Nioh

[Vy'drach]

Any Soulsborne series fans out here? Well you may want to keep your eye on this game coming out here. There's a free demo of it on the Playstation Store and beating bosses in it now will net you stuff when the game releases, if you buy it. Anyways, Nioh is basically a Japanese Souls game coming for PS4.

"But Vy, the Souls series IS Japanese."

Yes, but they don't take place IN Japan, now stop interrupting and:

Japan, 1600. You are Geralt of Rivia an inexplicably (so far) English Samurai named William and shit's fucky, yo. Bandits roam the land and yokai are wandering the lands, and boy, are they pissy. So you grab a sword and start trying to kill anything that so much as looks at you funny, but it is a Souls type game at heart, and a much more technical one (I'll get into those details in a minute) so that's easier said than done. You rest at shrines instead of bonfires, and you have a "Guardian Spirit" that you can choose and swap out at shrines, there's three at the start and five known so far in total, and among other things I'll get into in a second, they give you passive benefits, when they aren't guarding your Amrita AKA Souls that you dropped when you died.

The three to choose at the start are:

* Kato - A firewolf: Element is obviously fire

* Isonade - A shark: Element is water

* Daiba-Washi - A giant, horse killing bird: Element is air

You gain the souls by killing enemies, you drop 'em when you die, die before getting 'em again and lose 'em forever, SSDD, but now there's also gold to use as currency you don't lose, that you use to buy/sell things and blacksmith services.

Anyways, sounds just like a Souls clone, right? Well it's not quite. There's more than a few changes that really change the dynamic of the game. Probably the biggest is the "Stance" system. There are three stances you can swap on the fly and it's highly encourages to do so, especially since different stances are good for different things, they are high, the offensive stance, mid, the versatile "defensive" stance, and low, the fast and evasive stance. Each stance greatly changes the move set of the weapon. For instance, the spear class isn't just a pointy, pokey stick. High stance with it is a massive slam starter for a basic attack, and a massive spinning stab with the heavy attack. You can unlock a trip and a massive area continuous spin for it as well. Mid stance is slashes for basics and jabbing for heavy, with the unlockables mostly pertaining to do with things while blocking, such as a "parry" that knocks the enemy down and a placement swap with the enemy that presents their back to you. Also a kick combo finisher. Low stance is... well... can't see what you do with basics too well but let's just say you got to town with it, and the heavy is low sweeps. You unlock a backstepping slash and an attack where you jump over the enemy and stab downward, landing behind them.

Another big mechanic is "Ki Focus." Ki being the equivalent to stamina in the game, but when you spend it doing a combo, a portion of the used up ki will refill as a blue bar and if you hit the stance button, you'll be refunded that portion of it. Stamina management became an even bigger deal with it due to the importance of properly blocking and more importantly, getting hit will drain stamina and if you get hit while out of stamina, you'll be stunned, and if hit again, you'll be knocked onto the ground. And in both those states the enemy can perform the equivalent to a riposte from the Souls games. Blocking is big because not only does it nullify all damage from all but a select few attacks, attacking a block with the lighter weapons (IE not the axe or hammer) destroys your own stamina. Also with Ki Focus, large Yokai enemies will put down a "Yokai Portal" that if you stand in it, halts your ki regen/drains your ki, and if they stand in it, they regain ki, but if you do a perfect Ki Focus in/near it, you dispel the portal.

Another big mechanic is the "Living Weapon" system which is one of the other perks of the Guardian Spirits. Basically, if the spirit is with you, and you've gathered enough souls with it, you can enter this state where you receive bonuses depending on which spirit you have and are invulnerable with unlimited stamina, but any damage taken or stamina expenditure reduces the duration of it.

Other changes include the game is level based, equipment is leveled, with different rarities, random attributes, and random drop (though you can level up gear and reroll/swap attributes). A backstab mechanic does exist, but you have to put points in Ninjutsu and unlock it (Ninjutsu being essentially a gadget based spellcasting system) and even then the enemy must be unaware of your presence to do it. Otherwise, attacks from behind just do bonus damage, a better system if you ask me. 

You have two melee weapon slots (one active at a time so no dual wielding spears) and two ranged weapon slots. Melee weapon classes are the Katana, Dual Katanas, Spear, Axe, and Hammer. Ranged weapon classes are the Bow, Flintlock Musket, and Handcannon. Ranged weapon headshots are also much more devastating, most normal enemies will be tickled in the body but a headshot can one hit them.

There is a minimap but the terrain readout is basically to the point I'm not sure if it's real and I've just been having a Rorschach Test effect for it, but you can gain tracking effects for certain things in various ways, such as enemies and chests, so they appear on it. Very handy. 

Also, there is a system kinda like bloodstains from the Souls series, but with a twist. You'll find red "Warrior Graves" where another player died, and when investigating it, it will say how they died such as "Impaled by rogue" or "Crushed by yoki" and will also show you the type and quality of their gear, their level, and their name. You'll also see a button prompt to "Hold O to summon Revenant." The revenants are essentially black phantom enemies that use the gear the person had, and can drop it if you kill them (don't worry, the player doesn't lose any gear their revenant drops) so if you see someone your level+ with a good quality weapon of the class you like, go ahead and give it a try to see if he drops it for you. But Revenants, depending on levels compared to your own and gear, can be quite the tough opponents (Them dual katana wielders have absolutely 0 chill).