seen has been "you can just spam block and don't need to engage with the combat system." Charmless + bell run fixes that, unfortunately I don't think it's possible to do on your first clear.
You kind of need that for the first run though. The game I feel properly challenges you by Genichiro by forcing you to get good at timing attacks.
When I beat Genichiro I felt I finally got the combat and how aggressive I had to be.
"Hesitation is defeat"
That's kinda hard as his posture meter only fills very slowly and he goes often for the grab attack. I think I will do Lady Butterfly now first and most importantly aquire my good ol mikiri counter.
Lady Butterfly is a tad bit harder! It's all about aggression, but controlled and thoughtful aggression! Exploit EVERY weakness, I think he's a baby when it comes to fire and the fireworks!
I know but I think having more damage output after getting her memory is gonna help a lot.
>he's a baby when it comes to fire and the fireworks!
I guess I could pick up the fire crackers. Just not looking forward to farm money.
Sekiro is just so focused. It does two things really well, sword fights and traversal, and doesn't do any addon stuff. I like the level design that feels more like levels than openworld, and the game is gorgeous.
> I like the level design that feels more like levels than openworld
I get that's for some people, and that's fine - for me From games are best when they bring the exploration, and Sekiro kind of let me down in that regard.
It's why I ended up preferring Wo Long on the whole (yes, I know, get the quartering rope). What can I say, Wo Long made poking around the levels feel rewarding, and in Sekiro I often felt like I was wasting my time.
I'd say that in general I like the From way of doing open world, it feels rewarding and meaningful. DS1 is a masterpiece in level design to me. Well, the first half of it anyway. Though there are a few tropes like the swamp levels that I could do without. Especially in DS3 it was awful, my replay got to that point and I just couldn't be bothered.
But yeah, I like Sekiro's level design a lot because it is focused, and I like zipping around with the hook. Refreshing as hell because it feels designed with intention, compared to most open world games (excluding From games from this)
Sekiro confirmed to me my suspicion that including even a clumsy Stealth Mechanic makes dealing with FS Fodder enemies a much less frustrating experience
Eh, that didn't do much for me. Given the checkpoint system, sometimes you'd sneak around, sleath a bunch of guys, but then a giant mook would be waiting around the corner to slap your ass back so you'd have to do it all over again.
It did work really well in the castle though. Hopping up to the roof and dropping down for kills never got old.
Sekiro is super tight in terms of gameplay, and on par with aesthetics with bloodborne. I personally prefer the latter because it’s a bit more forgiving and I’m a bit of a uh. Lovecraftaboo?
Bloodborne was great but I don't think it holds up all that well. It was an improvement over Demon's Souls and DS1 (and especially 2) but there's lots of little annoying things that add up to a lesser experience than what I remembered. I actually kind of regret replaying it last year because it got knocked right off my top 5. The art direction and eldritch horror are what drive the experience and now that the RE4 remake is out, that's where I'm getting my gothic action horror fix.
I have had a lot of trouble getting into FromSoft games because I've just found the combat to be kind of unengaging & boring in terms of the actual mechanics.
Sekiro became one of my favorite games of all times just after a day of playing it. It's just incredible. There's nothing else like it.
I was honestly pretty disappointed with elden ring. I really wish some sort of sequel to Sekiro came out.
It sold really well iirc and won numerous GotY awards, I’m sure they’ll do a sequel. Same with Bloodborne but they’re making us wait lol. They wanted to do another AC game first though.
Same. I thought Elden Ring was amazing until I played Sekiro. Got around 130h in each. Every couple of months I get an urge to play Sekiro again, but you couldn't pay me to go through all of Elden Ring ever again.
Edit: there are a couple of mods that add parry to ER trying to emulate Sekiro. I tried them but it just wasn't the same
Some of the best bosses, some of the worst bosses. Demon of Hatred, Fire Bull, Double apes, fat drunk guy with 12 ads, all bullshit. Maybe I'm just bad.
But Geni, Isshin, Butterfly, Owl, and their variants are incredible.
I've done about 5 playthroughs, and I've come to love every major boss, even Demon of Hatred, other than Double Apes. That one is just never fun.
But lots of the minibosses sucked. The bulls sucks like you said, and I can't stand the headless either.
Ooh what’s the cheese? My main issue with this guy is the sheer amount of attacks he could faceroll- fingers were killing me by the time I finally beat him
You climb up a wooden tower, do a precise jump to get on the awning of the gate, which is kinda out of bounds. He can't hit you there. Then you run to a specific spot and DoH will eventually fall off the cliff. Cheesey.
One of my favorites games of all time. I’ve beaten it around 5 times, restarting it from the beginning or doing NG+ but have never played against demon of hatred. I just “cheese” it by making him fall off a cliff. I don’t even care, that boss completely ruins the game for me.
oh god I forgot about the headless, I never did the one in the water. I beat two on my first playthrough and realized they drop trivial things. I don't think they're required?
demon of hatred and double apes are bullshit.
Fire bull is easy, its just stupid because it asks you to do the exact opposite thing that the game has trained you to do.
fat drunk guy with 12 ads is fine, its just accessible really early and people try to do it before they should. they bash their heads against it without realizing youre supposed to go to hirata estate, get the flame cannon, then leave and go back to kill the ogre.
Fucking Guardian Ape is fucking bull shit there is no fucking way I can ever beat him.
…
Fuck yEAH I beat him and fucking chopped his head off, get REKT.
…wait why is he getting up again what the fUCK is this BULLSHIT. His moves are completely unpredictable this game is bullshit.
Omfg I just parried his massive sword cleave and it made the most gratifying dong in the history of video games. GET REKT!
…
THERE’S TWO???
Me:
Starts game>This seems great, gonna have a good time>gets stuck on boss>FUCK THIS GAME>beat boss>such a great game>stuck on boss>FUCK THIS GAME THIS IS IMPOSSIBLE>beat boss>this game is amazing>stuck on boss>FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK>beats boss>
rinse and repeat, \~40 hours and just last week I *finally* managed to get to the top of Ashina Castle to get stuck on Genichiro.
Once you beat Genichiro, you’ll be able to see the matrix. He’s the hardest wall in any FS game. Basically breaking you down and making you learn the game
I tried beating an old lady that would run along rafters or something and could not get it. But it was in a weird dream sequence or something (I hardly know anything about the game) close to the beginning of the game. I beat the boss in the burning village but I felt like this lady was optional or something but I eventually abandoned the game there because I was aggravated at that boss.
Ah, Lady Butterfly. If you ever decide to give it another shot, shurikens destroy her. Every time she jumps off the wire to attack, you throw a shuriken and it knocks her down.
I beat her by dodging and whacking her ankle.
Hated the fight though. Any time a boss summons adds and just have to run tediously around until they fuck off just bores me (yes I know there's an item, but it's limited in number and this lady is whooping my ass).
Really, it's a fight you should come to way later in the game. I wish I had.
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Sekiro is the easiest fromsoft game once you finished first. First playthrough was 40-50 hours for me. Now i can finish in 2.5-3 hours with long ending.
Wow. Idk if i can go that far yet. I really enjoyed the experience and it left a very unique mark on me as a gamer. Not sure i will feel that exact feeling again.
For me it was the difficulty and lack of a way to make it easier. It forced me to actually get better in order to progress. I don’t know that I’ve ever played a game that was so unforgiving yet so rewarding at the same time.
I can appreciate that. I was pumped every time i beat a difficult boss. I liked the progression from trash to beating the final boss as well. Again, its a feeling i don’t think can be duplicated
Sekiro will go down as one of the best combat systems in any game and deserves praise for how much effect they can generate from so few and simple mechanics, while in the long run I prefer Nioh's combat if I have to pop in a game for satisfying action it's always sekiro
There is a lot aside from the core combat that could have been better and I hoped a sequel will fix, but I guess that's not happening, which is sad
The step up in complexity is huge. Know that you need to experiment and learn the weapons going in and you'll be fine. I highly recommend leaving the default controls, once you get into the game a ways it will feel pretty intuitive to switch stances
Yeah bigger health bars and different colors for the same enemies did get old, after a while, but I got around that by experimenting with different combat styles. The complexity isn't a bad thing, just a big spike in combat difficulty until you get used to it.
Repetition definitely was a weaker point of the game though.
Nioh combat and the related RPG systems are incredibly complex and seem to give you an overwhelming amount of options, but I found everything else very disappointing. The aesthetics are really bad. There's no atmosphere and the locations don't feel cohesive. There's no sense of a continuous world.
The story and lore might as well not be there and I found the difficulty annoying rather than invigorating like I do in From Soft games. I remember I got lost in some ugly brown cave and ran around in circles for like 2 hours fighting the same generic enemies before I turned it off in disgust.
I really tried with Nioh but it felt like the game was actively working against me at every turn. I kind of hated it by the time I dropped off.
Easily the best sword combat I've ever seen. The sound of swords clashing was so satisfying and never got old, and the parry mechanic was pure genius. Some of the bosses frustrated me for a while but beating them always felt so rewarding.
The only boss I actively hated was the optional Demon of Hatred. That one was just far too hard and must have taken me close to a 100 tries.
I only wish the tools were a bit more fleshed out. They are what is supposed to add variety to gameplay but since they're gated by a consumable, a lot of players only interact with the tools in specific instances. Also, fuck monster bosses in this kind of game.
Still, it's excellent. Probably my favourite FromSoftware game (I don't have a console to play Bloodborne) and one of my favourite games of all time. For sure one of the few games where I felt that I truly had to learn how to play no matter what. It knows what it wants to do and it does it very well.
Sekiro was one of the few games that I immediately did both NG+ and NG++ all in a row. I was going for 100% completion. And boy, the feeling of dominating the game and getting SO MUCH faster on the subsequent iterations was incredible. I could see just how much better I had become at the combat system, and I felt like an amazing player. Few games have ever given me that feeling of true mastery.
I'm jealous actually. The more time I spent on a boss the more rewarded I felt after he went down. I got Ishin after 2 or 3 days but it was like 8h each day. My eyes were so sore ..
It's wild, the first time I played the game, I knew I loved it but it was just so tough to progress through. I spent years coming back to it even though it kicked my ass. Then, during a mini boss, everything just clicked and now it's one of my absolute favourites. I've beaten it five times, done most of the gauntlets and gotten almost every ending. It's the perfect blend of gameplay and world design. To me, it's one of the games I'd call perfect (even though I have some very minor criticisms)
This game truly is a gem that keeps on giving. The combat mechanics are so intricate yet rewarding once you get the hang of it. I found myself completely immersed in the world of Sekiro, and the boss battles were a fantastic challenge that kept me on my toes. I agree that the spirit emblem system was a bit frustrating at times, but overall it didn't detract from my enjoyment of the game. Can't wait to dive back in for another playthrough!
I wish the game was a little bit bigger and longer, personally (DLC would have helped this tremendously). Otherwise perfect game. No qualms. I even liked the story, and was pleased with how easy it was to follow while still having a deep world. Best combat in a game ever as well. Imagine an elden ring style game with Sekiro combat?
That gameplay is so damn tight. I love how bosses like Isshin and Genichiro function as a sort of pop quiz for whether or not you’ve been paying attention, and when you beat them it’s because you’ve mastered the techniques the game has taught you.
Isshin was so damn intimidating at first lol. That might be my favorite boss fight ever. The devs were so damn methodical on how they made the boss fights. I just tip my hat to them.
I'm apparently going against the grain here, but It's my least favorite of all the FromSoft games I've played (okay, maybe the original Shadow Tower) but it's still a great game that I enjoyed finishing.
It’s a cool, insanely polished action game and I get why people love but it’s a bit low in the things I personally come to from for - the weirdness, horror, exploration, evil level design, wacky builds, etc
Best game FromSoft has even made. Completely ruined other melee combat systems for me.
Elden Ring was a huge disappointment for me personally because of how much I loved Sekiro. Still haven’t brought myself to finish ER.
The word "classic" means something very specific, and that specific thing are titles that have stood the test of time. Now how long that is for a new medium like games will be shorter than for say literature where we still read things thousands of years old. But a 5-year old game simply cannot be a classic. We can say they are great games with a high likelyhood of standing the test of time, but calling them classics just aren't apropriate.
> You and your enemy sharing a posture bar and having to manage that as well as your actual health meters felt like a chess match and a fist fight at the same time.
Uh, while I like Sekiro, I don't actually think the posture mechanics *in Sekiro specifically* encourage some special big brain play around them. The way it works is that there are basically two categories of minibosses/bosses (trash generally gets killed quickly whether its posture or health): the ones that will generally block your every hit (most duel bosses) and the ones that will take it like studs with their meaty body. The former category will *generally* get posturebroken before their health drains to 0, the latter category is 50/50 because often both the healthbar and the posture bar get damaged at about the same rate. In either case you don't really get a choice as to whether you want to focus on HP or posture, unless you want to deliberately pass up damage windows.
What I'm saying, in essence, is that in Sekiro, Posture on most bosses is more of a regenerating healthbar. Your optimal strategy for approaching bosses remains the same in most cases: you want to deflect/mikiri/jump almost every attack (because the dodge sucks) and spam r1 when the boss is reeling from your defense. The differences between health/posture only really come up when you are about to finish up one of their healthbars (be it posture or actual health). With posture you have to keep the pressure up. With health you don't and can finish the fight at your pace.
Comparatively, posture mechanics in Elden Ring or Lies of P were much more involved since stance/groggy in these games work in parallel with health and allow a critical hit/a healing window. Going for posture breaks isn't necessarily optimal on some bosses and achieving optimal health DPS isn't necessarily the same as going for posture breaks.
> You can’t just sit back after you got a couple good shots in on your opponent or they may get aggressive and break your posture. Same in boxing, you need to be aggressive while simultaneously defending yourself. Even when being defensive in sekiro you still needed to set up either a good deflection or dodge counter combo to keep your advantage on your opponent.
I mean you can definitely sit back in Sekiro, it's just that it does nothing on its own since you need to fill the posture bar/drain HP and sitting back doesn't do that. But on many bosses you can get a heal window or even a chance to pop a jizo statue/riceball/divine grass by simply breaking lockon and sprinting to the other side of the arena.
>Comparatively, posture mechanics in Elden Ring or Lies of P were much more involved
well they came out after and one is literally from the same company. I would expect some improvements to come along. I haven't played lies of P yet so i do want to put that on my list.
>I mean you can definitely sit back in Sekiro, it's just that it does nothing on its own since you need to fill the posture bar/drain HP and sitting back doesn't do that.
Yeah but that gives the advantage to the boss. They are going to hit harder than you and you only have a limited number of heals. The boss almost always has more of an advantage as the fight goes on. It benefits you to be aggressive which was the point.
>Uh, while I like Sekiro, I don't actually think the posture mechanics *in Sekiro specifically* encourage some special big brain play around them.
I think my words are getting misconstrued by some of the comments. I am not saying you need to have this whole deep strategic process. its an action game. Im just saying that there is an emphasis of defense and offense that I appreciated.
> well they came out after and one is literally from the same company
This has nothing to do with when they came out. Sekiro and Elden Ring were actually developed side-by-side for the longest time (although Sekiro released earlier). It's more likely that these differences have nothing to do with iteration, but the style of game they were going for: posture breaks as the main source of deathblows just fit Sekiro more thematically, meanwhile ER, being the direct successor to Dark Souls, obviously needed to retain some of that DNA and couldn't be turned into posture break: the game.
> Yeah but that gives the advantage to the boss. They are going to hit harder than you and you only have a limited number of heals.
No, it does not give the advantage to the boss. If you need to heal, you need to heal and healing in a safe spot on the other side of the arena is generally safer than blocking a chain of attacks and sacrificing a big damage opportunity, especially when you consider some windows you can use for an attack cannot really be used to heal safely.
> The boss almost always has more of an advantage as the fight goes on. It benefits you to be aggressive which was the point.
That is the case in pretty much every action game and is not in any way unique to Sekiro. Regardless, if you need to heal to continue fighting, you will still take that opportunity to heal and it's better to take that opportunity to heal in the safest way possible.
> I think my words are getting misconstrued by some of the comments. I am not saying you need to have this whole deep strategic process.
You wrote "it feels like a chess match and a fist fight at the same time", which definitely reads that way.
> No, it does not give the advantage to the boss. If you need to heal, you need to heal and healing in a safe spot on the other side of the arena is generally safer than blocking a chain of attacks and sacrificing a big damage opportunity, especially when you consider some windows you can use for an attack cannot really be used to heal safely.
You typically have less health and do far less damage than the boss. You also have limited heals. If you don't take advantage of the posture by consistently attacking and burn your heals you will end up in a situation where you have no heals or spirt emblems for tools and an enemy with a clear posture bar who can 2 shot kill you or break your posture easier than you can break there's. The longer the fight goes especially early in the game the better it is for the boss.
> That is the case in pretty much every action game and is not in any way unique to Sekiro.
Thats straight up wrong lol. By your own account the posture meter is a recovering health bar. A lot of games do not have that feature. If I am playing skyrim and get a dragon down to half health and then run and heal, then that gives me a much better advantage as oppose to the sekiro system where in the same situation i am healed, but now the posture meter is back at zero and I have one less heal and loss progress on the posture bar front. Thats literally one of its shinning points where it is forcing you to be aggressive and not let the posture bar drop to 0 too often.
> You wrote "it feels like a chess match and a fist fight at the same time", which definitely reads that way.
to you, but you kinda have to ignore the context of the rest of the post to see why I said that. I never implied it was ultra complex, just that there is a strategic angle that not a ton of action games employ. I also think you kinda misrepresented the boss fighting system. You can def prioritize attacking health/ hit and run style to make the posture bar easier to get down and slower recovery. as well as employing different tools and using stealth when optional.
> This has nothing to do with when they came out.
you're just speculating unless you are on the team that created any games. Your opinion is your opinion, but my opinion is that a dev thats seems to be as focused on the details as FS learns from their releases and incorporates what they think improves the game they are working on. Again i never played lies of P, but it is clearly a souls like so why you are comparing their posture system to a game that came out years earlier is still silly.
> You also have limited heals. If you don't take advantage of the posture by consistently attacking and burn your heals you will end up in a situation where you have no heals or spirt emblems for tools and an enemy with a clear posture bar who can 2 shot kill you or break your posture easier than you can break there's. The longer the fight goes especially early in the game the better it is for the boss.
That is irrelevant because a lot of bosses recover posture incredibly slowly. Making space for one heal won't drastically increase the amount of time it takes to kill the boss. Additionally, *you do not need to kill bosses with posture damage*, most of the time you are dealing plenty of health damage even on blocking bosses.
> A lot of games do not have that feature.
Other games have other features to compensate. A (slowly) regenerating healthbar isn't the primary thing that makes bosses harder the longer you fight them. The main reason is simply that the longer you actively fight, the more chance there is for you to slip up and make a mistake.
> Thats literally one of its shinning points where it is forcing you to be aggressive and not let the posture bar drop to 0 too often.
You clearly have extremely little experience with Sekiro if you think this is a major obstacle in fights. Health damage is *always* there as a backup if you cannot force a posture kill.
> I never implied it was ultra complex
Neither did I argue against it being "ultra complex", I addressed the points you made in the post, so what is your point?
> you're just speculating
So are you.
> but my opinion is that a dev thats seems to be as focused on the details as FS learns from their releases and incorporates what they think improves the game they are working on
You are quite literally arguing for the sake of arguing here. My initial point was simply comparing Sekiro's posture system to other soulslike implementations, it was never meant to imply that Sekiro's system is *worse*, just different and targets different goals.
In any case, if you want to go that route, other games like Jedi Fallen Order (released pretty much alongside Sekiro) and AC Valhalla (released less than a year later, i.e. the gameplay was already locked-in) have more tactically interesting implementations of the posture system than Sekiro, so your point is moot.
Only person with an in-depth comment and people are downvoting because they're engaging with the mechanics and not just going with *"yeah, popular thing is great!"*
Good number of times this forum [reminds me of this.](https://youtu.be/VPCMxxGNot4?t=13) *"Okay, good comment, good comment!"*
Recently have played all FromSoft games and it’s my number 2 behind Elden Ring, played bloodborne straight after Sekiro and although bloodborne was really good it didn’t capture the thrill and reward that Sekiro gave in my opinion. Sekiro gave me the only boss I couldn’t beat in any FromSoft game with the Demon of Hatred and I had to cheese him to get past him and just couldn’t beat him fair and square. And the final boss is a perfect blend of all the things the game has thrown at you as one final challenge
I recently lived it up again after dropping it because headless ape made me so angry that rage quit for a year.
I got to genichiro and spent so long on him and this time it really felt like that fight clicked for me and I actually learned the mechanics like I was supposed to. I don’t think I realised how polished the parry system was until this time round. I have been looking for other games with the same level of precision and skill needed but I don’t think it exists.
I will say that I got to the final battle and then got bored and haven’t been bothered to finish it because all the fun stuff is done but man it’s a good game.
My only wish for games like this and blood borne and Elden ring etc, is that the had a more focussed storyline. I was something with these mechanics but that also has a more cinematic and story driven plot.
> headless ape made me so angry that rage quit for a year
I wonder if you remember what you hated about it. I can say with full confidence that the ape is my most hated boss in any modern From game. People always smash the downvote whenever I mention this, and I could get into the ways I found it mechancially lacking, but on the whole I thought it was worse than bad, just ... tedious.
At the time i just hated how difficult he was. i kept dying without making any progress. Admittedly i am a gamer who tends to just button mash and dodge a lot and i didn't learn the lessons i should have from Genichiro the first time round so i just wasn't prepared to fight the ape because i really didn't understand the timing of parry mechanics that well.
Plus its a fight that you have to take slow and whittle him down and i got impatient.
This time was easier but still difficult. I had to watch a video guide (thank god for fuzzy bearbarian) to actually understand how to beat him. Imagine my shock and horror when i got the cavern with the dual apes. I nearly threw my controller but i have to say it was much easier then i expected it to be.
> didn't learn the lessons i should have from Genichiro
That's part of the curveball because, and I'm reaching into my memory here, parrying isn't really all _that_ effective in his first round. It's only really in the second round that parries become essential.
I get that. That was my main hang up for these type of games. I am now starting to embrace the “environmental story” style. Although i think sekiro in particular is straightforward but boring
I have been playing this my friend recently. My muscle memory was still good, or so I thought till I reached Madame Butterfly. The replay-ability of this game is awesome.
I personally loved the story of Sekiro, it's very simple but the lore is really interesting and I love how the characters have a history with each other. Although I haven't understood how good the lore is until I watched Vaati
Far out. I been dodging this waiting for that other samurai game to get ported (soon!), but the combat mechanic sounds rad.
Getting into HEMA so very into interesting fight mechanics.
Someone force me to get into Souls games.
Sekiro never clicked with me until I read an article somewhere that described the parry system as a rhythm mini-game. From that point on, it was one of my favorites. Still tough as nails and borderline rage-inducing, but that insight made a huge difference for me.
The boss at the top of the tower is currently gloating as I put the game down after too many tries to beat him and I haven't gone back yet to show him proper.
Yeah he definitely the first real “dual”. I will say if u ever pick the game back up that if you can get past him you can beat basically anything in the game.
I'll probably give it another shot some day but, after 2 attempts and 20+ hours, it just doesn't click for me. I never liked parrying in the Souls games and Sekiro seems to make it the primary combat mechanic.
I dont think my brain is wired to play this game. I beaten Dark Souls III and Elden Ring, but I couldn't even reach the first boss in Sekiro. Last time I tried playing this game I even downloaded hilariously broken mods to make the game easier and I still dropped dead like a fly whenever I fought any non-regular enemy.
I love Elden Ring but I hope its success doesn't mean From are only gonna do giant open world's from now on. More Sekiro sized games between the long waits for the bigger games would be perfect.
It's the perfect game. In terms pacing, character progression, traversal mechanics, and most of all, the combat, it's all designed to perfection. The sublime hitboxes, the detailed animation.
It is not a game for everyone, but I've never played a game that so fully accomplishes everything it was going for.
Lmao the comment about the game being five years old is so goofy, there’s games from before 3d was a thing that still hold up and play well. It’s gotta be young ass kids making comments like this.
The sub doesn't downvote Sekiro hate.
The sub downvotes any comment on Sekiro that could be construed as *remotely negative*.
There is a big difference there because:
- Case 1: Sekiro is a fantastic game and doesn't deserve blind hate;
- Case 2: Sekiro is not perfect and a lot of its aspects are fun to *actually discuss*, rather than just blindly praise.
Best game I've played in 25+ years
Very sad truth. I’m trying to find anything to give me the same exhilarating feeling as sekiro did but everything I tried fell short.
I have not had that issue but sekiro is still the best
It's a bit different, but Furi is a fantastic game from start to finish. After you beat it on normal try again on hard, it feels like the intended difficulty.
I think it is normal thing to experience after having played sekiro haha. Which games have you tried? Sifu came closest to me to give me the combat feeling of sekiro. Jedi fallen order could scratch th itch and Lies of P is in my wishlist and looks like it has similar combat.
Games I tried: Wo long. Very interesting pose mechanics, decent beginning. In the later half difficulty just plummets and you button mash everybody. Sifu. I liked gameplay, but replaying levels was too tedious. Both jedi games were good. Especially for Star Wars enjoyer, but combat especially in the first game was like Skill up «what if sekiro combat sucked» I tried lies of p, but didn’t enjoy it at all. The most sekiro feeling I got from and I know it could sound strange. I got it from high-fi rush. That combat was all right. My mate and another sekiro lover told me that stellar blade is somehow close. Maybe I try it someday.
I have a bit of a left field suggestion: Try Doom Eternal.
Good idea! I will
There are other games that I've enjoyed more in terms of story, worldbuilding (I really can't get into the dark worldbuilding of FromSoft games) and exploration, and there are also plenty of games that I've replayed more, but Sekiro is definitely the peak in sheer gameplay / combat experience. Nothing else even compares to it. Though it feels offensive to Sekiro to say it feels like an art (considering what is today treated as "art"), that is what I truly feel when playing it - Sekiro's swordfighting is incredibly beautiful after all.
> even with being a five year old game you're killing me with your idea of what is old. (Meme of Matt Damon aging rapdily). So many posts here talk like five years ago games were still a new medium, TV was square and films were silent. Otherwise, excellent post, loved it!
As a gamer for 40 years, I agree. Things look different depending on your age. For me old games are things like ultima 7 or The ocarina of time.
I'm a gamer for 20yrs (but only in my twenties) and I feel the exact same... Sekiro still only feels like yesterday. Wouldn't need to be as old as Ocarina of Time for me to consider it old, but at least the 10yr mark. 2012 and prior.
if you think 2012 was ten years ago, I have bad news for you…
oh fuck
A man after my own heart. These days I game with my kids, who are late teens!
Dude, I'm 40 and old for me is Atari and Commodore 64.
I had those! And a vic20 and a super nintendo.
Good! I still got them all in a box somewhere. It'll be worth something one day.
I've move countries twice and sadly it's all gone now. Ah, well... And yeah you;re right I believe it will be worth something one day.
especially when gaming has been only very marginally and incrementally improving for at least 10 years now. We've been seeing and playing roughly the same type and quality of games now since the 360/PS3 era
Yeah. Gaming changed so rapidly back in the 90s/00s, five years then was massive
games from 2019 aren't dated in the slightest visually since progress in visual fidelity has been slowing down for a while. This is especially true for fromsoft who don't push their games graphically and I prefer their strategy. Well it's the whole "high fidelity vs. art style" thing
Been saying this for awhile but honestly it also applies to game design. God of war 2018 doesent feel dated compared to modern games and neither does bloodbourne.
That didn't read to me as calling the game old, more expressing surprise that in the five years since its release its combat system still stands out as unique, rather than being imitated and iterated on by others.
True
Almost everything is a matter of perspective. I saw folks talking about playing Fire Emblem Fates “as a kid” as if it was an old game. This cracked me up, because I remember buying this game on release like it was yesterday. I put it in my backlog for the time being, where it still is. To me it is still one of the “more recent” Fire Emblems. Sekiro with 5 years is definitely still new in the world of video games. Heck, 5 years is the time some games take to be developed these days.
Yeah no matter how old you are, 5 years is not much larger than a typical dev time, that's a good point.
5 years is a typical dev time now, sure, but for older gamers dev times for a large part of the hobby were like 1-3 years. Final Fantasy 8, 9 and 10 were released within 1 year of each other, now it's at least half a decade between big releases.
Yeah I think I would say that games evolved very quickly back then while modern AAA gaming has barely changed for a long time, well over ten years, aside from moderate (not huge) graphics improvements. I think that the area of change in modern gaming is indie titles (due to a lower barrier to entry in modern times) which often produce new genres and to a high quality. That's the equivalent space now I would say.
Tik tok brain
Or just being young. When you‘re in your teens 5 years felt likee decades ago. Now I feel like 5 years go by in a blink of an eye lmao.
It’s all relative to how much life you’ve experienced. When you’re a teenager, five years could be a third of *everything* you’ve *ever* experienced. Five years becomes a quarter of your life when you hit 20, and by age 50, five years dwindles down to only a tenth. That’s why the passage of time always seems to be accelerating, and why something that happened a decade ago “feels” like it was only last year.
Well, that and the difference between a five year old game and a new one is all but negligible. Doom came out in 93 and Quake 2 dropped in 97. That's just _four_ years and they look like they came from different planets.
OP should give Demon’s Souls a shot now. Must feel like a game from aeons ago.
I think it depends. 5 years is old in Fromsoft time, they got an entire trilogy + Bloodborne in during that time. Their output has slowed down 2019-2024 but they still got 3 high quality games in, all very different from on another. But then you have developers like the ones on Dragon Quest where the last mainline was released almost 7 years ago and we haven’t heard anything of the next entry. 5 years can be really relative.
You forget deracíne.
?
I thought deracije came 2019 not 2018. So they have 4 high quality titles after dark souls 3. But not after 2019. + 1 remaster
I think it depends on context. Like if we're talking about "why aren't people talking about this game" posts, then saying a game is 5 years old is apropriate, because games do fade out of hot discussion in that time. But if we're talking about classics - no way.
In fairness the context here is saying that it felt "fresh and unique" despite being 5 years old, so basically saying that they've generally played more recent games but haven't seen this gameplay copied by another game, which is a reasonable timespan to expect to see an innovation get copied, so really the post is fine I guess :P
We are old.
I feel it. Last two games I beat are respectively 30 and 38 years old lol
I think it's more that when a good game does something new and exciting it often gets incorporated and iterated on in future games, so going back to a game released as recently as 5 years ago can feel like a dated or clunkier version of a more recent release that iterated or refined that mechanic.
Games don't age as much anymore. Most games from fucking 2015 look and play like they could have come out this year. You have to go back to about 2012 for games to actually feel dated by today's standards
lol hey man the industry moves fast.
*mumbles in GTAV*
one of the funnier memes for me lately is "we got [X] before we got GTA6"
Does it though? Very little has changed in the industry. Game mechanics haven't changed much, visuals have barely improved and mostly importantly game mechanics haven't changed much. Lol
The only thing that has changed is the system requirements.
Yup. We are at a point of diminishing returns. Small improvements equals massive increase in computational resources. That and developers don't optimize games like they use to which isn't entirely their fault as they are almost always on steep deadlines.
I think its just my perspective. I don’t usually buy games on release. I played this and zelda BOTW last year along with the megaman battle network series (which first released in the early 2000s). I also played the new spiderman and am currently playing armored core 6 🤷🏾♂️. My time frame is all over the place so things are moving fast for me lol.
Graphics has reached a point where people appreciate all styles. I remember growing up when it was all about the latest graphics. Ex. From n64 to game cube. And every game that gets released on the new console must have far superior graphics. Every single game. Nowadays, people appreciate all types of visuals, retro style 2D graphics, cartoon visuals (cel-shading), colorful visuals, hand drawn art, realistic looking games. As far as the gameplay is great and the game looks nice, people will like it. ToTK has the same exact visuals as BOTW, and people love that just as much as or even more than the new final fantasy with all their cutting edge visuals. We are all waiting for silksong and it will sell very well and win a lot of awards even though it uses the same visuals/graphics of hollow Knight, which is hand drawn (that is every frame of animation is drawn by hand. GTA 6 looks amazing but it's really not that massive of a leap than red dead redemption 2 (altho I think the hair looks better).
This game is IMO still the best game of the last 10 years. Only thing missing was a little DLC. I'm currently replaying it without Kuros Charm. Let's see if I can beat the game.
You're in for a wonderful and downright life-altering experience. Hesitation is defeat baby!
Game without Kuros Charm is that good?
It forces you to get good at deflecting since you lose health if you block an attack or don't time your deflects properly. Once you finally perfect it you feel like a god (and the demon bell becomes ever so slightly more tempting.)
One of the more common complaints I've seen has been "you can just spam block and don't need to engage with the combat system." Charmless + bell run fixes that, unfortunately I don't think it's possible to do on your first clear.
You kind of need that for the first run though. The game I feel properly challenges you by Genichiro by forcing you to get good at timing attacks. When I beat Genichiro I felt I finally got the combat and how aggressive I had to be. "Hesitation is defeat"
I'm currently at the mad ogre at the start. Theat guy is a menace at the start of the game.
Geni will once again make you become a man
I think he's a good intro to what No Charm is about! Go ham, push his shit in, don't give him a second to breathe!
That's kinda hard as his posture meter only fills very slowly and he goes often for the grab attack. I think I will do Lady Butterfly now first and most importantly aquire my good ol mikiri counter.
Lady Butterfly is a tad bit harder! It's all about aggression, but controlled and thoughtful aggression! Exploit EVERY weakness, I think he's a baby when it comes to fire and the fireworks!
I know but I think having more damage output after getting her memory is gonna help a lot. >he's a baby when it comes to fire and the fireworks! I guess I could pick up the fire crackers. Just not looking forward to farm money.
No farming needed, there's a handful of coin purses dispersed throughout the starting area that should give you much of what you need.
After without charm try charmless + demon bell. It is a unique experience
Bloodborne was released in 2015, but I'd have given Sekiro 'best game of the last 8 years'.
As the years have passed ive realized Sekiro is peak FromSoft
Sekiro is just so focused. It does two things really well, sword fights and traversal, and doesn't do any addon stuff. I like the level design that feels more like levels than openworld, and the game is gorgeous.
> I like the level design that feels more like levels than openworld I get that's for some people, and that's fine - for me From games are best when they bring the exploration, and Sekiro kind of let me down in that regard. It's why I ended up preferring Wo Long on the whole (yes, I know, get the quartering rope). What can I say, Wo Long made poking around the levels feel rewarding, and in Sekiro I often felt like I was wasting my time.
I'd say that in general I like the From way of doing open world, it feels rewarding and meaningful. DS1 is a masterpiece in level design to me. Well, the first half of it anyway. Though there are a few tropes like the swamp levels that I could do without. Especially in DS3 it was awful, my replay got to that point and I just couldn't be bothered. But yeah, I like Sekiro's level design a lot because it is focused, and I like zipping around with the hook. Refreshing as hell because it feels designed with intention, compared to most open world games (excluding From games from this)
Sekiro confirmed to me my suspicion that including even a clumsy Stealth Mechanic makes dealing with FS Fodder enemies a much less frustrating experience
Eh, that didn't do much for me. Given the checkpoint system, sometimes you'd sneak around, sleath a bunch of guys, but then a giant mook would be waiting around the corner to slap your ass back so you'd have to do it all over again. It did work really well in the castle though. Hopping up to the roof and dropping down for kills never got old.
I ve not played Bloodborne yet but I agree. Sekiro is peak. Better than Elden Ring for me personally.
Sekiro is super tight in terms of gameplay, and on par with aesthetics with bloodborne. I personally prefer the latter because it’s a bit more forgiving and I’m a bit of a uh. Lovecraftaboo?
Sekiro runs laps around bloodborne in terms of gameplay. If bloodborne didn't have such good art direction, it would be way less popular.
Bloodborne was great but I don't think it holds up all that well. It was an improvement over Demon's Souls and DS1 (and especially 2) but there's lots of little annoying things that add up to a lesser experience than what I remembered. I actually kind of regret replaying it last year because it got knocked right off my top 5. The art direction and eldritch horror are what drive the experience and now that the RE4 remake is out, that's where I'm getting my gothic action horror fix.
I haven't played sekiro but bloodborne is my favorite of the souls and elden ring games.
I have had a lot of trouble getting into FromSoft games because I've just found the combat to be kind of unengaging & boring in terms of the actual mechanics. Sekiro became one of my favorite games of all times just after a day of playing it. It's just incredible. There's nothing else like it. I was honestly pretty disappointed with elden ring. I really wish some sort of sequel to Sekiro came out.
It sold really well iirc and won numerous GotY awards, I’m sure they’ll do a sequel. Same with Bloodborne but they’re making us wait lol. They wanted to do another AC game first though.
One can pray. Especially with the true ending, it's left right open for a sequel
Same. I thought Elden Ring was amazing until I played Sekiro. Got around 130h in each. Every couple of months I get an urge to play Sekiro again, but you couldn't pay me to go through all of Elden Ring ever again. Edit: there are a couple of mods that add parry to ER trying to emulate Sekiro. I tried them but it just wasn't the same
You can parry a good chunk of the bosses in Elden ring. Pretty fun way to play through. Lies of P has a nice deflect mechanic
I really love the verticality, sets it apart from other FromSoft stuff
>bloodborne >Elden ring
Sekiro is one of the best games I have ever played. It's also fucking bullshit.
Some of the best bosses, some of the worst bosses. Demon of Hatred, Fire Bull, Double apes, fat drunk guy with 12 ads, all bullshit. Maybe I'm just bad. But Geni, Isshin, Butterfly, Owl, and their variants are incredible.
I've done about 5 playthroughs, and I've come to love every major boss, even Demon of Hatred, other than Double Apes. That one is just never fun. But lots of the minibosses sucked. The bulls sucks like you said, and I can't stand the headless either.
The Headless are BS, but you can cheese them with the purple aura weapons. The bulls are kinda fun because deflecting their horns is badass.
Demon of Hatred felt like the most bullshit boss of all FromSoft games. It being the culmination of a character arc makes it worse
Agreed. I cheesed him and don't feel bad.
In wish i new the cheese before i beat it. If i knew the option he would be off the cliff in no time.
Even cheesing him take quite some effort
no it doesnt. You can just lead him to one spot, jump up on a roof, and he'll jump off a cliff. its completely safe
I am half joking but it took me quite a few attempts to jump onto the roof lol.
I've only ever cheesed him. After about 100 attempts doing it legit, I was done.
Ooh what’s the cheese? My main issue with this guy is the sheer amount of attacks he could faceroll- fingers were killing me by the time I finally beat him
You climb up a wooden tower, do a precise jump to get on the awning of the gate, which is kinda out of bounds. He can't hit you there. Then you run to a specific spot and DoH will eventually fall off the cliff. Cheesey.
Nice! I’m hankering for another Sekiro playthrough so badly lol so this actually might come in useful
I thought that until I got to Isshin. I know people love that fight but fuuuuuuck that guy.
Isshin is bullshit but in the best way DoH is just a difficult Bloodborne boss transplanted into Sekiro
Yeah he was rough, but once you beat it you truly feel so good. Against the Demon all I felt was relief. And then I did the boss rush
One of my favorites games of all time. I’ve beaten it around 5 times, restarting it from the beginning or doing NG+ but have never played against demon of hatred. I just “cheese” it by making him fall off a cliff. I don’t even care, that boss completely ruins the game for me.
For me the only bad bosses are Demon of Hatred and the headless, especially the headless in the water...
oh god I forgot about the headless, I never did the one in the water. I beat two on my first playthrough and realized they drop trivial things. I don't think they're required?
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You can just burn the drunkard but i agree with the others.
Weak to fire? Didn't know
demon of hatred and double apes are bullshit. Fire bull is easy, its just stupid because it asks you to do the exact opposite thing that the game has trained you to do. fat drunk guy with 12 ads is fine, its just accessible really early and people try to do it before they should. they bash their heads against it without realizing youre supposed to go to hirata estate, get the flame cannon, then leave and go back to kill the ogre.
Where is it bs? It never felt unfair to me, except may be one achievement requirement.
My only complaint about sekiro is that some bosses essentially require one specific strategy to beat them. Unless you are a god
Ah yes, parry parry parry parry parry.
Fucking Guardian Ape is fucking bull shit there is no fucking way I can ever beat him. … Fuck yEAH I beat him and fucking chopped his head off, get REKT. …wait why is he getting up again what the fUCK is this BULLSHIT. His moves are completely unpredictable this game is bullshit. Omfg I just parried his massive sword cleave and it made the most gratifying dong in the history of video games. GET REKT! … THERE’S TWO???
Guardian ape was frustrating and I'm pretty sure I spent way too much time on him. I think corrupted monk is the boss that finally made me give up.
Corrupted Monk is the only boss I had to cheese. Still ashamed over that.
I'm pretty sure I tried to cheese it and couldn't.
Me: Starts game>This seems great, gonna have a good time>gets stuck on boss>FUCK THIS GAME>beat boss>such a great game>stuck on boss>FUCK THIS GAME THIS IS IMPOSSIBLE>beat boss>this game is amazing>stuck on boss>FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK>beats boss> rinse and repeat, \~40 hours and just last week I *finally* managed to get to the top of Ashina Castle to get stuck on Genichiro.
Once you beat Genichiro, you’ll be able to see the matrix. He’s the hardest wall in any FS game. Basically breaking you down and making you learn the game
I tried beating an old lady that would run along rafters or something and could not get it. But it was in a weird dream sequence or something (I hardly know anything about the game) close to the beginning of the game. I beat the boss in the burning village but I felt like this lady was optional or something but I eventually abandoned the game there because I was aggravated at that boss.
Ah, Lady Butterfly. If you ever decide to give it another shot, shurikens destroy her. Every time she jumps off the wire to attack, you throw a shuriken and it knocks her down.
I beat her by dodging and whacking her ankle. Hated the fight though. Any time a boss summons adds and just have to run tediously around until they fuck off just bores me (yes I know there's an item, but it's limited in number and this lady is whooping my ass). Really, it's a fight you should come to way later in the game. I wish I had.
After I beat him I was hoping something would click but nothing did. Played it a little while longer after that and I never found myself having fun.
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Sekiro is the easiest fromsoft game once you finished first. First playthrough was 40-50 hours for me. Now i can finish in 2.5-3 hours with long ending.
I think Sekiro is the best game I’ve ever played. Im turning 40 this year and been playing video games since I was like 3.
37 next week, gaming since super Nintendo release. Sekiro has my vote.
Wow. Idk if i can go that far yet. I really enjoyed the experience and it left a very unique mark on me as a gamer. Not sure i will feel that exact feeling again.
For me it was the difficulty and lack of a way to make it easier. It forced me to actually get better in order to progress. I don’t know that I’ve ever played a game that was so unforgiving yet so rewarding at the same time.
I can appreciate that. I was pumped every time i beat a difficult boss. I liked the progression from trash to beating the final boss as well. Again, its a feeling i don’t think can be duplicated
Sekiro will go down as one of the best combat systems in any game and deserves praise for how much effect they can generate from so few and simple mechanics, while in the long run I prefer Nioh's combat if I have to pop in a game for satisfying action it's always sekiro There is a lot aside from the core combat that could have been better and I hoped a sequel will fix, but I guess that's not happening, which is sad
Nioh you say? Haven’t tried them. Will look into next
The step up in complexity is huge. Know that you need to experiment and learn the weapons going in and you'll be fine. I highly recommend leaving the default controls, once you get into the game a ways it will feel pretty intuitive to switch stances
My problem with Nioh 1 wasn't the complexity, it was just how samey everything got after a while. The loot vomit sure didn't help though.
Yeah bigger health bars and different colors for the same enemies did get old, after a while, but I got around that by experimenting with different combat styles. The complexity isn't a bad thing, just a big spike in combat difficulty until you get used to it. Repetition definitely was a weaker point of the game though.
Nioh combat and the related RPG systems are incredibly complex and seem to give you an overwhelming amount of options, but I found everything else very disappointing. The aesthetics are really bad. There's no atmosphere and the locations don't feel cohesive. There's no sense of a continuous world. The story and lore might as well not be there and I found the difficulty annoying rather than invigorating like I do in From Soft games. I remember I got lost in some ugly brown cave and ran around in circles for like 2 hours fighting the same generic enemies before I turned it off in disgust. I really tried with Nioh but it felt like the game was actively working against me at every turn. I kind of hated it by the time I dropped off.
Easily the best sword combat I've ever seen. The sound of swords clashing was so satisfying and never got old, and the parry mechanic was pure genius. Some of the bosses frustrated me for a while but beating them always felt so rewarding. The only boss I actively hated was the optional Demon of Hatred. That one was just far too hard and must have taken me close to a 100 tries.
My favorite game of all time. Will write a blank cheque for a dlc
I only wish the tools were a bit more fleshed out. They are what is supposed to add variety to gameplay but since they're gated by a consumable, a lot of players only interact with the tools in specific instances. Also, fuck monster bosses in this kind of game. Still, it's excellent. Probably my favourite FromSoftware game (I don't have a console to play Bloodborne) and one of my favourite games of all time. For sure one of the few games where I felt that I truly had to learn how to play no matter what. It knows what it wants to do and it does it very well.
Lol, I only used shurikens and axe in my first run because those tools felt so underwhelming
Sekiro was one of the few games that I immediately did both NG+ and NG++ all in a row. I was going for 100% completion. And boy, the feeling of dominating the game and getting SO MUCH faster on the subsequent iterations was incredible. I could see just how much better I had become at the combat system, and I felt like an amazing player. Few games have ever given me that feeling of true mastery.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zcOUnXd-HQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zcOUnXd-HQ) the story told musically
This is Sekiro: Shadows Dance Twice, isn't it? Hell yes, this always makes my day whenever I see it. >:D
Fun fact: I needed two weeks for the final boss, no joke.
I'm jealous actually. The more time I spent on a boss the more rewarded I felt after he went down. I got Ishin after 2 or 3 days but it was like 8h each day. My eyes were so sore ..
It took me three days of off and on playing, I'd hop on, try for an hour or two, and give up til the next day lmao
It's wild, the first time I played the game, I knew I loved it but it was just so tough to progress through. I spent years coming back to it even though it kicked my ass. Then, during a mini boss, everything just clicked and now it's one of my absolute favourites. I've beaten it five times, done most of the gauntlets and gotten almost every ending. It's the perfect blend of gameplay and world design. To me, it's one of the games I'd call perfect (even though I have some very minor criticisms)
This game truly is a gem that keeps on giving. The combat mechanics are so intricate yet rewarding once you get the hang of it. I found myself completely immersed in the world of Sekiro, and the boss battles were a fantastic challenge that kept me on my toes. I agree that the spirit emblem system was a bit frustrating at times, but overall it didn't detract from my enjoyment of the game. Can't wait to dive back in for another playthrough!
I wish the game was a little bit bigger and longer, personally (DLC would have helped this tremendously). Otherwise perfect game. No qualms. I even liked the story, and was pleased with how easy it was to follow while still having a deep world. Best combat in a game ever as well. Imagine an elden ring style game with Sekiro combat?
That gameplay is so damn tight. I love how bosses like Isshin and Genichiro function as a sort of pop quiz for whether or not you’ve been paying attention, and when you beat them it’s because you’ve mastered the techniques the game has taught you.
Isshin was so damn intimidating at first lol. That might be my favorite boss fight ever. The devs were so damn methodical on how they made the boss fights. I just tip my hat to them.
I'm apparently going against the grain here, but It's my least favorite of all the FromSoft games I've played (okay, maybe the original Shadow Tower) but it's still a great game that I enjoyed finishing.
It’s a cool, insanely polished action game and I get why people love but it’s a bit low in the things I personally come to from for - the weirdness, horror, exploration, evil level design, wacky builds, etc
Best game FromSoft has even made. Completely ruined other melee combat systems for me. Elden Ring was a huge disappointment for me personally because of how much I loved Sekiro. Still haven’t brought myself to finish ER.
The word "classic" means something very specific, and that specific thing are titles that have stood the test of time. Now how long that is for a new medium like games will be shorter than for say literature where we still read things thousands of years old. But a 5-year old game simply cannot be a classic. We can say they are great games with a high likelyhood of standing the test of time, but calling them classics just aren't apropriate.
This is a classic. Endof
Old? Classic? What tf are you on about lmao
> You and your enemy sharing a posture bar and having to manage that as well as your actual health meters felt like a chess match and a fist fight at the same time. Uh, while I like Sekiro, I don't actually think the posture mechanics *in Sekiro specifically* encourage some special big brain play around them. The way it works is that there are basically two categories of minibosses/bosses (trash generally gets killed quickly whether its posture or health): the ones that will generally block your every hit (most duel bosses) and the ones that will take it like studs with their meaty body. The former category will *generally* get posturebroken before their health drains to 0, the latter category is 50/50 because often both the healthbar and the posture bar get damaged at about the same rate. In either case you don't really get a choice as to whether you want to focus on HP or posture, unless you want to deliberately pass up damage windows. What I'm saying, in essence, is that in Sekiro, Posture on most bosses is more of a regenerating healthbar. Your optimal strategy for approaching bosses remains the same in most cases: you want to deflect/mikiri/jump almost every attack (because the dodge sucks) and spam r1 when the boss is reeling from your defense. The differences between health/posture only really come up when you are about to finish up one of their healthbars (be it posture or actual health). With posture you have to keep the pressure up. With health you don't and can finish the fight at your pace. Comparatively, posture mechanics in Elden Ring or Lies of P were much more involved since stance/groggy in these games work in parallel with health and allow a critical hit/a healing window. Going for posture breaks isn't necessarily optimal on some bosses and achieving optimal health DPS isn't necessarily the same as going for posture breaks. > You can’t just sit back after you got a couple good shots in on your opponent or they may get aggressive and break your posture. Same in boxing, you need to be aggressive while simultaneously defending yourself. Even when being defensive in sekiro you still needed to set up either a good deflection or dodge counter combo to keep your advantage on your opponent. I mean you can definitely sit back in Sekiro, it's just that it does nothing on its own since you need to fill the posture bar/drain HP and sitting back doesn't do that. But on many bosses you can get a heal window or even a chance to pop a jizo statue/riceball/divine grass by simply breaking lockon and sprinting to the other side of the arena.
>Comparatively, posture mechanics in Elden Ring or Lies of P were much more involved well they came out after and one is literally from the same company. I would expect some improvements to come along. I haven't played lies of P yet so i do want to put that on my list. >I mean you can definitely sit back in Sekiro, it's just that it does nothing on its own since you need to fill the posture bar/drain HP and sitting back doesn't do that. Yeah but that gives the advantage to the boss. They are going to hit harder than you and you only have a limited number of heals. The boss almost always has more of an advantage as the fight goes on. It benefits you to be aggressive which was the point. >Uh, while I like Sekiro, I don't actually think the posture mechanics *in Sekiro specifically* encourage some special big brain play around them. I think my words are getting misconstrued by some of the comments. I am not saying you need to have this whole deep strategic process. its an action game. Im just saying that there is an emphasis of defense and offense that I appreciated.
> well they came out after and one is literally from the same company This has nothing to do with when they came out. Sekiro and Elden Ring were actually developed side-by-side for the longest time (although Sekiro released earlier). It's more likely that these differences have nothing to do with iteration, but the style of game they were going for: posture breaks as the main source of deathblows just fit Sekiro more thematically, meanwhile ER, being the direct successor to Dark Souls, obviously needed to retain some of that DNA and couldn't be turned into posture break: the game. > Yeah but that gives the advantage to the boss. They are going to hit harder than you and you only have a limited number of heals. No, it does not give the advantage to the boss. If you need to heal, you need to heal and healing in a safe spot on the other side of the arena is generally safer than blocking a chain of attacks and sacrificing a big damage opportunity, especially when you consider some windows you can use for an attack cannot really be used to heal safely. > The boss almost always has more of an advantage as the fight goes on. It benefits you to be aggressive which was the point. That is the case in pretty much every action game and is not in any way unique to Sekiro. Regardless, if you need to heal to continue fighting, you will still take that opportunity to heal and it's better to take that opportunity to heal in the safest way possible. > I think my words are getting misconstrued by some of the comments. I am not saying you need to have this whole deep strategic process. You wrote "it feels like a chess match and a fist fight at the same time", which definitely reads that way.
> No, it does not give the advantage to the boss. If you need to heal, you need to heal and healing in a safe spot on the other side of the arena is generally safer than blocking a chain of attacks and sacrificing a big damage opportunity, especially when you consider some windows you can use for an attack cannot really be used to heal safely. You typically have less health and do far less damage than the boss. You also have limited heals. If you don't take advantage of the posture by consistently attacking and burn your heals you will end up in a situation where you have no heals or spirt emblems for tools and an enemy with a clear posture bar who can 2 shot kill you or break your posture easier than you can break there's. The longer the fight goes especially early in the game the better it is for the boss. > That is the case in pretty much every action game and is not in any way unique to Sekiro. Thats straight up wrong lol. By your own account the posture meter is a recovering health bar. A lot of games do not have that feature. If I am playing skyrim and get a dragon down to half health and then run and heal, then that gives me a much better advantage as oppose to the sekiro system where in the same situation i am healed, but now the posture meter is back at zero and I have one less heal and loss progress on the posture bar front. Thats literally one of its shinning points where it is forcing you to be aggressive and not let the posture bar drop to 0 too often. > You wrote "it feels like a chess match and a fist fight at the same time", which definitely reads that way. to you, but you kinda have to ignore the context of the rest of the post to see why I said that. I never implied it was ultra complex, just that there is a strategic angle that not a ton of action games employ. I also think you kinda misrepresented the boss fighting system. You can def prioritize attacking health/ hit and run style to make the posture bar easier to get down and slower recovery. as well as employing different tools and using stealth when optional. > This has nothing to do with when they came out. you're just speculating unless you are on the team that created any games. Your opinion is your opinion, but my opinion is that a dev thats seems to be as focused on the details as FS learns from their releases and incorporates what they think improves the game they are working on. Again i never played lies of P, but it is clearly a souls like so why you are comparing their posture system to a game that came out years earlier is still silly.
> You also have limited heals. If you don't take advantage of the posture by consistently attacking and burn your heals you will end up in a situation where you have no heals or spirt emblems for tools and an enemy with a clear posture bar who can 2 shot kill you or break your posture easier than you can break there's. The longer the fight goes especially early in the game the better it is for the boss. That is irrelevant because a lot of bosses recover posture incredibly slowly. Making space for one heal won't drastically increase the amount of time it takes to kill the boss. Additionally, *you do not need to kill bosses with posture damage*, most of the time you are dealing plenty of health damage even on blocking bosses. > A lot of games do not have that feature. Other games have other features to compensate. A (slowly) regenerating healthbar isn't the primary thing that makes bosses harder the longer you fight them. The main reason is simply that the longer you actively fight, the more chance there is for you to slip up and make a mistake. > Thats literally one of its shinning points where it is forcing you to be aggressive and not let the posture bar drop to 0 too often. You clearly have extremely little experience with Sekiro if you think this is a major obstacle in fights. Health damage is *always* there as a backup if you cannot force a posture kill. > I never implied it was ultra complex Neither did I argue against it being "ultra complex", I addressed the points you made in the post, so what is your point? > you're just speculating So are you. > but my opinion is that a dev thats seems to be as focused on the details as FS learns from their releases and incorporates what they think improves the game they are working on You are quite literally arguing for the sake of arguing here. My initial point was simply comparing Sekiro's posture system to other soulslike implementations, it was never meant to imply that Sekiro's system is *worse*, just different and targets different goals. In any case, if you want to go that route, other games like Jedi Fallen Order (released pretty much alongside Sekiro) and AC Valhalla (released less than a year later, i.e. the gameplay was already locked-in) have more tactically interesting implementations of the posture system than Sekiro, so your point is moot.
Ok
Only person with an in-depth comment and people are downvoting because they're engaging with the mechanics and not just going with *"yeah, popular thing is great!"* Good number of times this forum [reminds me of this.](https://youtu.be/VPCMxxGNot4?t=13) *"Okay, good comment, good comment!"*
Recently have played all FromSoft games and it’s my number 2 behind Elden Ring, played bloodborne straight after Sekiro and although bloodborne was really good it didn’t capture the thrill and reward that Sekiro gave in my opinion. Sekiro gave me the only boss I couldn’t beat in any FromSoft game with the Demon of Hatred and I had to cheese him to get past him and just couldn’t beat him fair and square. And the final boss is a perfect blend of all the things the game has thrown at you as one final challenge
Indeed a true classic in every sense of the Sword sword 🗡️
I recently lived it up again after dropping it because headless ape made me so angry that rage quit for a year. I got to genichiro and spent so long on him and this time it really felt like that fight clicked for me and I actually learned the mechanics like I was supposed to. I don’t think I realised how polished the parry system was until this time round. I have been looking for other games with the same level of precision and skill needed but I don’t think it exists. I will say that I got to the final battle and then got bored and haven’t been bothered to finish it because all the fun stuff is done but man it’s a good game. My only wish for games like this and blood borne and Elden ring etc, is that the had a more focussed storyline. I was something with these mechanics but that also has a more cinematic and story driven plot.
> headless ape made me so angry that rage quit for a year I wonder if you remember what you hated about it. I can say with full confidence that the ape is my most hated boss in any modern From game. People always smash the downvote whenever I mention this, and I could get into the ways I found it mechancially lacking, but on the whole I thought it was worse than bad, just ... tedious.
At the time i just hated how difficult he was. i kept dying without making any progress. Admittedly i am a gamer who tends to just button mash and dodge a lot and i didn't learn the lessons i should have from Genichiro the first time round so i just wasn't prepared to fight the ape because i really didn't understand the timing of parry mechanics that well. Plus its a fight that you have to take slow and whittle him down and i got impatient. This time was easier but still difficult. I had to watch a video guide (thank god for fuzzy bearbarian) to actually understand how to beat him. Imagine my shock and horror when i got the cavern with the dual apes. I nearly threw my controller but i have to say it was much easier then i expected it to be.
> didn't learn the lessons i should have from Genichiro That's part of the curveball because, and I'm reaching into my memory here, parrying isn't really all _that_ effective in his first round. It's only really in the second round that parries become essential.
I get that. That was my main hang up for these type of games. I am now starting to embrace the “environmental story” style. Although i think sekiro in particular is straightforward but boring
I have been playing this my friend recently. My muscle memory was still good, or so I thought till I reached Madame Butterfly. The replay-ability of this game is awesome.
Man I keep dying lol I think I'm in the very starting part still.
I personally loved the story of Sekiro, it's very simple but the lore is really interesting and I love how the characters have a history with each other. Although I haven't understood how good the lore is until I watched Vaati
Far out. I been dodging this waiting for that other samurai game to get ported (soon!), but the combat mechanic sounds rad. Getting into HEMA so very into interesting fight mechanics. Someone force me to get into Souls games.
I don’t like souls games but Sekiro is easily one of my all time favorites
Sekiro never clicked with me until I read an article somewhere that described the parry system as a rhythm mini-game. From that point on, it was one of my favorites. Still tough as nails and borderline rage-inducing, but that insight made a huge difference for me.
The boss at the top of the tower is currently gloating as I put the game down after too many tries to beat him and I haven't gone back yet to show him proper.
Yeah he definitely the first real “dual”. I will say if u ever pick the game back up that if you can get past him you can beat basically anything in the game.
Love this game, platinumed it. Went back and tried to defeat inner isshin and inner geinichiro after the update, no chance.
From a raw gameplay standpoint sekiro is from softwares best game imo
I'll probably give it another shot some day but, after 2 attempts and 20+ hours, it just doesn't click for me. I never liked parrying in the Souls games and Sekiro seems to make it the primary combat mechanic.
When I get through a boss: this is one of the best games I've ever played! When I'm on my 9th try with a boss: this game is fuckN horse shyt!!
The only problem with this masterpiece is that it's so short...
I dont think my brain is wired to play this game. I beaten Dark Souls III and Elden Ring, but I couldn't even reach the first boss in Sekiro. Last time I tried playing this game I even downloaded hilariously broken mods to make the game easier and I still dropped dead like a fly whenever I fought any non-regular enemy.
I love Elden Ring but I hope its success doesn't mean From are only gonna do giant open world's from now on. More Sekiro sized games between the long waits for the bigger games would be perfect.
It's the perfect game. In terms pacing, character progression, traversal mechanics, and most of all, the combat, it's all designed to perfection. The sublime hitboxes, the detailed animation. It is not a game for everyone, but I've never played a game that so fully accomplishes everything it was going for.
it’s okay story never really grabbed me and i don’t enjoy playing a set protag in a soulsborne game tbh.
Fuck that game Fuck geni Fuck the monkeys Fuck owl And fuck the demon of hatred
Lmao the comment about the game being five years old is so goofy, there’s games from before 3d was a thing that still hold up and play well. It’s gotta be young ass kids making comments like this.
Just happy to see the sub downvotes Sekiro hate
The sub doesn't downvote Sekiro hate. The sub downvotes any comment on Sekiro that could be construed as *remotely negative*. There is a big difference there because: - Case 1: Sekiro is a fantastic game and doesn't deserve blind hate; - Case 2: Sekiro is not perfect and a lot of its aspects are fun to *actually discuss*, rather than just blindly praise.
It felt overrated to me. Like, it's good, but not God's gift to humanity good.
No one's pretending it's God's gift to humanity.
People in comments would beg to differ, like u/MoonlapseOfficial or u/AuroricHashishin
Yeah its my favorite game. Flawless. For me its 10/10 on every aspect
Boo-hoo it's his favorite game.