076
REVIEW
@MrOscarTKINFO
FORMAT PS4
ETA OUT NOW
PUB SONY,
KOEI TECMO
DEV TEAM NINJAemons can be downright nasty.
And Nioh 2 pulls no punches as
it introduces us to the ugly side
of the yokai-slaying business.
Within the first five minutes
we encounter a massive bull
demon amid smouldering ruins
outside a village in peril. But
we simply can’t defeat it. Sneaking around
the wide area, we make our way through some
more forest, en route taking on roving human
bandits eager to pillage in the chaos, but we
also have to avoid any yokai who stand in our
way. They’re just too strong.We play carefully, with consideration. Fighting
through the village, we liberate it from bandits
(it’s liberated until we pray at a shrine, at least.
Dark Souls-style, most enemies return to their
places unless they’re demons from an area we
actually purify). Ascending a hill, we come to a
cherry blossom tree past the village’s large shrine,
and are forced into an encounter with a horse
demon, Mezuki, who we can’t sneak around this
time. We dodge roll his charges, and chip away
with hits where we can. But then he roars, pulling
us into the dark yokai realm as strange flowers
take root and our own half-yokai horns appear.
Within these realms (of which there are plenty
strewn throughout Nioh 2’s large stages), your
ki – essentially your stamina – recharges much
more slowly. We can’t avoid Mezuki’s grab and
he pulls us into the air, his half-cleaver, half-axe
sawing us into two. ‘Ah,’ we think, ‘we’ve seen
this before.’ You’re meant to die at the beginning
of soulsbornes, right? Then it will take you
forward and you’ll progress?
In this case we’re wrong, time and time again.
As if the yokai realm has invaded OPM Towers,“IT’S HARD AS NAILS, BUT IT TEETERS
DELICATELY ON THAT EDGE, A
TRIUMPHANT BALANCING ACT.”
NIOH 2
Even a yokai may cry when
they’re facing these bosses
YOKAI MATE?