Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice - From Software and Hidetaka Miyazaki's new game for PS4, XBone, PC

The sound and animations for deathblows should be noted as being one of the most satisfying things ever in a video game.

SHUUUNG *arterial spray*

Totally.

I spent a beautiful spring day obsessively throwing myself at the demon boss, definitely the hardest thing I've done in this game (and it really is more like a Souls fight).

Just couldn't get through the last phase after learning the first two, I was about to write it off as not worth it when it finally clicked, got him just before I had to leave the house.

Just the last boss now, and I can get back to my non-Sekiro pursuits!

I lost my husband to this game. I understand. Watching it is even fun. Lol

I just did the Demon of Hotrod too. I died a bunch of times on the first two phases then did the third one in one try ¯\(°_o)/¯

It's a shame, what happened to him, but toxic masculinity is what it is I guess

There have been like three times on this game where I've given myself til midnight to beat a boss before going to bed, then got the worst case secenario of doing it at 11:59 and having too much fkn adrenaline to sleep

It's a shame, what happened to him, but toxic masculinity is what it is I guess

lol, exactly right.

The last boss is really fun, only gave him 1/2 an hour so far but it's feeling doable.

Give me a DLC where I kill Genichiro over and over forever

well I sure got my wish

I got last boss down to half health in his last phase, then fucked up a dodge, then got impatient and tired and started dying on the gimme first phase

I'm just sitting down with my coffee to do this. I feel comfortable enough with Genichiro and the first phase that it feels like my fault if I die. Still figuring out phase 2 (and I hope that the lightning will carry phase 3,only made it to that one or twice).

Or maybe I'll just die on phase 1 over and over. One mistake and his posture goes back to zero.

Just gottim. I'm a very ungracious winner in this game, lots of screaming and taunting at fictional Japanese men as they bleed out

The lightning almost doesn't come out as often as you want it to in phase 3, I found it more nerve wracking to run around trying to bait it instead of just keeping up the pressure

Think the key freebies in the spear phase are his jumping stab and also when he does the backwards jump spear swing, he'll usually follow it up with three blockable gunshots and then a mikiri counterable thrust

Didn't use many prosthetics etc, just the occasional mortal draw for quicker damage and the umbrella as an emergency block if I couldn't sprint away from an AoE

I did iiiiit (too).

It took three hours to get to phase 3 today, but luckily I got it in one (thank you based lightning).

Played around in NG+ after giving Kuro his charm back, which makes you take chip damage if you don't block perfectly. It's almost a whole different game, much more exacting (made me realize how much I was spamming block).

Fantastic game, but I think I'm done forever.

Congrats, good going one-shotting the last bit

I'm done too, 63 good hours logged, uninstalled it, may my blade ever be slick with the blood of the despicable failson Ashina Genichiro

shout out to Pot Noble Harunaga, you really pulled it off you crazy bastard

It's sad, he was a fish

Here I am half-hoping they won't do dlc this time

Whenever I see clips of this I keep thinking it's "Ghost of Tsushima," which reminds me to look forward to "Ghost of Tsushima."

holy shit i am slow at this game / i guess am better at not letting it take over my life like Bloodborne did when i was living by myself?

its so weird how I must have done the Genichiro fight maybe 50 or 60 times - the first time it seemed impossible but every single time i could feel a tiny bit of improvement, until the time i killed him i took almost no damage, first and second phases done in about 90 seconds each, then did the lightning reverse 3 times in a row on phase 3. holy shit thats a fun fight.

got the monkeys done last night and excited to see the next areas.

^Sekiro in a nutshell. There were definitely certain bosses in Souls that I never learned 'properly', because you could switch to a different weapon/setup to make things easier, or because they were weak to a certain type of build. Here they made sure that there's no way around learning the whole moveset.

(even certain prosthetics or buffs might make things easier, you're still probably going to get killed if you don't know when to use them)

i think that becomes very clear the first time you get a deathblow without even taking off half a bosses health. 99% of the time its not about cheesing damage.

i've been sort of lowkey sneaking playtime with this game and holy fuck i COMPLETELY missed a whole area because i never went across a bridge at one point.
love you so much from software

this got into my head in a big way. Stuck on Genichiro in lightning mode, all these fucking headless ghosts (they scare me), and the corrupted monk illusion.

took out true corrupted monk last night even without getting the second phase aerial deathblow everyone seems to do - surprised myself but he can go down pretty quick with a lot of deflecting. trying to do all 4 endings in one playthrough - Shura is done, doing the rest now. still loving it.

I got to the final boss two weeks ago, attempted for a few hours, put it down and haven’t picked it back up again. :/

Hopefully get back to it, but won’t have time for at least another week. Will be a little rusty.

trying to do all 4 endings in one playthrough

Oh, I didn't know this was possible. So it doesn't actually, y'know, end after you get an ending?

I did the Isshin one and I never experienced Owl pt. 2.

i am soooooooo bad at this. chances of reaching an ending: 2-3%

i'm stuck at the damn boss right after the ogre (general tenzen), even though i can now reliably start the fight with all of his henchmen eliminated and 1 deathblow down due to stealth.

i think it clicks? at some point the combat clicks? or you just throw it down in rage, misery and frustration and never go back to it idk.

I'm... okay? at this game, I've done p much all there is to do including most of the quest lines, and I can't see myself ever beating that final boss. Has anyone here managed that?

oh and

*SPOILERS*

that big red demon seems like no fun to grind away at, so I've not killed him either

no, i screwed up because i didn’t listen to so and so whispering to someone else which meant although i’d closed off i think two of the remaining paths. never fought the fire demon or the last boss. enjoyed it a lot but i’m not *really* sure why. it lacks the strange and fragmentary mythos and metaphysics of dark souls and bloodborne. and the environments aren’t that potent. but the combat is v pure once you get the hang of it. and the boss fights are *intense*, in the way the combat system forces you to remain persistently engaged and make incredibly quick judgments.

it's definitely more explicit in terms of its storyline. I found it very atmospheric, and I think the environment is as ingenious as that in DS1, possibly more so as it changes over the course of the game as the plot pushes on. I agree about the combat, it's an absolute joy to take out a boss that you had previously thought was invincible, even more so than the Souls games as there's no recourse to outside help and little scope for cheesing.

I did the last boss and the fire demon, both of which were worthwhile and my most memorable parts of the game. That could just be because they were at the end, but it's probably because they took the longest to learn.

(I think I did use the flame umbrella on the demon, which protects you from the move where he jumps into the sky)

Also this series is essential viewing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mmP5jOWemI

scrub dojo - this sounds like my dojo

xxp okay I will go back and give it another go (or 100 goes!), does that vide provide some useful hints?

video!

enter the dojo

I don't think he's made videos about those last bosses yet, but lots of good info about the mechanics and entertainment value is high imo. There are plenty of other videos of other people doing it if you're into that.

Looking upthread apparently it took me at least three hours to learn the final boss. :) I'm sure if I started Sekiro again today it would take me quite awhile to get back into the rhythm of it.

I suspect this is next in my queue ...

And I'm in! Just did the intro stuff, more or less. It's going to take some getting used to how fast this game is, even compared to "Bloodborne." It's a huge relief (at least for now) that all the arcane RPG stats n stuff doesn't seem to play a huge role, because that always made me anxious.

Bookmarked.

It's now been awhile since I've played this (never went back to it), but yeah iirc the special skills and tools aren't really required (with a couple of basic exceptions), but just make things easier.

The current top Any% speedrun for Sekiro is 19m 55s, so if you take longer than that you're doing it wrong imo

Oh, I'm totally doing it wrong.

i think i made it to the TWO MONKEYS stage and that did it

Hmm, maybe I spoke too soon. I'm in the first village and the first mini boss, or at least tougher soldier, is giving me a little bit of trouble, because I was being impatient, thinking there were fewer repercussions than in a Souls game. But I think I'm wrong. You lose half your accumulated HP, it seems, and there must be a catch to resurrections, because why would it give me the option? I'm assuming the HP you get from enemies is how you level up, but I suspect there are some malignant mechanics are work that I am as of yet unaware of. Hopefully reversible!

did you check out one of those "10 things you should know the first time you play Sekiro" kind of guides or are you going in cold? i'm trying to remember if there was some deal with death that had irreversible consequences (though not gamebreaking ones), but i never played this one. maybe it the system in Mortal Shell (which i didn't finish).

anyway, might be worth taking a look at one just in case!

I glanced at one, and my big takeaway was "use your items" and "be aggressive." But yeah, I think there was a downside to coming back from the dead? Though I suppose it might be worth it to come back from the dead if it means keeping your Souls or whatever they are here (XP). Like a Devil's bargain. I'll look into it.

You don't need to worry about it too much. There's an item you can get to deal with it.

https://www.polygon.com/sekiro-guide/2019/3/25/18281289/sekiro-rot-essence-dragonrot-cure-item

Yeah, I think I need to follow a walkthrough. I was hoping to try it relatively on my own, but I'm barely into it and I'm already knee deep in esoteric lore, the statue carver is sick because of me, I keep getting items with mysterious uses, and praying to a statue of Buddha sent me back in time three years. Plus I'm going to have to get a lot better at fighting, though at least the first mini boss stays dead!

Don't worry about resurrecting, it's part of the game (and plot).

And yeah it takes time to get used to the combat, that's the whole thing. Iirc hp is a red herring (for bosses), it's all about breaking their posture.

The trickiest thing so far is that in a lot of ways the combat is the *opposite* of Dark Souls. There are shields in DS but they are rarely useful, and Bloodborne gets rid of the shield entirely; in Sekiro, it actually benefits you to keep your block up all the time. In DS, rushing in at an enemy is a surefire way to get killed; in Sekiro, keeping up the pressure and pounding away seems to be a better strategy than giving the enemy time to regain their composure. In DS, you are more or less immune when you roll; in Sekiro, dodging and rolling and getting out of the way allows the enemy to regenerate posture. In DS, parrying was a helpful skill that makes certain specific fights and enemies easier; in Sekiro, parrying is essentially key to combat, even at the most basic level. In DS, your stats give you an upper hand, and you can farm to improve your power; in Sekiro, you're at the mercy of your mastery of timing. I suppose in this one it's balanced out a bit by giving you a grappling hook hand and dispensing with stamina.

So yeah, gonna take a bit to get used to this.

Well, I'll say this much: at least I know what I'm in for. I've been fighting the chained ogre mini boss for a while now and my impatience has been my downfall. The first ten times it killed me with one hit I should have gotten the message that I should not let him touch me, but he's well within reach.

So, the dragon rot that everyone has (because of me), does that have a negative impact aside from lowering my odds of getting some stuff back after death?