Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice Review

Rise from the Shadows, Master the Blade, and Defy Death Itself

Coming off the heels of a critically acclaimed number of action RPGs with the Souls games and Bloodborne, FromSoftware took a distinctly different direction with 2019’s Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. Shedding many of the RPG components and other common features of their prior titles, Sekiro takes a more direct, straightforward storytelling approach and introduces a combat system focused more on action, reflex, and the use of skills. This approach allows it to carve out a unique identity while still spiritually retaining the same atmospheric elements and game design ethos that define the Soulslike sub-genre.

Sekiro’s defining strength is its stellar combat system, which is based on a “posture” mechanic. In addition to a standard health bar, the titular protagonist, Sekiro, and all enemies have a posture meter that, when filled up, breaks. Breaking posture requires a balance of relentless attack, timely parries, and smart dodges followed by counterstrikes. Inflicting enough posture damage and achieving a posture break allows executing a “death blow.” This usually kills most enemies, although bosses and other powerful enemies require multiple death blows. While it is possible to chip away at the enemy’s health, which does eventually increase posture damage, parrying and clashing swords forms the dominant, central basis of combat.

In most encounters, the execution works beautifully, especially when fighting bosses, and Sekiro sports some of the best swordplay in any game, period. Attacks feel like they have real weight and enemies respond in an aggressively substantial manner, which helps keep fights feeling momentous and rapid. It would be very easy for Sekiro’s combat to play one-dimensionally if it just incorporated attacking and defending; however, the presence of “perilous attacks,” indicated by a red kanji and audio cue, prevents monotonous fights. These attacks cannot be blocked or parried, which helps to curb complacency by forcing movement and the use of additional abilities.

Maintaining aggressiveness and pressuring the enemy’s posture is critical to victory.

The constant push-and-pull nature of each fight is often akin to a rhythmic dance, and surmounting bosses with a final, visceral death blow results in truly satisfying and unmatched rushes of euphoria upon victory. The game’s oft-repeated shinobi code of “hesitation is defeat” is masterfully incorporated against a wide variety of enemies and is near-universal in its applicability to combat.

Relishing Sekiro’s greatest combat moments, however, comes with a precondition, which is the high skill floor. The game does not allow statistical customization or changing equipment. As a result, there is no leveling past a boss or switching to a different, more advantageous weapon; to achieve victory, competency at parrying is crucial, if not necessary. While this can be a slight detriment and initial turn-off, time and patience are well worth the dizzying thrills Sekiro provides, and the game offers sufficient abilities, tools, and advice to surmount most of its challenges.

Primarily, the game allows multiple deaths and has a resurrection system that eventually recharges through killing enemies, which reduces frustration by allowing mistakes in tougher areas or boss battles. Further, Sekiro uses special tools through the use of his prosthetic arm and various martial abilities earned through skill trees, both of which confer massive advantages. However, using these requires expending an in-game currency, Spirit Emblems, that becomes rarer and more expensive to procure later in the game. While this is an understandable measure to prevent overreliance, there are multiple points where their availability is not adequately balanced, which artificially reduces the ability to experiment at several junctures.

Resurrection helps keep combat manageable, one can get back up and try again!

Despite its near-perfect combat, there are rare but notable moments where Sekiro falters in its mechanical execution. There are several optional enemies and a few bosses which subvert the game’s “hesitation is defeat” principle. While some are due to design oddities, this is primarily owing to a status effect known as “Terror,” which builds quickly and eventually results in instant death. It is a terrible inclusion that is totally and wholly inconsistent with how the game approaches combat, as counteracting it requires using defensive tools or running away, which kills the pacing of fights. Nevertheless, Terror is uncommon enough and rarely required outside of optional fights.

Outside of combat, Sekiro features superb level design and exploration, primarily due to its use of the grappling hook tool for Sekiro’s prosthetic arm. This enables fluid, multidirectional movement across various gaps throughout levels, which have multitudes of anchor points that can be traversed in rapid succession. Areas are regularly scattered with helpful items and fascinating secret locations, but paying attention to the environment provides additional benefits due to the positional advantages gained against enemies.

Grappling facilitates the game’s secondary stealth mechanic, which is a valid and often ideal option for disposing of enemies or even significantly damaging an entire health bar for bosses. Noticing particulars of the surroundings and taking careful, deliberate paths to eliminate enemies produces a sense of awareness and deep immersion, which balances out the more common and chaotic direct combat encounters. It also excellently incorporates the secondary shinobi commandment in the game, that “there is no distinction between honor and victory.” While there are a few locations, mostly before bosses, which seriously suffer from annoying and repetitive enemy placement, stealth is incorporated magnificently through most of the game.

This oblivious monk is totally unaware that shinobis don’t operate on a code of honor…

That said, some of the rewards gained from exploration, including sidequests and character arcs, can often become unavailable because of a feature of the game known as “Dragonrot.” Essentially, after every permanent death, there is a chance a random NPC throughout the game becomes sick and infected with Dragonrot, rendering their questlines incompletable unless they are healed with rare, difficult-to-obtain items. This frustrating inclusion needlessly punishes death and disincentives engagement with the world, regardless of the otherwise sufficiently valid lore explanation for its existence.

The harsh ramifications of Dragonrot are disappointing, as the game’s story, setting, and characters are all compelling, if a bit basic in some respects. Sekiro’s events occur during the late Sengoku period in a fictionalized Japan, which provides an absorbing, convincing backdrop for the game’s intense skirmishes in an era roiled by conflict. The game very entertainingly straddles a line between historical influence and mythology. While it features realistic elements like the widespread presence of tanegashima matchlock rifles, it also incorporates mystical dragons, spirits, and concepts like blood curses. Environments, enemies, and characters are all crafted gorgeously, and the game is visually and atmospherically excellent in just about every regard.

However, elements of the story, primarily characterization, are few and far between. The core conflict sees the main character, Sekiro, attempting to protect and safeguard the immortality of Kuro, who is the divine heir to the throne for the Ashina clan’s embattled, collapsing kingdom. While there’s enough interesting setup warranting forward progression on a consistent basis, there simply aren’t enough moments to substantially develop the emotional impact of the story or its characters. This is especially true due to the dreaded Dragonrot feature, which can very easily stunt the progression of a sidequest until it is no longer available. Without prior awareness and foreknowledge of how to mitigate its propagation, it is difficult to engage with characters in a meaningful, timely manner.

Shamisen and shō are consistent features of the soundtrack and bring a special tranquility to enchanting locations.

Luckily for Sekiro, its score and general sound design elevate not only its story and atmosphere, but its gameplay as well. Composed by Yuka Kitamura, the soundtrack utilizes traditional Japanese instruments and compositional styles to great effect, richly fleshing out environments and meaningfully elevating the emotional impact of certain battles, especially in the late game. The tone and atmosphere throughout the game’s distinct, thoroughly detailed levels owes much to the exquisite background music.

Additionally, it is easy to overlook but impossible to overstate the importance of Sekiro’s sound design in strengthening its combat and overall gameplay experience. There is a very distinct, audible difference between the sound produced from a parry and block, and there is a terrifying but easily identifiable audio cue for perilous attacks. These sound effects work brilliantly in tandem with fluid animations and slight enemy tells, further augmenting an already masterful combat system.

Overall, Sekiro is defined by its riveting, challenging, and ultimately highly rewarding gameplay. Stemming from simplicity but giving a wide variety of different combat options, few games come close to matching the exhilarating rush that Sekiro’s best moments provide. Exploring its atmospherically engrossing levels is a treat, from a visual, musical, and atmospheric standpoint. Even if exploration and character storylines are sometimes hampered by Dragonrot, repeatedly severing the immortality of bosses with brutal “Shinobi Executions” and discovering the ritual secrets of eternal life offers a captivating experience that stands out as one of FromSoftware’s best and most distinctive titles.

BATTLE SYSTEM

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INTERACTION

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ORIGINALITY

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STORY

    

MUSIC & SOUND

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VISUALS

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ps4

20-40 HOURS

VERY HARD

Fast-paced, responsive, and rewarding combat system with incredible boss fights
Gorgeously crafted environments with spectacularly atmospheric soundtrack 
Excellent level designs are fun to traverse and explore
Stealth mechanics and prosthetic tools make difficulty more manageable

Dragonrot drastically reduces ability to interact with characters and weakens the plot 
Some annoying enemy placement and boss mechanics that run contrary to the game’s combat ethos and design.