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Why Nioh 2 still stands out in the soul space


The most memorable enemy I encountered in a video game this year was not the rotten valkyrie Malenia from the Elden Ring, as well as any of the other fearsome deniers of the Lands Between. Nor are any horrible bats, zombies and ghouls attacking you after a few minutes of the game lunch in Vampire Survivors bullet hell. No, the enemy that I miss the most is a humble enemy from the first 30 minutes of Team Ninja’s 2020 samurai Soulslike Nioh 2– an enemy that you will kill hundreds of times in any level of the game, but still equally important.

Nioh 2’s first level makes a clear statement in every conceivable way. This is not a game that makes it easy to get into its core loop through the tutorial. The Enki you fight in the game’s first “Dark Realm” is a big challenge – and he’s merely the first enemy you can’t take down.

Now playing: Nioh 2 video review

I was a bit embarrassed to die with this spear yokai for the first time – anyway, as someone who beat Nioh 1, I think I’ll be well prepared for at least the first few hours of the season. next. However, 20 deaths later dimmed this impression. In short, this first Enki is Nioh 2. If you can beat him, you can conquer the rest of the game, but it won’t be easy for you either way.

The Nioh series is often described as Team Ninja taking on a Soul-like role, and that comparison is well-founded – at least to a certain extent. It has many of the elements typical of the From Software game: winding levels with gradual checkpoints, enemies that respawn after each ‘fire’, and extremely difficult bosses. However, once you get past this shallow layer, you’ll find that Nioh is more comparable to a character action game like Devil May Cry than a game like Elden Ring.

Your Yokai attacks really increase the odds.
Your Yokai attacks really increase the odds.

The first lesson Enki teaches you is the basic one: enemies strike hard in Nioh 2. Two chain blows from any enemy are almost always enough to take you down, and even weak enemies will have four or five hits. combine to rock you with. The second lesson you’re likely to learn – especially if you’re coming from the Souls game – is that dodging rhythm game-style attacks isn’t the way to go in Nioh, unless you really know. what am i doing. doing. Instead, it’s best to use your block to avoid oncoming attacks, using your dodge to get out of the way of high winds.

The most important technique in Nioh 2 is the “ki pulse”, which is essentially an alternate version of Gears of War’s active reload. Tapping the right shoulder button at the end of a combo will return you a large portion of your stamina (called “ki”). If you time your beats perfectly, it will also dispel pockets of “shadow worlds” around you, which slows down your ki regeneration rate and often makes yokai harder to deal with. Since blocking consumes ki and almost every action requires it, it’s fair to say that ki equates to life in Nioh – if you run out of it, all you can do is stand there and try Block the inevitable finishing blow from your opponent.

If that’s not enough to deal with, each weapon also has three different states, each with its own strengths, weaknesses, and move sets. The low stance is fast and slippery, the medium stance excels at blocking and stabilizing, and the high stance is slow and hits like a truck. Switching between poses in a beat gives you a little extra ki recovery, which strongly encourages you to learn their basics to punish your enemies appropriately.

One of the big reasons this particular Enki became a stumbling block for many players was because the first fight took place in a “shadow world” area. Unlike the bags I mentioned earlier, there’s nothing you can do with these washed out monochromes and they reduce your ki regeneration rate significantly. However, there are also some benefits: You can launch your special yokai attacks much more often than usual, which can buy you time to recharge your watch.

This snake is one of the first really tough bosses in the game.
This snake is one of the first really tough bosses in the game.

Defeating enemies in Nioh isn’t just about draining their HP to zero – each enemy has their own visible ki bar, which you can consume when under intense attack. Once it hits zero, you can “grapple” your opponents for massive damage, or knock them out for a devastating attack. Yokai-type enemies (as opposed to human-type) become susceptible to being stun locked when they run out of ki, and you can completely deplete the outline of the ki to deal massive damage if you try to keep attacking.

I know this sounds complicated to those who haven’t played the game – and it does, especially compared to the old Roll-and-R1 games of the core Souls games. But once you get the hang of it, Nioh 2 almost feels like a game like solving your own meters and combos and learning your opponent’s set of moves. Its combination of complex systems and Souls-style mechanics is like nothing else I’ve found, and I’ve played a lot of the more popular Soulsy games over the years.

That’s not to say the Nioh game is a perfect masterpiece, of course. Their level design is often not boring and superfluous, and lacks the compelling, complex storyline that elevates the Souls series beyond its own imperfections. Those with a current interest in the Sengoku period may find its numerous sassy characters more appealing than I do – mostly I struggle to remember which bad swordsman it was.

No doubt hundreds of people bought Nioh 2 for sale, only to give up after this Enki stabbed them dozens of times. But while some people might give the game this harsh treatment, I think it’s an understandable move. Nioh 2 won’t appeal to everyone – it’s a no-nonsense “masocore” experience aimed at players who’ve learned the hard lessons of Dark Souls and are willing to put them aside in favor of a new era. new rule.

I assume playing other Souls games actually makes you worse at Nioh 2 for the first few hours, because the game punishes many of the habits From Soft rewards, especially panic and Estus-chugging. In a market with so many Soul game simply taking the existing lore and mechanics of these games and converting around proper nouns, Nioh doesn’t mind standing alone with his own personal model. And that’s why both games – especially Nioh 2 – are worth playing. If you want a challenge, of course.

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