Star Wars - The Rise of Skywalker Review

OK, so just before Christmas comes around, I thought I would do a quick review of a film I recently seen and the film in question is Star Wars - The Rise of Skywalker, which is to be the final film in the Star Wars saga.

Now this film has really split the fans and critics right down the middle and has had its fair share of mixed reviews and bad reactions from fans. So, is it a good sold finale or just a big letdown?? Well, let's find out.

And as I will say just a little bit about the story, the following warning is coming up...

THE ODD SPOILER OR TWO ARE AHEAD BUT NOTHING MAJOR (HONEST!!).

STORY

So, the story begins with Supreme Leader Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) searching for the location of Emperor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) that leads him to the planet, Exegol where he finds a physically impaired Palpatine. Palpatine tells Ren that he must find and kill Rey (Daisy Ridley) in order for him to complete his destiny and become the supreme ruler of the galaxy.

Meanwhile, Rey continues her Jedi training under the tuition of Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher) and the other resistance fighters receive information from a spy in First Order that Palpatine is indeed alive and has returned. Rey on looking for clues for Palpatine's whereabouts searching Luke's notes that include Jedi texts about a Sith wayfinder that will lead her to Palpatine. And so its from here that Rey travels with her friends and fellow resistance fighters, Poe (Oscar Isaac), Finn (John Boyega) and Chewbacca (Joonas Suotamo replacing the late Peter Mayhew) along with C-3PO (Anthony Daniels) and R2-D2 to the planet Pasaana to start the trail to find Palpatine...

THOUGHTS

As a conclusion to the Disney trilogy and indeed the main Star Wars saga, The Rise of Skywalker is an entertaining film that has actually been getting alot of stick from many fans and reviewers alike but I personally think its a better film than its been given credit for so far (or a lack thereof).  And I really do have to say I don't get the hate for this film as there is still plenty to enjoy here as it has its share of good action scenes, engaging character moments and a reasonably decent ending. And while its certainly not a perfect film, I still think it makes for a solid end to its trilogy and its WAY better than the Last Jedi was and this film in a way sets out to perform a certain amount of damage control inflicted by LJ's director, Rian Johnson (boo lol!). 

PERFORMANCES

As for the performances the cast are all on good form here.

Starting with Daisy Ridley who is excellent once again in her role as Rey, the last jedi who takes up her pivotal role again in the trilogy and in the film we learn more about her background story but I won't say anything about it here! Ridley has some good moments but again I won't really say much about them but suffice to say that Rey's character has developed some rather unique force powers that we haven't seen before now and she does have her share of good action scenes.

Adam Driver is also very good again in his role as Kylo Ren/Ben Solo, who by now is the supreme ruler of the First Order and seeks out Emperor Palplatine, who is rumoured to be still alive but still has his own emotional conflict as he harbours feelings for Rey. And as the film progresses, Kylo will have a very important choice to make that has quite an impact on the film's ending but that's all I'm going to say!

Carrie Fisher even though she passed away three years ago still puts in a fine performance here as Princess Leia. And what we see here was cobbled together from unused footage of The Force Awakens and it works very well for the most part and hangs together well as an actual performance and it was great to see that we even managed to get that much for her final send-off.

Oscar Isaac also does pretty well in his role as Poe Dameron, the commander of the resistance, who is also a formidable pilot and he is given alot to do here as he takes on a hefty role as the film progresses. We also later get hints into Poe's past as he meet someone he previously knew at some point in the film where its suggested he had a prior relationship with them.

John Boyega is also pretty good in his role as Finn, a former first order stormtrooper now a resistance fighter. John however somehow is actually given less to do here, despite his screen time, his character doesn't develop that much more over the course of the film, which is a bit of a pity.

WARNING: THIS NEXT PARAGRAPH IS KIND OF A SPOILER!

Mark Hamill also makes a return to his role as Luke Skywalker who by now is a force ghost and he consults Rey later on. Basically at this point, Luke is taking on the same mantle here as Obi-wan Kenobi did in the Return of the Jedi and there are some pretty clearly drawn comparisons here between the two films for these scenes.

Anthony Daniels does very well again as C-3PO in what his of course his final performance as the pesky protocol droid, who seems to get on everyone's nerves. Threepio however does kind of have a touching moment later in the film but I won't say much more about it than that. At any rate, Anthony Daniels is the only actor to have appeared in all the episodic films of the Star Wars saga, so he get's a good send-off here.

Keri Russell is also pretty good in her role as Zoril Bliss, who is an old acquaintance of Poe's and she ultimately ends up helping the resistance out with their mission (and yet again that's all I will say about that here!). Strangely however, we never actually even get to see Keri Russell's face in the film as she is always wearing her helmet and there is one brief moment where she opens her vistor so we can see her eyes and that's it!

Billy Dee Williams makes a welcome return to the Star Wars saga here again as Lando Calrissian, except he looks decidedly older of course than he did before (and a bit heavier lol!). Regardless however of his age, Billy Dee Williams still looks well, especially given that he is now 82 years old! At any rate, its good to see Billy back in Star Wars even if it does feel like they are trying to re-uinite the old gang at any cost!

Kelly Marie Tran does well enough in her role as Rose Tico, who befriended Finn in the Last Jedi and it appeared like there would be a blossoming romance. However, the romance it appears to have been stopped dead in its tracks by director JJ Abrahams as she has been largely sidelined here with very little to do in her role, which is in some ways not a bad thing as the alleged romance never went anywhere anyway between Finn and Rose.

Domhall Gleeson also does OK in his role as the weasly General Hux, a senior officer in the First Order, who has harboured much resentment over Kylo Ren in the previous films and continues that here.

Richard E. Grant also makes an appearnce here as General Pryde, who is a high ranking officer in the First Order and he is a pretty ruthless SoB it has to be said and appears to have the backbone to do what Hux probably can't. Again I won't say much more here about Grant's role except of course he is very good in it as Grant is in just about anything he does.

And last but not least is Ian McDiarmid as Emperor Palpatine and his is great once again in the role as he is pretty comfortable in it by now and he certainly revels in hamming up the evil Sith lord, who is out to regain his rule over the galaxy. And we learn a pretty big spoiler about Palplatine's connection to one of the characters here, which I will leave for another time and most likely in a revisitation of this post.

DIRECTOR 

As for the direction, J.J. Abrahams returns to the helm here and for the most part he does a pretty good job as despite the film's fairly lengthy run-time of 2 hours and 22 minutes, it never really lags at any time. I would probably say there are times where J.J.'s pacing is just a bit too chaotic, especially at the start of the film where there is so much going on at the one time. That aside, J.J. knows how to handle action scenes and he get's some good, engaging performances from his cast and he does a solid job overall here (take that haters heh heh!).

MUSIC

Music wise of course we get one final score from the great John Williams, who thankfully is still around and its great to see him live to finish the scoring for all nine Star Wars films and he contributes a very fine one to end proceedings. The only thing however I would say about the score is that there is a lot of retreading of the old themes from the original trilogy, which feels like they are trying to pay a bit too much lip-service for the fans. That aside however, its just great to see Williams finish off the saga than someone fill in for him.

FLAWS

As for the flaws...yep OK I admit that The Rise of Skywalker isn't perfect however I don't really want to get into spoiler territory here so I will try and address a few issues by going into as little plot stuff as I can.

So, to start off, one of the issues I had to do with the film is that the start of it is way too chaotic as Abrahams has the audience thrown right into the action straight off with no let-up and then it jumps too quickly between its other storylines. And its here that the film feels really rushed in places with its structure and I felt like they should have slow the pacing down in the opening 30 minutes or so as it just a bit too overkill how it is.

WARNING: KIND OF SPOILER IN THIS NEXT PARAGRAPH BUT NOT A BIG ONE!

Another issue I had was to do with the idea of Rey's new force powers as she suddenly use the force to heal wounds and maybe bring people back from the dead! I mean that is some pretty powerful force stuff right there, which was never exhibited in any of the previous films! So, for me I felt like Rey's new ressurective powers, was a bit daft and its another way of the film maker trying slap on new ways in which the force can be used.

I also thought the reveal of the First Order spy in the film was also pretty stupid and I will not mention here who it was although I do admit that the reveal itself was fairly surprising and I didn't twig right away who it would be. In the end though, the whole First Order spy thing felt a bit uneccessary.

Also like I previously mentioned, there are times where the film tries to pay a bit too much lip-serve to the fans in its use of music from the previous films just in case you needed a reminder of things. As an example there is a moment where we see an X-Wing being lifted out of a swamp! Ring any bells on that one?! And yep of course John Williams music from Empire Strikes Back suddenly ramps up at that moment. So, yeah in those moments it all get's a bit trite and contrived and again it feels unnecessary for Abraham to keep prodding people into remember the greatest hits moments from the classic Star Wars films.

Then there is the whole idea of the force connection between Rey and Kylo, which to be honest is pretty stupid and no thanks to The Last Jedi, we still get that connection in this film. And without giving much a way there is one moment in the film where Kylo can essentially physically touch Rey using this connection and he is able to pinpoint here location through it! And I'm sorry but I have to say that the whole thing is basically a bunch of BS and shouldn't really have been included again here. Sadly the damage control for the whole virtual-physical-touch-over-millions-of-miles-away force power introduced by Rian flipping Johnson was overlooked here!

And last of all I think it would be safe to say as one Youtube reviewer said that the opening title scrawl for the film sucks! Yep, the opening scrawl is very badly written and it begins with perhaps the WORST opening line I have ever seen in any of the scrawls which is "THE DEAD SPEAKS!". WHAT???! Is that really the best you can come up with for an opening scrawl?! Sorry but again its a completely naff way to start off the title scrawl, which doesn't really get that much better as it carries on.

Anyway that's it for the flaws.

SUM UP

So, to sum up, the finale to the Star Wars saga, The Rise of Skywalker is actually a pretty entertaining, decent send-off to the main chapters of the franchise and while I agree that it is far from perfect, what I don't agree with is all the hate this film is currently getting as it feels pretty unwarranted. Its like people wanted to see the greatest film ever made and expected something much higher and mightier than this but in the end I do think this is a very decent worthy send-off for Disney's trilogy and it deserves a bit more credit than its been given so far.

So, while its no masterpiece, I still think The Rise of Skywalker is well worth a look.

Anyway so that's it for now and I would like to finish by wishing you all a Merry Christmas tomorrow and I will be back with another post or two soon before the year is out.

Till then its bye fer now.

Soulsborne and Sekiro Game Rankings Part 2 - No's 3-1

Right, so its time for part 2 of my ranking the Soulsborne and Sekiro games in my order of preference and here I will look at the games in the top 3 of FromSoftware's catalogue. Again I have left Demon's Souls off this list because I haven't played it yet and given its lack of availability on other platforms other than the PS3 makes it difficult for me to get unless I get a PC emulator version, which I might look into in future in order to play it.

Also just to say that this list is based on my own preferences so feel free to disagree as I'm sure we all have different opinions on what is the best Soulsbornekiro (someone else coined this phrase not me by the way and its pretty good imho lol!).

So, with that all said, let's take a look at the remaining top 3 games...

3. Dark Souls III

So, at No.3. is funnily enough a game with the number 3 in it, Dark Souls III, which saw the return of Hidetaka Miyazaki as director after he took a leave of absence in Dark Souls II as he was busy working on Bloodborne at the time and felt he didn't want to direct two games simultaneously.


And with Miyazaki's return we got a real treat with Dark Souls III as its a game that is high on quality not only in its general content but also in its challenging boss fights as well as having a terrific soundtrack. Also given that this was to be the final Dark Souls game it was a fitting send-off to a great trilogy of games and as such one of the best in the series.

Story-wise Dark Souls III differs somewhat from its predecessors where your playable character is a champion of Ash, known as the Ashen One and someone who was almost made a Lord of Cinder but ultimately was not given that mantle and shares a similar undead curse to the previous game characters. So, the basic idea here is that the Ashen One will collect the souls of the Lords of Cinder in order to link the flame but in doing so they must fight their way past many dangerous enemies before they can reach their path to Lothric castle where ultimately the Ashed One will fight Princes Lorian and Lothric to complete the required souls needed to do so.

Dark Souls III succeeds really well in borrowing elements from the previous games and tweaking some of the issues from those games, especially by cutting down on the amount bosses and focusing more on creating memorable boss fights rather than just a bunch of boring filler ones like in Dark Souls III. And the game also feels a lot tighter than its predecessor as a result of this which also helps become a more enjoyable game.

And Dark Souls III has no shortage of memorable and challenging boss fights such as The Twin Princes, Lorian and Lothric, which is an incredibly difficult battle as the two brothers teleport around their throne room twatting you with miracles and a giant flaming sword! Then there are other great fights such as the Nameless King, who's difficulty is notorious in the series and with good reason as he is mighty brutal to take on in combat! And of course there is also Slave Knight Gael, who stands as easily one of the best bosses in the series, who pretty much concludes the entire series itself as he is the last DLC boss of the game itself.

Dark Souls III also includes some new neat elements such as the weapon art focus point system, which did appear in Demon's Souls but only this time the combat and move sets of the weapons now feel way more refined and sophisticated than before. There are also plenty of new weapons to check out of which quite a few of them are pretty cool such as the Sellwsword Twinblades, Millwood Battle Axe and the Follower Sabre. You can also even create weapons from boss souls just as you could before and from that you also get some pretty nifty weapons such as Lorian's Greatsword, which is a firey one and Vordt's Hammer, which is essentially a giant hammer that inflicts frostbite damage.

You also have the opportunity to use consumable items such as coloured pellets that help reduce elemental damage such as fire, lightning and dark and these come in extremely handy throughout and it helps that they last two minutes, which is great when you are in the middle of a boss fight.

Dark Souls III also does something a bit different with hollowing than in previous games because rather than you reverting back to your hollow form when you die, this time you don't and you need to undergo a process to become a hollow, which involves seeking out an aged sorcerer that gives dark sigils that make you hollow. And the more you die, the more this will increase your hollowing level, which can also increase your attack power if you do certain builds such as luck or bleed. 

There are of course still some issues with Dark Souls III in that maybe it is the least most innovative entry in the series as it builds on what is already there without adding a great deal of new content. I also felt that it lacked certain things such as more alternative healing items other than your standard estus flasks and just a handful of divine blessings, which you can only use one at a time! You can get some items that restore your health but they work far too slowly to be that effective and overall I'd say the lack of extra healing items is a pest here.

I also felt it was daft to have the blacksmith Andre (who also appeared in the original Souls game) upgrade your estus flask usage rather than the bonfire keeper yet you could upgrade the amount of health the estus flask restores yourself at the Firelink Shrine bonfire! It just felt to me like this whole estus upgrade process was rushed and wasn't really thought through properly.

But those issues aside, Dark Souls III is an incredibly solid entry in the Souls series and one of my favourites that saw the series get a great send-off and it deserves it place here at No.3.

2. Bloodborne 

So, at No.2 is Bloodborne, which for me ranks as one of the two masterpieces that Hidetaka Miyazaki has directed in the Soulsborne series and is a tremendous game overall that despite some similarities to the Souls games, it still stands out on its own.

As for its story, Bloodborne differs quite a bit from the Souls games in that it follows more the ideology of the works of H.P. Lovecraft, who was an American gothic horror writer. And the game itself is set in a Victorian-esque time where you play as a hunter who enters a dream-like world, fighting against a scourge of beasts in the town of Yarnham where you must try and find a way to stop the beast plague and end the nightmare that plagues the town.

Bloodborne is a terrific game without a doubt and even though as I said it shares some similarities to the Souls games in terms of healing, the travel system, being essentially an undying character as well as very similar weapon upgrade items, it still remains a pretty unique game in its own right. The game also has a great, brooding atmosphere to it as you wander the creepy town that is Yarnham fighting a large number of beasts and getting covered in torrents of blood as you do it making this easily one of FromSoftware's bloodiest games!

This game is also great because of its innovative ideas and this is especially the case with its weapons, as they are known as trick weapons that have initial form but can be transformed into another one to perform different attacks.

As an example there is the Hunter Axe, a strength weapon which starts off as a basic battle axe but on its transform mode it extends into essentially a halberd that allows for greater ranged attacks. Other trick weapons also include the strength based Whirligig saw, which in its un-transformed phase is a large stick which you can use to perform blunt attacks but when transformed you can attach a circular buzz saw head to the stick to perform serrated damage attacks. Then there are skill weapons such as the Blade of Mercy, which is refined sharp blade that can break off into two smaller blades as can perform some very fast combo attacks. And there is another skill weapon such as Rakuyo, which performs similarly to the Blade of Mercy except it starts as a longer slender sword that breaks off into two blades and can also be used to perform combo attacks.

The game also makes use of items known as runes that act similarly to the rings in Dark Souls that can boost your resistances to certain types of damage such as poison, fire, bolt and frenzy (which is similar to curse in the Souls games and can kill you outright or take a large amount of your health). Other ruins can also boost your attack power, help to discover more items from fallen enemies and even help you to restore your health when attacking enemies that have damaged your health.

WARNING: THIS NEXT PARAGRAPH FEATURES A SPOILER CONNECTED TO THE END OF THE GAME!

Another great element of Bloodborne is of course the boss fights, which for the most part are also pretty memorable, very well designed and can also be pretty tough too. And the memorable boss fights include Father Gascoigne, a blood-thirsty hunter who driven mad by his desire for blood, Lady Maria, a hunter you encounter in the Hunter's Nightmare in the game's DLC. Ludwig, who was formerly a hunter and is now a hideously mutated horse like beast. Gerhamn, the First Hunter, who (SPOILER!!!) can become a boss if you refuse to leave the Hunter's Dream at the end of the game. And last but not least is the Orphan of Kos, who is rather gross looking humanoid creature with a large placenta (yuk!) which he can attack you with and must rank as the hardest boss in the entire game!

The game also has arguably the best soundtrack of any of the games in the Soulsborne-Sekiro series so far as it is absolutely superb with one exception which is the theme for boss, Micolash, which is rubbish and is the only blight in another-wise magnificent score. And some of my favourites from the score include the themes for Gerhman, Lady Maria, Ludwig, Blood Staved Beast and Laurence, The First Vicar all of which are terrific, memorable themes.

Flaws wise, Bloodborne does have some issues here and there and the biggest issue alot of people raise it is to do with the game's Chalice Dungeons, which are a group of underground dungeons that the hunter can explore in which they will fight a hoard of enemies and more bosses. The dungeons are also where the hunter can pick up the very best blood gems in the game, which you use to boost the damage output of your weapons. The only problem is that the dungeons can tend to get pretty tedious after a while although I have to admit, I actually don't mind searching through them and they can be fun for a time.

Another issue I had was to do with farming for blood chunks that will upgrade your weapons to +9 as the process to do this pretty tedious and takes a long time! However if you can boost your discovery level high enough with the aid of the correct runes then you will be able to get a slightly better drop rate from certain enemies but without them its a major slog to do!

Lastly I felt, as I'm sure plenty of other fans of the game do that the PVP (i.e. online option of the game) is pretty poor and especially the summon system as you can literally spend FOREVER trying to get a summon for a boss fight! I also felt that PVP invasions in the game were a bit hit and miss and idea to find and kill a chime maiden makes things a bit annoying if you want to prevent being invaded when you are online. 

However all that aside, Bloodborne is still one of the very best games in the Soulsborne series and its filled with great, fast paced combat, innovative weapons, a terrific soundtrack and stylish well designed not to mention, challenging boss fights. And I think it easily deserves to be ranked in the top 2 games of the series as its that good.

And with only one game left to look at, I think we can all guess what is at No.1....

1. Dark Souls

Yep, at No.1 is of course the original Dark Souls, which for me is the best overall game in the Soulsborne-Sekiro series and even though Demon's Souls started the whole shebang off, Dark Souls was the first game I played and as such is still my favourite.

So, what makes Dark Souls so good? Well, for me again it brings a lot of innovative ideas to the table and it is also a game that is filled with varied combat, memorable and engaging NPCs, challenging boss fights and for its, very impressive visuals that got an excellent overhaul in the Remastered edition that came out last year.

Dark Souls also introduces the core concepts of its trilogy with the story of a chosen undead that is destined to succeed Gwyn, the Lord of Cinder, in order to break the curse and link the flame to keep the age of fire going. However in order to do so, the chosen undead must fight their way through a hoard of enemies, bosses and also claim the souls of four Great Ones in order to access the final area of the game and take on Gwyn in combat.

Dark Souls has so much to offer in terms of its variety of combat, traversing different areas and environments not to mention giving players the chance to create many different builds such as a warrior, sorcerer, pyromancer, swordsman (or woman) or even a cleric. And again you have access to a wide variety of melee weapons such as swords, axes, halberds, spears, clubs and hammers as well as magic spells, miracles (for Clerics), pyromancies and dark magic. So there are plenty of weapons to choose from here and many of them would reappear in the sequels and are among my favourites in the series. With all this at the players fingertips, the possibilities of creating builds in Dark Souls is practically limitless.

The game also has plenty of interesting and memorable NPCs such as Solaire, a knight who is in search of his own personal enlightment and can be summoned to help you in several boss fights. Then there is of course Patches, a sneaky and untrustworthy merchant, Big Hat Logan, an eccentric but legendary sorcerer and of course Siegward of Catarina (aka onion bro!) who wears onion-like shaped armour and even sleeps standing up!

Then we have the game's bosses some of which rank among the very best in the series not to mention the most memorable. And the game's best bosses include of course the legendary Ornstein and Smough, Knight Artorius, Four Kings, Manus: Father of the Abyss, Gwyn: Lord of Cinder and Pinwheel (just kidding about Pinwheel!). And if you are unfamiliar with the Souls games and are new to them then these bosses are sure to tie you up in knots and in fits of frustration for days on end!

The game's visual design for its time is also very impressive and the variety in its environments is also just as good with again some terrific well designed bosses and interesting, not to mention tough standard enemies. However I would say though that the character models for your playable character aren't the best as their faces look just a bit too soft and undefined in comparison to the other games in the series.

Dark Souls also differs from the other games in that you can upgrade your own stats at the bonfire yourself without another figure such as you would need to do in the other games. The game also even let's you upgrade your own weapons and armour at the bonfire, which is something none of the other Souls games let you do without a blacksmith. So, in a way Dark Souls is the most forward thinking of the three games in the trilogy and in that respect the sequels kind of took a backward step.

Where Dark Souls does fall down a little is that the weapon upgrade path is a bit more complicated that in the sequels as you need to different embers if you want to upgrade your weapons all the way to +15 (the sequels would be +10). Also if you want to make elemental weapons such as fire, lightning or magic ones, you need special shards to do so and it requires you to downgrade your existing weapon to +5 before you can convert it. Not only that but the game insists on using different coloured chunks for the upgrades for different types of weapons, which is a bit tedious and it feels a bit unnecessary and again in the sequels you just used standard chunks rather than a bunch of different ones.   

And lastly there is of course the whole issue with the animation of drinking your Estus flask during fights because when you do drink it, you are rooted to the spot and cannot move and this often can be difference between life and death as more often than not if you drink at the wrong time it will result you in getting killed! Thankfully by the time we got to Dark Souls III, this issue had been ironed out and you can drink your Estus on the move but I always felt this was really frustrating in the original game and to an extent even in Dark Souls II.

However those quibbles aside, the original Dark Souls is still for me the best game in the series and it forever will warrant repeated playing with its exciting combat, great boss fights and virtually endless variety in making different builds and using a vast array of weapons and spells. Its the best of the best and it deserves to be at No.1 on this list.

Right, so that's it for now and I will be back soon with another review as I recently seen the latest Star Wars at the cinema, The Rise of Skywalker, so you can expect a review forthcoming for that.

Till then its bye for now, may the good blood guide your way and praise the sun!

Soulsborne and Sekiro Game Rankings Part 1 No's 5-4

OK, so for a change I thought I would do something a little different but with a familiar theme as I thought just for fun that I would rank the Soulsborne games and Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice in a listing to see which ones I liked the least and the best. And I figured given the amount to cover in each game that I would split this up into two separate posts.

Now before I go on, I would just like to say that I really like all of these games so there are none on this list that I hate at all, which is why I decided to title the post without saying which is best and which is the worst.

Also I would like to point out that this list will omit Demon's Souls simply because I haven't played it as it was a PS3 exclusive game and I no longer own a PS3 and haven't done so for several years. I could however try and download a PC emulator version of the game and might still do in the near future but until then I will need to unfortunately leave it off this list.

So, with that all said let's take a look at these games and how I think they rank. 

5. Dark Souls II (Scholar of the First Sin Edition)

So, at No.5 is Dark Souls II, the Scholar of the First Sin edition, which was the remastered version of the original Dark Souls II game and came out for the PS4 with an impressive visual overhaul and a somewhat changed layout of the game from the initial release. And the reason why I have put the Scholar version on here is simply because its the only version of Dark Souls II that I have played and despite the stick some fans of the series give this game, I still really enjoy it myself.

Dark Souls II storyline follows a similar pattern to its predecessor where you play a nameless human undead who is set on a path to try and break the undead curse and obtain four souls of the Great Ones in order to do so. The player is guided along the way by Emerald Herald, a mysterious figure who can upgrade your character's stats along the way (such as strength, endurance and vigour). Emerald also tells your character to seek King Vendrick once they have obtained the four souls, which will ultimately lead them toward their destiny to replace Vendrick as the King of Drangleic.

Dark Souls II had quite a job ahead of itself with trying to better its remarkable predecessor and for the most part DS II goes a pretty good job although it does ultimately fall short of reaching the great heights of the original game. Still that aside there is plenty going for Dark Souls II as it filled with fun combat, great ideas as well as some pretty challenging enemies and boss fights.

What Dark Souls II did well for me personally is that it was a game of fresh ideas such as the inclusion of bonfire ascetics, which allows for you to essentially reset an area and strengthen enemies as well as reset boss fights but the only difference is they are now stronger than before. The upside to this though is that it allows you pick up more of the original items that were there and you can even farm for a tonne of souls in certain areas particularly if you fight the Giant Lord boss you can keep using ascetics to kill him over and over again and earn a tonne of souls! Its almost like a cheat code for the game!

The game also introduced some pretty cool weapons and spells and it greatly improved on sorcery in the original with a greater inclusion of Hexer spells (which is basically dark magic) that allowed you to spam some very cool spells in enemy's faces! It also helped that the casting speed in Souls II is WAY faster than it was in the original, which leaves you less vulnerable than before.  Weapons wise there are also some cool ones that include the redesigned Greatsword, which looks amazing and rather than the skinny looking blade we saw in the original Souls, its now a big thick blade that must about 7 feet long! The game also improved greatly on the move set of the weapons here as if I had one criticism of Dark Souls it was that some of the weapon's combos and moves felt pretty underdeveloped.

Dark Souls II also did a very interesting thing with your character's hollowing and the curse status, which no longer kills you outright but instead it just lowers your health by one level (up to 10 times) and turns you from human to hollow form. So, I thought it was a good idea to actually change the whole idea of curse just outright killing you but instead it more kind of continues to impose the undead curse on you further by making you more hollow in appearance. I also liked the idea that when you turn hollow in this game that you don't suddenly look incredibly skinny like you did in Souls I and III but instead your skin is green and scabby but your body weight remains the same, so you remain in proportion rather than suddenly turn horribly anoxeric looking.

The PVP for Souls II was also a big improvement in that you had the option to burn a human effigy (which is the equivalent of the humanity items you used in the original Souls game to return you to human form) to prevent being invaded for a time (up to 30 minutes or so). This was especially a good thing as random invasions often prove to be a real pain in the ass with the Souls games, especially if you have a lot of Souls on the line!

Where Dark Souls II does fall down however is with its lack of memorable bosses as most of them are frankly pretty forgettable and boring to fight and this is pretty unfortunate given that the boss fights are one of the main staples of the series. However in Dark Souls II there were 41 bosses in total, which include 9 bosses from 3 DLCs and that is simply too many! What also made things worse were that they kept recycling the same bosses over and over again (I mean who's bright idea was it to put Dragonrider in the game four times over?!) which showed the developers were lacking ideas.

However that's not to say that Dark Souls II had no good bosses at all as there will still a handful of good ones such as Sir Alonne, Fume Knight (my personal favourite of Souls II) Sinh the Slumbering Dragon, Vendrick (yeah I kind of like this fight), Burnt Ivory King and of course the original Smelter Demon. Its just a pity that the game decided to waste its time on developing so many mediocre boss fights that could easily have been scrapped especially ones like Dragonrider, Royal Rat Authority, Royal Rat Vanguard and not to mention maybe the worst of the lot: the Covetous Demon, a Jabba the Hutt rip-off attempt!

Also on the plus side, Dark Souls II also has a pretty killer soundtrack for the most part (although its not always regarded that way by the fans) with some great tracks by Motoi Sakuraba and Yuka Kitamura. The standout tracks here for me were the themes for Sir Alonne, Fume Knight, Vendrick, Skeleton Lords, Ruin Sentinels and Aldia: Scholar of the First Sin.

So all flaws aside, Dark Souls II is still a lot of fun to play and I've enjoyed doing alot of playthroughs of this game with a variety of different builds using various different weapons and spells. In fact I often found  my choice of build was to either be a hexer or a cleric and both of which you can have alot of fun with but the possibilities within these games are limitless that's always the main fun of a Souls game.

So while it remains the weakest of the three games in the Dark Souls trilogy, Souls II is still a lot of fun and brought some fresh ideas to the table and is well worth checking out despite any hate it get's from certain fan groups.

4. Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice

So, in 4th place is FromSoftware's latest offering, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, which recently won the game of the year award and its certainly a pretty damn good game. However for me out of all five games I have played of FromSoft while I do think Sekiro is a better game than Dark Souls II it still doesn't quite outmatch the other games ahead of it. 

For those of you who might be unfamiliar with Sekiro, it is set in a fictitious version of Japan in the 16th century where you play as a Shinobi (essentially a ninja) named Wolf, who's young Lord, Kuro is kidnapped and Wolf fails in his attempt to save him as he loses his left arm in a duel with an opposing clan member, Genichiro. Wolf soon awakens in a delapidated temple and discovers that his severed arm has been replaced with a prosphetic one by a sculptor, who himself was once a shinobi. So, from here, Wolf begins his mission to save Kuro, who is an undying, divine heir and stop Genichiro in his plan to create an immortal army using Kuro's blood.

And Sekiro has plenty going for it with its intense combat as you clash swords with various enemies and rely on using deflect and parry techniques to take on your opponents, which ends with Wolf using a deathblow to finish off his foes. It also brings alot of other elements to the table that are appealing and unique especially the Shinobi prosphetic tools, which offer plenty of variety in how Wolf can take down his enemies as he can use makeshift spears, axes and other tools such as firecrackers, poison knives and even protective metal umbrellas!

Sekiro is also easily the most visually stunning game they have produced with its glorious graphics, which are rich in detail and the environments varied and above all very colourful, which is a breath of fresh air in comparison to some of the drab colour in their previous titles. The character models also look great here and are by far the best seen in a Fromsoft game so far although this relates primarily more to the main characters than anything else.

Its also fair to say however that Sekiro is very challenging game and its difficulty level is pretty punishing as Wolf can be wiped out by alot of enemies with just two hits! And I have to say that's mainly why I put this game further down the list as I initially found the game's difficulty quite alienating and it took using a PC mod to makes things a bit easier (but not too much honest as this game still gave me a hard time!). I have since replayed it on the PS4 Pro on its standard difficulty and it was quite a struggle to work through but I eventually managed to succeed in completing the game, so I guess I should give myself a pat on the back for that alone lol!

There are also plenty of bosses in Sekiro and in fact I really would ahve to say there are simply too many of them and some of them are even recycled just like they did in Dark Souls 2, which is not a good thing and makes gameplay a bit tedious at times. Infact anyone who levelled recycling bosses at Dark Souls 2 as a criticism should really take a closer look at Sekiro as it totally over does it here by recycling not only main game bosses but also mini bosses too! 

However there are still quite a few bosses in the game that I really enjoyed taking on such as the Guardian Ape, Genichiro, Lady Butterfly, Demon of Hatred and of course the final and unquestionably the hardest boss: Isshin, the Sword Saint. In fact Isshin was so tough it took 3 days worth of attempts for me to finally beat him!

The game also has an excellent score by Yuka Kitamura, who worked on the Soulsborne games in the past and her music is typically very Japanese sounding and fits the period perfectly. The standout tracks for me here were the themes for Isshin, the Sword Saint, Emma the Gentle Blade, The Corrupt Monk, Guardian Ape, the Divine Dragon and the Great Shinobi Owl. 

So, for me Sekiro takes 4th place on the list and even though it doesn't quite scale the heights of the games ahead on the list, its still a pretty damn good game in its own right. And Sekiro succeeds in providing a very challenging single player experience that will push and stretch players to the limit and despite its punishing difficulty, its one that I would still welcome coming back to in the future. 

OK so that's it for now and I will be back soon with Part 2 of my look at my ranking the Soulsborne-Sekiro games.

Till then bye for now!

Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice - Review Update

Well, well, well...just when I thought I was finished with a certain game by the acclaimed game developing team that brought you Dark Souls and Bloodborne (i.e. From Software) I've decided to give it another go. And yep the game in question is Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice.

Now, I've already done two posts on this game alone and in both of them, I expressed my disappointment over the game and how I felt it didn't live up to expectations as I even gave Sekiro a second chance and again I just didn't enjoy playing it. However...I decided to give Sekiro one more chance to see if I could get into it but only this time I bought it on the PC instead of the PS4 and I will say more about why in a bit.

So has my opinion changed??? Well, let's find out! 

So as this is essentially a review update, I will still mention a bit about the story, so here is the usual warning...

PLOT SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

STORY (By the way this was taken from the Sekiro Wikipedia page)

"In a re-imagined late 16th century Sengoku period Japan, warlord Isshin Ashina staged a bloody coup and seized control of the land of Ashina from the Interior Ministry. During this time, a nameless orphan is adopted by the wandering shinobi named Ukonzaemon Usui, known to many as Owl, who named the boy Wolf and trained him in the ways of the shinobi. Two decades later, the Ashina clan is on the brink of collapse due to a combination of the now elderly Isshin having fallen ill and the clan's enemies steadily closing in from all sides. Desperate to save his clan, Isshin's grandson Genichiro sought the Divine Heir Kuro so he can use the boy's "Dragon Heritage" to create an immortal army. Wolf, now a full fledged shinobi and Kuro's personal bodyguard, loses his left arm while failing to stop Genichiro. As he received the dragon’s blood from Kuro three years prior, Wolf survives his wounds and awakes in an abandoned temple. In the temple, he meets the Sculptor, a former shinobi named Sekijo who now carves Buddha statues, and Wolf finds that his missing arm has been replaced with the Shinobi Prosthetic, a sophisticated artificial arm that can wield a variety of gadgets and weaponry...".

And its from here where Wolf (or Sekiro as he is later known) must start his dangerous journey to try and rescue his kidnapped lord and get revenge over Genichiro...

THOUGHTS

Well...so after my initial disappointment with Sekiro on playing the game I just found it too difficult and punishing to warrant playing by the time I had reached the Genichiro boss I had felt pretty frustrated and deflated by the game. The second time round I tried the game (bought it again on the PS4) but perhaps rather foolishly I decided to start playing it where I left off as I kept my PS4 save files and I ended up feeling the same way as I failed to make a dent on Genichiro and on trying to tackle a mini boss (a human centipede one) to get some extra prayer beads.

However...this time round I purchased the game for the PC and the reason why is because I decided to try out a game mod that would make Sekiro an easier experience. Now, I didn't try this mod straight away and played the game up to a point where I felt frustration creeping as I failed to get by that pesky Blazing Bull mini-boss. So after some trouble I finally managed to load in one of the easy mods (perhaps the first one was a bit too easy!) and not before long it transformed my opinion of the game as it suddenly became a far more enjoyable and accessible experience.

Now I must admit I am cheating a bit here by playing an easier mod of the game but to be fair I have loaded in a mod that has eased the difficulty level but not to the point where the game is no longer challenging as I am still dying quite a bit in this version and have had my struggles with some bosses. However I think what is more important is that thanks to this mod, it has changed my opinion of the game and I am happy to say I now think that Sekiro is a very good game with plenty going for it. In fact this mod might even encourage to go back and have a go at the game in future at its standard difficulty (although I might regret it!).

So with that said, I am now enjoying the game mechanics more, the combat, the story lore (well to an extent!) aswell as the number of unique items that can be found and used in the game also. And it just shows you that just maybe Hidetaka Miyazaki (the director of the game and the Soulsborne games) should have incorporated an easier mode to ensure that players can it enjoy the game more rather than rely on using PC mods to achieve this.

GAMEPLAY (This section will be split into sub-sections just so you know!)

Before I start just to explain as the playable character in the game is referred to as both Wolf and Sekiro, he is later referred to as Sekiro, so for the purpose of this post, I will refer to the character as Sekiro and try and use the game's full title or an abbreviaton to avoid confusion!

Well, as for the gameplay, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice while it has its differences to the Soulsborne games, it stills shares the same non-linear structure where you can explore different areas rather than having to fight each area in succession. The game also shares similarities to the SB games such as healing and check points, as here in Sekro SDT and I will go into more detail on them below.

COMBAT 

However that aside, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice does largely depart from the Soulsbourne formats in most other respects and this is especially the case regarding the combat because here instead, Sekiro will use his katana to attack an enemy's posture (or their poise) and continue until its broken and then Sekiro can perform a deathblow attack to finish them off. However this will vary when it comes to the boss fights because Sekiro will be required to perform at least a couple of deathblows to finish them off as they have larger health pools. Sekiro can also deflect attacks from enemies but this does of course come with a penalty as they can also break Sekiro's posture to land an attack of their own. Sekiro can also perform stealth attacks and sneak through areas to takedown enemies from behind or from above.

SKILLS 
 
Sekiro will also throughout the game earn XP points for taking down enemies and based on these points, he can upgrade his skills and these tend be a mixture of defensive and offensive skills and the number of points he can gain will increase as he progresses and kill stronger foes. Also as Sekiro progresses in the game, he can earn more points and enhance his skills and he will access them from the idols he travels by. These skills are a mixture of combat arts, which you can swap out as you gain more of them (but you can only use one at a time) and other techniques known as latent arts that affect different abilities such as Sekiro's stealth abilities. Also from the skill tree, Sekiro can even increase the amount of spirit emblems he can hold as well as boost the amount of health his healing gourd can restore. 

TOOLS AND ITEMS

Sekiro similar to the Soulbourne games, has its own share of tools and items to be found throughout the world. Starting with the tools, well you may notice of course Sekiro only has one primary weapon which is his katana but once he obtains his prosthetic arm, he can pick up a number of accessory weapons that can be attached to the arm to help him take down his enemies. As an example there are Shurikens, which are ninja stars that Sekiro can throw at enemies, flame-vents, which are used to set enemies on fire, loaded-spears, which Sekiro can stab foes with them and loaded-axes, which again Wolf can use to stagger enemies to help him land a deathblow. He also can access other tools such as umbrella shields that can deflect enemy attacks or absorb elemental damage such as lightning or fire.

There are also plenty of other items in the game that are of much use such as different sugars that when Sekiro consumes them, he will gain different boosts such as reduction in physical/posture damage or an increase in his attack power. Other items include balloons, which when Sekiro crushes them will again provide different abilities such as receiving more gold from fallen enemies, or increased chances of getting discoverable items held by enemies also. 

ENEMIES, MINI BOSSES & BOSSES

As for the game's enemies, they are mainly comprised of a mix of humans, beasts, ogres, apes, lizards, dogs and many, many more. The human enemies tend to be members of opposing Samurai clans and tend to attack you with katanas, spears, torches, bows, guns and even canons. The mini bosses however tend to be a bit more unique in that there are so many to be found in the game and they tend to have either one or two health bars, which involves Sekiro landing successful deathblows to finish them off. These mini bosses can vary in difficulty with some being very easy whereas others can be very tough to beat.

As for the main game bosses however they have larger health bars and can have up to three at the most and pose a greater threat to the player. And this game has its fair share of challenging bosses and despite even the game mod I used, I still struggled BIG TIME on the final boss, Isshin, the Sword Saint, who was absolutely brutal to fight and it took me 74 attempts over 3 days to finally beat him! So, I think its safe to say that FromSoftware finally came up with a truly challenging final game boss after their previous final bosses had lacked such a high level of difficulty. 

PERILOUS ATTACKS 
 
Bosses and standard enemies can also perform perilous attacks that deal out a lot of damage, which Wolf cannot block however he can counter them with a skill move (Mikiri counter) either that or he will have to jump back to avoid them. Perilous attacks are identified by a red kanji symbol just as the enemy performs the attack and its recommend that Sekiro dodge the attack just as the symbol fades to stand the best chance of evading it. 

IDOLS, VITALITY AND POSTURE

Moving onto the game's travel system, which are the idols that are very similar to the bonfires and lamps that were used in Souls and Bloodborne as Sekiro will find these idols throughout the game's world. The idols similar to the bonfire and lamps in SB games, act as checkpoints for the player and will restore Sekiro's health fully aswell as his health items. At the idols, Sekiro can also upgrade his skills, his vitality and his posture (same as poise in Dark Souls) aswell as purchase Spirit Emblems that are used to utilise his prosthetic arm's tools and determines how many uses he can have of each tool.

As for Sekiro's vitality and posture, these can be upgraded gradually throughout the game but in order to do so, Sekiro will have to fight a number of mini bosses to do so as he will obtain items called prayer beads that will let him increase both these stats. Wolf will also need to obtain four beads that form a prayer necklace to upgrade his vitality and posture by one level and there are 40 beads to be found throughout the game. Sekiro's vitality bar can be found on the bottom left of the screen whereas his posture bar is on the bottom centre area of the screen, which will fill up as he is attacked and reduce as it recovers. The boss health and posture bars by contrast are found at the top of the screen.

RESSURECTION AND DRAGONROT (Warning: this next section is kind of a spoiler!) 

Another aspect of the gameplay is of course connected to the title where Sekiro can actually die...twice which means if he is killed once in combat, he can be ressurected once more before finally dying and the ressurection stat can be fully replenished whenever Sekiro rests at an idol. His ressurection status is shown down below his health bar and is indicated by two circular nodes that are cancelled out after Sekiro has died once but they can be refilled after he kills so many enemies or a boss.

However there is a big penalty that can be incurred if Sekiro keeps dying and that is dragonrot, which is an illness that certain NPCs in the game will contract as a result of Sekiro's repeated deaths. Wolf however can cure the dragonrot via the use of blood droplets and he must do this to ensure that the NPCs recover and he cannot proceed with their quest lines until he does.  

GRAPHICS AND MUSIC

As for the graphics, well this is easily From Software's best looking game to date as Sekiro is stunning game visually speaking and the environments are both rich in detail and varied as Sekiro traverses many different areas such as temples, sewers, dungeons, open fields and of course fortresses. The character models are also pretty good although they are primarily better for the main characters but not quite so good for some of the enemies in the game as they can tend to look a bit goofy! But overall this game is very easy on the eyes in terms of its visuals.

Moving onto the music, the game is scored by Yuka Kitamura, who worked on the Soulsborne games aswell and overall its a pretty good score, which to its credit sounds very different to the scores we are familar with in the SB series. The score however doesn't quite scale the heights of the very best soundtracks in the Soulsbourne universe but it is still a fine one all the same and its mini-boss theme alone is well worth listening to even if it is overused in the game! That aside there are also some pretty good boss themes such as the ones for the Guardian Ape, Lady Butterfly and Isshin the Sword Saint. 

FLAWS

As for flaws...well despite having changed my opinion on the game from last time, Sekiro it has to be said still has some worth mentioning.

For starters I would have to say that the game's main issue for me is its fairly steep learning curve in terms of difficulty as it is a pretty punishing game overall (hence why I downloaded the easier mod lol!). Also because its strictly a solo game with no means for any other players to join you in the fight, you are forced to beat the game alone and given the stern challenge presented by the game's bosses, mini bosses and standard enemies, its a daunting task to undertake and one I had found initially very off putting.   

Another issue is maybe to do with the whole setup of the game as you are very limited in terms of building your character's stats as all there is available is your vitality and posture as well as your resurrective powers (based on how many enemies you kill or when you reset the world at an idol). Now to be fair, Fromsoft here did decide to go with a skill tree system where you can unlock many different attacks and defensive maneuvers and that does offer some variety to the combat in the game.

Then we get to the consumable items as there are simply too many of them to be found in the game and similar to some of the Soulsbourne ones that can be pretty useless! As an example one of the most common pickups from fallen enemies are ceramic shards, which you can use to attract the attention of individual enemies (similar to pebbles in Bloodborne) but here they aren't that effective at drawing your opponent over to you.

Further to this point, I found that there are some items that would have been better if you had more supply of and as an example I wish you could have access to more pellets in the game at one time rather just three, which I think is not enough. And the funny thing is there are some items such as antidotes, dousing powders for example that you can use five times at once but you can't with the pellets, which is a bit annoying.

Another issue is to do with the lack of availability of certain items in the game early on and only later in the game do you end up getting them more regularly such as divine confetti, which is essentially for taking on certain bosses in the game. However, divine confetti is only available in limited quantities until you fight one of the main bosses later on and by then you really wish you had those supplies by then! To be fair divine confetti is farmable from certain enemies in the game, so its not too bad in that regard. 

Another big problem I had with the game was to do with the mini-bosses as there are simply too many of them and some of them are pretty challenging, which I admit is to be expected in a From Software game. Now quite a few of these bosses are optional but they are also fairly essential to getting prayer beads to upgrade your vitality, which means you need to keep fighting them over and over until you have defeated them in order to get just one bead! So, if you want to farm up to get the beads you could be in for a frustrating time if you want to do so.

However sometimes the mini bosses can be a complete joke and barely even deserve having a boss HP bar to begin with, especially one boss called the Mist Noble, who you can defeat in a matter of seconds! So the challenge pendulum does swing both ways I guess from extreme difficulty to extreme ease.

I also had an issue with quite a few of the NPCs in the game as majority them really don't have much in the way of personality or character with the exception of maybe the odd merchant and the Sculptor but there are no real standouts in this game like there are in Soulsborne games. Here there is no equivalent of Solaire, Patches, Siegward or Eileen the Crow and that's a pity. Further to this, while I do think its good that From Software finally gave a playable character a voice and more than one expression (well.. maybe not!) I felt that Sekiro has barely any personality either and gives nothing but gruff, concise responses. Its like Fromsoft tried to have a go at a playable character with a voice but decided to keep it along in line with their idea of creating a blank one that does little more than fight. 

Another niggle I had with the game was to do with when Sekiro dies the first time during a boss battle or standard enemy combat you get the choice of letting him die or resurrect. Now I appreciate the "die" option is there if you have had enough but I still think that is an option that shouldn't be included and I will tell why. So, the reason why I think the "die" option isn't a good idea is because during a couple of boss fights I accidentally pressed the "die" option button (L1 on the PS4) and it simply ended the fight when I didn't want it to! So, I just think it would have been a better idea to have simply give you only the one option to "resurrect" and keep on fighting as you will be pretty annoyed if you accidentally hit the die button and were in the middle of a decent attempt at a boss.

Then there is a problem to do with how when you fight mini bosses and if you run out of the area you fight them in, their health bars with automatically reset! Now, this happened to me in the Chained Ogre mini-boss fight as I had removed one of his health bars with a deathblow but tried to distance myself from him a bit and when I came back into the area, his health had fully reset itself again! And it also even happened again later in the game when I fought the Sichimen Warrior boss (and more on him in a bit!). So, while I do appreciate it the game will reset the boss's health if you run far away from the fight, its still a bit of a cheat if you give a little distance and have already taken away one of their health bars!

And last but not least another big complaint I have with the game is to do with one of the damage stats you suffer from in Sekiro and that is terror. Yep, terror is this game's answer to what curse was in Dark Souls and frenzy was in Bloodborne except its way more annoying! And the way terror works is very similar in that enemies that deal out terror damage, it causes your terror meter to build up and when it does, Sekiro instantly dies. Now I can appreciate that From Software wanted to include an insta-kill mechanic like curse and frenzy to Sekiro but I think they really abused it here, especially with the annoying Sichimen warrior bosses who dish out elemental terror attacks non-stop and it makes fighting them a real pain in the ass! So, for me terror is a game mechanic that Sekiro could easily have done without.  

Anyway that's it for the flaws.

SUM UP

So, to sum up this updated review, I have to say that I have now changed my opinion on Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice and I no longer see it as a disappointing game but instead a really entertaining, intense and gripping one that is well worth checking out. And I think simply by trying out the game on the PC using a slightly easier mod got me right into the game and it pitched the difficulty level just at the right place for me, which made me appreciate the game much more.

And yeah OK it might sound like I'm cheating myself of the original punishing experience of the game's standard difficulty but believe me the mod version I am currently using is still pretty challenging and the only real difference being that enemy damage you take isn't quite as severe as you would in the standard game. So, for me the game now feels a lot more balanced and I still wouldn't say no to going back to try it at its standard difficulty in future. 

Sekiro of course also has its own bonuses such as its beautiful visuals, intriguing Japanese setting, I also like the idea of the combat simplified down to using just one primary weapon rather than having almost too many weapons to choose from like you have in the Souls games. The game's combat is also pretty intense and very challenging and the prosthetic Shinobi tools are also a pretty neat touch. I also even like that the game gives you the choice to start new game plus rather than force you to start it after you having defeated the final boss in the game (which you are forced to in the original Dark Souls and Bloodborne).

Another thing I quite liked is that From Software FINALLY gave players an option to PAUSE THE GAME while you were in the middle of fighting or at any point while playing for that matter! So, this alone is another plus for Sekiro.  

So, I am happy to conclude this review by saying that Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice is now a game that I really enjoy and would gladly go back to replay it in the future. Is it as good as the Soulsborne games? In my opinion the answer to that would still be no as Sekiro still has its work cut in trying to better those incredible titles that came before it. It certainly has gone up in my estimation though and while its not a masterpiece it is a pretty damn good game and that's enough for me.

Right, so that's it for now and I will be back soon with another post.

Till then its bye fer now!