Sekiro Critique: It's (Not) Like Dark Souls

[@moma026able]

So far the only video I've come across on YT that does Sekiro justice. Great job man, keep it up! Love your analysis.

[@Erumore]

I'm a bit late replying to this but thank you so much! Stick around and there'll be plenty more videos in the future; I have a few already planned for early next year :)

[@moma026able]

@@Erumore will be looking forward to it!

[@JuliusCaesar103]

This video was hilarious at times, great job. Also Robert's dad is the best mini boss FromSoft has ever made.

[@losgann]

Great video. I've platinumed the game and had no clue the shortcut at 15:40 existed. I agree the death penalty is too strong and was one of the reasons I didn't really like Sekiro after my first playthrough. It's much less of an issue once you know where and when to farm xp and bank your sen but it was really annoying on that first playthrough where I blundered my way through to the credits without the game clicking with me and if I never went back to give Sekiro another shot it would never have become one of my favourite games of all time. There are a few encounters where you do have to fight a 2v1 (Double Ape for instance), but in a lot of instances the game allows you to use stealth, prosthetic tools and ninjitsu techniques to even the odds before you start the fight proper. Like you showed for Seven Ashina Spears - Shume Masaji Oniwa and his best friend, you are often able to stealth kill or puppeteer the lesser enemy in these 2v1 fights (I always puppeteer Lone Shadow Vilehand's friend to make it a 1v2 for example). I wish the prosthetic tools were better or had spirit emblems fully restore on rest rather than pulling from a stock so that players could experiment with them more freely. There are a few interesting interactions - freeform ones like using an unlockable skill to coat your katana in blue fire to fight spirit enemies without needing to use a divine confetti are great and should've been a higher focus; and hardcoded ones like using the loaded spear to pull the centipede out of the Guardian Ape when you've knocked it down in the second phase which is really cool and wish there was more of them, but I don't think there is any real in-game way to figure this out except by happy accident.

[@Erumore]

It makes my day to get comments like this and to hear that people are enjoying my videos, so thank you! Probably my biggest complaint regarding Sekiro is the length of time it can take before the game properly 'clicks' with you. Especially because so many players will be coming to it with Dark Souls in mind, I think FromSoft really needed to give more attention to quickly teaching the player the right way to play. Puppeteering the weaker enemy in 2v1 fights is a great idea; I wish I'd thought of that! Generally speaking, I think the prosthetic tools needed a bit more utility against normal enemies, since (to my memory) almost all of them were only useful against specific enemy types (and always had predictable effects). Using the spear against the Guardian Ape is a great bit of interaction that almost no players will ever realise is possible, which is such a shame. This is something I've been thinking about recently; how do you let players know what is possible in your game? Thanks again for the comment and I'm glad you liked the video! Stick around for many more in the future :)

[@losgann]

@@Erumore I have your Elden Ring video in my watch later and I'm looking forward to it.

[@nosouponhead]

Sekiro is hands down my favorite game of all time. Start to finish, I had pure fun. I was so sad to see Elden Ring reverted back to the Dark Souls style of combat.

[@Zayd-bg1pt]

shurikens are mainly good for the followup, not the actual shuriken itself

[@zachthompson9976]

This was hands down my unquestionable favorite fromsoft game, until armored core 6 that ism now i cant decide. Love the video and really hope u do one for ac6 as well, would love to hear your take on the game

[@nosouponhead]

Wait, is Armored Core 6 actually good? It got generally bad reviews.

[@AkinokazeHaruichiban]

My favourite FromSoft game, and undoubtably [to me] the template for what a Tenchu revival should follow.

[@FangsofYima]

21:00 I actually disagree, while the timing is tighter than souls games rolling can actually really simplify boss attack moves. I was pretty hard walled on the Owl fight until I learned that rolling through his attacks actually stops the combo there leading to easy and near continuous counter slashes. Whereas if I had deflected he would continue his combo another 3+ hits each of which carried the risk of doing huge damage to me.

[@mojotheaverage]

The unseen aid aspect was basically a non feature for all three of my sekiro playthroughs. I think the only times i ended up getting unseen aid, I'd already lost all my money and xp so it was completely pointless haha. I also agree that dragon rot was poorly implemented and I'd argue just not worth adding to the game at all. Still though, i adore this game, but i agree with pretty much all your critiques and had almost exactly the same experience. I completed my first playthrough, even beating sword saint ishin, but i basically did it through just smashing my head into it over and over again. My second playthrough, after playing elden ring and becoming pretty disenfranchised by it, was incredible. It felt so refreshing and finely tuned compared to the overtuned enemies and fairly tired combat of elden ring

[@telekinesticman]

Dang I need to try this one after I finish Dark Souls, I love seeing the faster, more aggressive combat...and the grapple hook, of course.

[@telekinesticman]

I forget if I already said this somewhere else on the channel, but I played Sekiro earlier this year and LOVED it. The removal of the RPG stuff and occasional bullshit from Dark Souls made it near-perfect for me. My main issue is that there's still some obtuseness for progression and sidequests, and a few areas are *way* too small for combat, because the camera would keep getting stuck on the walls and I couldn't see a thing. Otherwise I basically never got frustrated, unlike Dark Souls which had a few moments that felt really unfair, and that it expected me to go level up to meet the intended balance. I never felt this way in Sekiro, I could always take on whatever challenge came my way through my own skill, which is *exactly* what I wanted. Demon of Hatred was the only boss I outright didn't like, although it was nowhere near as hard on my second playthrough. EDIT: And for the record, I just started Dark Souls 3 last night as well. I'm sure I'll enjoy it, and probably Elden Ring too, but man, all I want is a Sekiro sequel now. Bloodborne on PC would be nice too.

[@Erumore]

Glad to hear you enjoyed the game as much as I did. It's a perfect example of how subtracting elements from an established formula and focusing on really polishing one element can lead to incredible results. Going back to the standard Souls combat after playing Sekiro is a seriously disorienting experience, so DS3 might take a bit of getting used to. One of the most disappointing things about ER for me was the return to that stamina-based system, and I still wish FromSoft had given us something new instead of falling back on it. I finally got to play Bloodborne last year, and my controversial opinion is that I didn't love it. After 4 Souls games (and after 150 hours with ER), I'm kind of over the whole stamina thing to be honest. Still hope it comes to PC though. Fingers crossed Armored Core will offer some new experiences next month - the director was one of the lead designers on Sekiro, which might be a good sign.

[@BenetbenetLive]

good work! amazing channel, music is little to loud at parts in this one. keep it up

[@Erumore]

Glad to hear you enjoyed the video! Thanks for the feedback, I'll bear that in mind.

[@BenetbenetLive]

@@Erumore i can't stress enough. People in this genre are often plaged by blatant plagiarism, lack of original thought. Inceccent need to seem intelligent. "The Extrinsic motivation of unveiling the archetypal symbolism of our protagonists penis, creates a unique blend of ludonarative dissonance and compelling meta mechanics" you however do not suffer from this. You make quality stuff. Critiquing games is to some degree inherently pretentious but I appreciate your restraint, thoughtfulness and precision.

[@Erumore]

Thank you, I truly appreciate the compliments. I'm trying to create the kind of videos that I like to watch, and it's really good to hear that others are enjoying what I'm making.

[@15awesomehighfive]

I would like the video twice if I could: once for the great critique, twice for playing in japanese. Kudos.

[@mal9369]

Lady butterfly was the boss that made the combat click for me. I had only played dark souls 1 before, so I was expecting something similar with sekiro, but i was so thrown off. The dodge is borderline useless for actually dodging attacks, so I played a hit and run strategy trying to chip enemies health down. It was when I found that through aggression and calculated defense I could control the pace of a fight when dealing with butterfly that I came to fall in love with this combat system. Both dark souls and sekiros combat are immensely rewarding when you come to master them, but in totally different ways

[@15awesomehighfive]

I would love it if From's gameplay evolution was designing a combat system designed for taking on multiple oponents, groups of foes. New IP, new combat system.

[@Erumore]

Interesting idea! There's something really compelling about going head-to-head against a single foe that I think would be lost in a game based around group fights, but I'm very intrigued by the thought of what FromSoft could do with the concept. Thanks for the interesting comment!