Nioh (the series)

Another day, another Nioh boss beating my ass into a fine paste!

This time, it's Okatsu's turn.

Well, Shima is dead. Yay!

Now there's a five-storey yokai running amok on the battlefield. Boo!

I love reading your adventures playing Nioh Ulythium , perhaps this will be my final push to give it another chance - as if JuniorFE hasn't already tried his best to convince me

Gosh, I wish you were so thorough with your uni courses

Nioh 2 wasn't easy, yet you completed that...

That is not a commonly held opinion from what I've seen

I thought the second was slightly clearer but I barely paid attention in either of them. Just wanted more of that sweet sweet yokai killing action.

I think I'm nearing the end, now.

The mission called 'The Samurai from Sawayama' was bastard difficult, but the boss at the end of it wasn't too bad; now I'm on 'The Demon King Revealed', which will no doubt prove equally hard.

JonFE If it helps (or hinders!) you at all, I certainly think that Nioh is worth playing, even though it has probably angered me more than any other game I've played to date. (Wow - that's quite the caveat.)

There's also the fact that many people, including some of our fellow Font Geeks, regard Nioh 2 as the superior game in pretty much every respect - in that sense, you may prefer to skip the first and go straight to the sequel.

JuniorFE How come you didn't finish Nioh, if you don't mind my asking? You clearly made some good progress with it, and if Hino-Enma didn't make you throw in the towel, I doubt anything else did! Was it just swallowed by a massive backlog?

Loot is randomised and outlcassed so quickly, I doubt it matters

Personally I preferred the first game. I felt the second added too many new elements and the combat felt less satisfying. They add a mechanic where you can one shot enemies to lose their ki and it's super telegraphed to the point where it felt like all you're doing is waiting for that one moment. Same with bosses. Might be remembering differently but that was one of the things that put me off

The other was that it ditched the gimmicks you got in each level in the first game which kept things a bit more fresh, especially when the levels themselves aren't all that interesting. There's a thing they do on most (all?) levels where you have to enter a yokai realm section, where you can't use certain abilities, find a particular enemy and kill it. That would have been fun for one stage in the original but I just got sick of it in the sequel

Another thing I remember was the heavy use of enemies from the first game (especially if you played the DLC)

None of those things are terrible or make it a bad game. I just preferred the original from what I played of it

Ulythium Thanks!!! I already regard both Nioh games worth playing. I used to love team Ninja games back in their OG Xbox days, especially Ninja Gaiden Black and I always had my eyes on their games. I've purchased both Nioh games and their DLC on release and double dipped on PS5 as well.

My problem was failing to get the grasp of ki pulse and thinking, possibly erroneously, that it was of vital importance for me to use it as a stamina reserve and yokai cleanse... Then, time passed by, newer games caught my attention and Nioh got pushed to the backlog. Wo Long made me appreciate Team Ninja games again and that's what will probably make me try again, along with JuniorFE who is adamant that ki pulse can be avoided.

The odd thing about ki pulse is that it is important but they eventually give you an easy mode where where you ki pulse on dodge.

Once I got that, I rarely pressed R1 to do it anymore. Combo, dodge out of there and you’ve regained a chunk of stamina.

JuniorFE has offered me his old Nioh save file to continue from since it already has sloth on that, so maybe I'll put it to good use