Tempy wrote:

Been playing a lot of Nioh this week because i’ve been off ill and i’ve been meaning to get back to it for ages. Had to start again as my cloud save didn’t work for whatever reason, but that’s probably for the best. It’s an utterly bizarre game though. I’ve been playing it with the help of a few guides to understand the stat and gear stuff, as it’s very in-depth in a Diablo 3 style, with loot having lots of randomised incremental effects and special abilities as well as set bonuses and so on that basically make it a... Soulslike loot ARPG? It’s a mad blend of genres because the first half means that’s it’s overly punishing (more like sadistic and mean) and if you don’t understand the second half it can be even harder. Anyway, so much old news as this is what I discovered back from my 20+ hours with the demo back in the day, when it was even harder than it is now. It’s clearly designed to be pummelled in co-op, but I hate using that as a crutch and so I have been battling through it solo. It can be insanely frustrating at times, especially with some of the bosses having pointless combos where if you aren’t specced perfectly gear-wise you’ll get stun locked to death, or the window for escape will land you back in trouble making the gap in punishment utterly pointless. Also the window for timely blocks and parries is... insane? I don’t know how anyone can react as fast as you need to, adding another layer of frustration on top of a brilliantly outstanding but very exacting and punishing combat system that expects you to dance your fingers across the pad like a caffeinated spider. Still, I have refrained from summoning and I am now on the last mission main mission before the NG+ content? though I have one or two side missions left to do. Deposit all of that, it’s a weirdly enjoyable experience but it throws the whole difficulty debate around the Soule games and especially Sekiro into sharp relief, in a weird way. From what I’ve read and seen, co-op trivialises most bosses and tough fights utterly (and i’ll be dipping in to this for NG+) but it also means the game’s difficulty is frequently petulant and arbitrary, and has no way of leading the player through a meaningful learning experience. Where Sekrio has razor’s edge focus, to the point that its combat can be vested with no HUD and no challenge is off limits because you haven’t got the right gear or a good enough limits, Nioh is all over the place with most enemies killing you in two hits and bosses laughing at the idea of giving you even a second to heal. Challenge is a weird thing in games though, because Nioh also has tons of tools in the form of ninjitsu and magic that let you turn the tables, in a more free form and versatile way than Sekiro’s tools and items, although I think they’re great too. Ultimately i’d rather a game that gives you the tools to follow a curated path through a game like Sekrio rather than crafting your difficulty around the exceptions of co-op and random loot drops and stat levels. But Nioh has still been really good fun, and has an incredible amount of missions to plough through. If only it wasn’t so utterly capricious so often.

regmcfly wrote:

God help me I was in game in ocean terminal whiling down time before lunch at The Kitchin at 12 (pics incoming in food thread) and I kept circling Deadly Premonition with badges for £39.99 on switch. Then I checked eBay and Amazon and they were wanting £10 more and I guess I own Deadly Premonition now.

JonB wrote:

JonB wrote:

Holy shit I just beat Father Gazza first time.

And only now just remembered that weapons have two forms in this. Duh.

hylian_elf wrote:

Brilliant fight. I think I beat him first time too on NG+ and NG++, but you’ve had a big break so good going! Let’s see how you do with Amelia cos I struggled on her.