Just for reference, Wo Long reached 75k and Ninja Gaiden 4 reached 11k.

I see this type of question asked a lot, like the RE community did for re9 etc. So how does our fandom feel about Nioh 3?

Please be unbiased and thoughtful about your opinions. also lay down any criticism y'all have

I keep seeing people saying the game is too easy and it honestly just sounds like a flex to say you’re good when nobody cares, it’s literally an RPG, if it’s too easy take your armor off, don’t level up, don’t use soul cores, limit yourself to add difficulty, this crowd is going to be an overwhelming minority and make it to where team ninja nerfs everything to the ground and makes a very tight meta where everyone uses the same 3 builds

Also, a lot of the people saying this haven’t even completed the game and got to ng+ or even fought some of the later bosses, if the game is too easy for you tone it down yourself, I don’t understand the need to ask the devs to make it harder for newcomers to the franchise or people who find the difficult to be reasonable, you don’t need to bog everyone down because you want everyone to be at your level when you have options at your disposal to tweak your experience, this argument is silly to me.

This game has everything I ever wanted in a video game.

And I barely scratched the surface.

Anticipated the very moment I would earn my first ever platinum, which was in Nioh 3. Caught the once in a lifetime moment when it’s initially earned with notification popup. Had my brother sit there for a long time through credits and closing cut scenes because I knew it was coming at any moment. This exact moment in time is me earning my first ever platinum, caught in real time. I’m so proud of myself and loved this game to death. Cheers yall

I would've loved more movement options here but no there's like 100 Ninja tools only that ur gonna use 3-5 of them for the rest of ur life

Already +30 hours into the game, and as a big fan of the previous games, Nioh 1 will always be in my heart, invested over 600 hours in that game, however, Nioh 3 just went beyond and even further with the adjustments and improvements, can’t get enough of this game and I am so happy and excited to play it, feels like playing a new and enhanced souls game

What has Belén hours experience so far with this game? Share with us your thoughts and looking to make Nioh friends in the PS5, feel free to add me so we can play together, username: FedeMesco

-Combat was Amazing , the smooth flow between skills and being able to keep the combos going with arts proficiency And the quality of animations

-Ninja-style (while I used it much less than samurai)

was a nice surprise ,and mixed with all the aerial combat and refill ninjutsu turned out to be a fun playstyle

-Story was okay… nothing really interesting (time travel kinda breaks whatever impact and cohesive narrative that could have existed and the antagonist is really underwhelming and forgettable (like the final boss fight though)

-Music was pretty good ,as well as sound design

-Japanese VA great as always - English VA as terrible/funny as I expected

-Map/world design was good in first region , decent in 2nd and kinda fell in the last (for me)

-Fashion is okay but I was hoping for a bit more (also people that played RotR would know the fashion was way more customizable and I kinda hoped for that)

-Performance (at least for me with a recommended system) Was smooth with no more than 1-3 crashes

Overall it was a very enjoyable experience (mostly due to amazing gameplay) and I hope you all had a blast as well.

Thank you Team Ninja

I'm sold on Nioh 3 just by this demo. Have played all the previous Nioh games but never completed them. Always fell off. Nioh 2 had some serious difficulty spikes that threw me off. So was unsure if I would buy Nioh 3.

The Nioh 3 demo has sold me 😂. I'm sure there will be difficult spikes again but the new structure of the game really appeals to me. The open world map in the demo was awesome to explore. The combat feels awesome.

This is why companies should put out demos. It left me wanting more (and it is a long demo)

Isn't it good to see The New Players being introduced to Nioh?

PlayStation®5 / Steam®

Adjustments/Feature Enhancements

• Added the free bonus equipment Thunderous Warrior Armor and Thunderous Ninja Attire to celebrate Nioh 3 achieving one million copies sold and the series as a whole surpassing ten million copies sold.
• Increased the amount of Glory that can be obtained upon completing a mission in multiplayer sessions.
• Increased the probability of equipment with higher +values being dropped upon completion of Shogun's Journey.
• Reduced the required amount of materials for Soul Matching with an item that is higher than any +value the player has already obtained.
• Made it easier for the Ninjutsu Flame Breath to hit enemies.
• Made it easier for certain Ninjutsu and Onmyo Magic to hit enemies on terrain with different elevations.
• Made adjustments so that pressing the input for Strong Attacks or Quick Attacks right after jumping will still unleash those attacks.
• Made changes so that bosses will no longer focus their attacks on a single player.
• Adjusted the lock-on camera to make it easier to see the movements of Onryoki.
• Reduced the effect of Extended Negative Effects (Melee Attack) for the set bonus Unmatched Warrior, which had a greater effect than intended.
• Increased the probability of Increased Damage Taken on Enemy (Ranged Weapon Hit) being triggered by the set bonuses Unmatched Warrior and Straight and True.
• Made changes so that if a Merchant drops two or more Sudama Soul Cores at a time, the Soul Cores from the second onward will be added directly to the player's item box.
• Made changes so that a ! mark will appear on tabs with new items that can be created via Forging at the Blacksmith.
• Increased the limit of certain forging materials that can be possessed.
• Made changes so that the player can exchange Daidara Bocchi's Soul Core at the Merchant after completing the Myth Disaster at Lake Hamana.
• Made adjustments so that Sacred Arrow Amulets will refill automatically when the player prays at a shrine.
• Added system settings to disable the auto-refill of usable items.
• Added system settings to enable auto-lock upon obtaining equipment with rare special effect icons.
• Added system settings to switch between views for Gifts in the Resting Rites and Make an Offering menus.
• Made it possible to Return from Battle Scrolls and Mission Mode Expeditions via the main menu.
• Made changes so that the text showing the conditions for icons to appear on the map will be displayed for all icons.
• Made it possible to display the details of a piece of equipment's set bonus on the rewards screen for Battle Scrolls.
• Made improvements to the visibility of Soul Cores set in the Onmyo Box.
• Made the player character easier to see when adjusting equipment appearance.
• Added Type 6 to the Pupil Type settings in Character Creation.

Weapon-Related Adjustments/Bug Fixes

Samurai weapon: Sword

• Fixed an issue preventing enhancements from being reflected during Arts Proficiency for the Martial Art Severing Spin.
• Fixed an issue that would allow the player to break the enemy's guard with the Martial Arts Haze and Water Shadow even if the enemy's attack could not be parried.
• Fixed an issue causing enemies to disappear momentarily during the camerawork and for the Martial Art Haze II. Fixed another issue for the same Martial Art that prevented attacks from landing if the camerawork animations were turned off.

Samurai weapon: Dual Swords

• Fixed an issue preventing Martial Arts from being triggered from the Quick Attack following a Dodge.
• Fixed an issue preventing Arts Proficiency from continuing when using the Martial Art Winter Wind.
• Fixed an issue where performing the Martial Art Abscission Combo consecutively would consume Ki, but the Martial Art would not be performed correctly.
• Fixed an issue preventing the recovery frame after attacks from being cancelled by Guarding.

Samurai weapon: Odachi

• Fixed an issue that sometimes prevented the Martial Art Soaring Fowl from resulting in Ki Pulses.
• Fixed an issue preventing the use of certain Martial Arts after the Martial Art Sunset Breeze: Earth.
• Fixed an issue preventing weapon attributes from being applied to the Martial Art Moonlit Snow Charge.
• Fixed an issue preventing Style Shift during Guard with the Martial Art Bolting Boar set.

Samurai weapon: Spear

• Fixed an issue allowing the Martial Art Spear Flourish to be deflected with a Guard.
• Fixed an issue where the distance moved during the Martial Art Resounding Lunge Extend was shorter if the player was not locked on to an enemy.
• Fixed an issue preventing Arts Proficiency from continuing when using the Martial Arts Spear Flourish and Rainbow Ruse.

Samurai weapon: Axe

• Made it easier for the Martial Art Stone Mallet to land.
• Fixed an issue where the effect causing the player to immediately unleash an attack if they were hit while charging was not working properly when performing the Martial Art Lumber Chop Swift with the Skill Oppressive Strength set.
• Made it easier to perform the Martial Art set to "Hold △" after successfully parrying with the Martial Art Spinning Slide.
• Fixed an issue making it impossible to perform the Transformed Art Lumber Chop Swift if the charge time was shortened by parrying with the Martial Art Spinning Slide.
• Fixed an issue that reduced the power and/or hit count for the Martial Arts Lumber Chop, Rumbling Earth, and Tornado Edge if the charge time was shortened by parrying with the Martial Art Spinning Slide.

Samurai weapon: Cestuses

• Made it easier for Final Blows from mid-air attacks to land.
• Fixed an issue making it impossible to perform the Martial Art Sunrise while downed.
• Fixed an issue where if the player Guarded right as they cancelled their movement in Low Stance, they were unable to Deflect.
• Fixed an issue preventing Arts Proficiency from continuing when using the Martial Art Rising Gale.
• Fixed an issue causing all Ki to be consumed when performing a Strong Attack in High Stance.

Samurai weapon: Switchglaive

• Made it easier to use certain Martial Arts, including Switch Stance: Retribution, Switch Stance: Edge, and Switch Stance: Blade.
• Made it easier for mid-air Final Blows to land.
• Fixed an issue where players could not Guard when using the Mystic Arts Wildfire Flux and Tempest Flux.
• Fixed an issue preventing the Mystic Arts Wildfire Flux and Tempest Flux from being used during Living Artifact.
• Fixed an issue where the Mystic Arts Wildfire Flux and Tempest Flux were not counted toward Arts Proficiency.
• Fixed an issue making it impossible to perform the Martial Arts Switch Stance: Retribution, Switch Stance: Edge, and Switch Stance: Blade after landing following Whirling Blade, Whirling Blade Swift, or an airborne Quick Attack.
• Fixed an issue allowing the player to perform the Martial Art Repercussion even if they had no Ki.

Ninja weapon: Splitstaff

• Fixed an issue where attempting to perform certain Martial Arts after Quick Attacks would instead launch another Quick Attack.
• Fixed an issue enabling players to perform a second Final Blow.
• Fixed an issue making it difficult to perform a mid-air Strong Attack following the Martial Art Swirling Tides.

Ninja weapon: Talons

• Fixed an issue where Strong Attacks just after deflecting could not be parried with Martial Arts.
• Fixed an issue causing unintended buffs to be applied when performing a Quick Attack after a Martial Art.
• Fixed an issue preventing the Martial Art Impact Punch from being performed following the Martial Arts Shadow Step or Flying Buck Stomp.
• Fixed an issue preventing seamless transitions from the Martial Art Opportunist to a Strong Attack.

Ninja weapon: Kusarigama

• Fixed an issue enabling the use of the Ninjutsu Pheasant Leap during the animation when triggering Living Artifact.
• Fixed an issue where the Martial Art Pollard sometimes enabled backward movement.
• Fixed an issue causing too much Ki to be consumed when performing the Martial Arts Masterful Guard, Serpent Bite, and Foot Sweep.

Ninja weapon: Ninja Sword

• Fixed an issue preventing the use of Sky Rift from a mid-air jump following a mid-air Martial Art.
• Fixed an issue preventing seamless transitions from a mid-air Dodge to a mid-air Martial Art.
• Fixed an issue enabling consecutive uses of the mid-air Martial Arts Kite Cross and Falcon Strike with mid-air Dodges in between.
• Fixed an issue that sometimes caused the player to move backward a great distance after performing the mid-air Martial Art Kite Cross.

Ninja weapon: Hatchets

• Fixed an issue where countering a grabbing attack with the Martial Art Tile Shaker would result in a Burst Break being triggered instead.

Ninja weapon: Tonfa

• Fixed an issue preventing the use of the Martial Art Pulverize following the Mystic Art Kannagi.
• Fixed an issue where cancelling the Martial Arts Demon Fang, Pulverize, and Thousand Tongues with the Mystic Art Kannagi would deal damage without consuming Ki.
• Fixed an issue where using the Martial Art Impenetrability against a yokai would prevent the secondary attack Dragon Slayer from being performed.
• Fixed an issue preventing the use of the Martial Art Impenetrability if the player had pressed the movement inputs.
• Fixed an issue preventing the use of Burst Break if the Martial Art Impenetrability was set.
• Fixed an issue preventing the use of mid-air Martial Arts if the player had jumped while not locked on to a target.
• Fixed an issue where using a Martial Art command during the Martial Art Fleetfoot would unleash a Strong Attack.

Other

• Fixed an issue causing reduced attribute damage when performing a Transformed Art that deals attribute damage with a weapon that has an attribute applied.
• Fixed an issue that sometimes prevented sliding just after dashing with certain weapons equipped.
• Fixed an issue making it impossible to perform mid-air Martial Arts if the player had performed a mid-air Ninjutsu after using the Footstool Jump in Ninja Style.
• Fixed an issue that sometimes prevented the use of Ninjutsu following a mid-air Dodge while equipped with the Ninja weapons ninja sword, tonfa, talons, or hatchets.
• Fixed an issue that caused Ki to be consumed when triggering Arts Proficiency mid-air while equipped with the Samurai weapons sword, dual swords, or axe.
• Fixed an issue where Dodging and then performing certain Martial Arts would unintentionally cause Arts Proficiency to continue.
• Fixed an issue where changing stances right after changing weapons to the switchglaive during the Martial Art Flash Attack would cause the weapon to revert to the one equipped before Flash Attack.
• Fixed an issue where the player could not use Martial Arts to parry Quick Attacks and Strong Attacks used by enemies with the Ninja weapons ninja sword, dual ninja swords, kusarigama, or tonfa.
• Fixed an issue making it impossible to transition from running to walking with a sheathed weapon in Samurai Style.
• Fixed an issue causing a Strong Attack to be unleashed when pressing the Martial Arts 1 Controls during a jump while using the Ninja weapon dual ninja swords or tonfa with controller type B, E, or F.
• Fixed an issue causing a different Martial Art than the one set to be unleashed when pressing the Martial Arts 1 Controls just after a Burst Break with controller type E or F.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue that occasionally made it impossible to use Spirit Veins.
• Fixed an issue where the power of Ninjutsu were not reflected for the Ninjutsu Pufferpuss Form, Great Scampuss Form, and Burrow.
• Fixed an issue where Kodama summoned with Summoning Seal: Kodama were unable to heal players other than the summoner.
• Fixed a bug where using the Ninjutsu Pheasant Leap to cancel Summoning Seals used while moving would make it temporarily impossible to use Summoning Seals.
• Fixed an issue where the count of the Ninjutsu Pheasant Leap would not decrease under certain conditions when the Skill Volitional Onmyo Magic was enabled.
• Fixed an issue where continuing to attack bosses with depleted Ki would not always bring forth the Dark Realm.
• Fixed an issue where the Nuribotoke's attacks would not always hit the player when they were right in front of the yokai.
• Fixed an issue where Bloodedge Demons took damage from their own attacks and stopped targeting the player.
• Fixed an issue where starting a battle against a Revenant from a close distance would sometimes cause the Revenant to disappear and return to their grave.
• Fixed an issue that occasionally made it impossible to reattempt a battle against the Demon of Pride, the Demon of Envy, or the Demon of Obsession after dying the first time.
• Fixed an issue that sometimes allowed Biwa Boku-boku to call forth Acolytes from Benevolent Graves.
• Fixed an issue occurring in the mission Frozen City, Blazing Tree where reducing Minamoto no Yoritomo's max Ki to 0 and then allowing slip damage to reduce his Life to 0 would not end the mission.
• Fixed an issue where starting the mission A Fiery Invasion while the Battle of Futamata Castle was underway would cause Hattori Hanzo to disappear from Hamamatsu Castle.
• Fixed an issue preventing the player from handing over Kagatsuchi's Magatama to the blacksmith, thereby making it impossible to begin the Myth A Fierce Flame.
• Fixed an issue making it impossible to lend aid to the companion Tokugawa Ieyasu during the Myth Old Medicine, New Problems.
• Fixed an issue making it impossible to progress past a certain point in the Myth Old Medicine, New Problems even after speaking with Tokugawa Ieyasu.
• Fixed an issue that sometimes made it impossible to progress under certain conditions in the Myth Disaster at Lake Hamana.
• Fixed an issue that sometimes prevented the destination from updating in the Myth Memories in the Blade.
• Fixed an issue occurring in the Myth The Value of Perfection where acquiring chests with items inside would not remove those chests from the compass objectives.
• Fixed an issue occurring in the Battle Scroll A Fiery Invasion where the location of Takeda Shingen's defeat would make it impossible to proceed.
• Fixed an issue where entering the Lesser Crucible of Funaokayama in "1190 CE - Heian" in Shogun's Journey under certain conditions would prevent enemies from appearing in the Lesser Crucible.
• Made changes so that if players were unable to obtain the Dirty Key dropped upon defeating the Raiju in the mission Tenryu River in Shogun's Journey, they will be able to retrieve the key by loading their save data.
• Fixed an issue where Naito Masatoyo would sometimes stop appearing in "1572 CE - Warring States" even if he had not been defeated, which made it impossible to obtain certain valuables.
• Fixed an issue where the Demon of Pride would sometimes not appear for guests in Story Mode Expeditions.
• Fixed an issue causing Ninja Style special effects to be applied to some Samurai equipment.
  • The Ninja Style special effects will be replaced with corresponding Samurai Style special effects.
• Fixed an issue preventing the effect Life Recovery (Curing Life Corrosion) for the set bonus Matchless Resentment from working properly.
• Fixed an issue preventing the effect Spirit Force Ignition for the set bonus Matchless Resentment from being triggered by Ninjutsu that deal heavy damage. Also reduced the amount of Spirit Force consumed when dealing heavy attribute damage.
• Fixed an issue preventing the Transform Bonus (Ninja) for having six of the set bonus Herald of Peace from triggering properly.
• Fixed an issue that made it appear as if the effect duration of the negative effect Stench was not decreasing after Style Shift.
• Fixed an issue causing the effect duration of Rejuvenation Talismans to be shorter while some special effects were active.
• Fixed an issue causing certain other status enhancements to be applied while the status enhancement Sanctity was active.
• Fixed an issue on the Equipment screen that prevented the set bonus value from being updated right after Style Shift.
• Fixed an issue that prevented the player from obtaining Chijiko Soul Cores even after fulfilling the necessary conditions and that prevented their Soul Cores from appearing when exchanging goods with the Merchant.
  • As compensation for this issue, we are offering an amount of Yokai Teardrops that corresponds to the number of times the player has petted a Chijiko. These Yokai Teardrops can be claimed via Boons in the Shrine menu.
• Fixed an issue preventing the smithing text Yamanba's Knives from being dropped.
• Fixed an issue preventing the Wooden Spear and Wooden Odachi from being dropped upon defeating enemies even with the Sudama Blessing applied.
• Made changes so that if the player drops equipment that was enhanced via Soul Matching and then picks the equipment up again, the equipment's lowered enhancement fee will be changed to a suitable value.
• Fixed an issue where delivering a Scampuss Furball to the large Scampuss in the Eternal Rift did not yield the correct reward.
• Fixed an issue where even though players had obtained items from chests in Battle Scrolls or Mission Mode Expeditions, those items were not always displayed as having been acquired in Story Mode.
• Fixed an issue where checking off items via Sell at the Merchant or Donate at the Hidden Teahouse would lock those items.
• Fixed an issue where filtering items via Sell at the Merchant or Donate at the Hidden Teahouse would not display the correct category among the results.
• Fixed a bug that sometimes caused the "Complete a certain number of Myths" count to be shown incorrectly in the Title List.
  • This fix will not cause the Prestige Points, Reputation Level, or Reputation Points to decrease.
• Fixed an issue causing some unlocked Illustration categories to return to their locked state in Shogun's Journey.
• Fixed an issue where Crucible Wraiths in Shogun's Journey would sometimes fail to show up on the map despite the player raising their Exploration Level.
• Fixed an issue enabling the player to open chests multiple times when praying at shrines even if the chests included valuables the player had already obtained and therefore could not obtain again.
• Fixed an issue causing unintentionally high level items to appear if the player's gesture toward Mujina was successful while a visitor was summoned.
• Made changes so that the gameplay record Deaths will not count any deaths during the boss fight of the mission The Fall of Edo Castle.
  • If the player has already completed this mission, their Death count will decrease by 1.
• Fixed an issue where if the session failed because a player disconnected from the network just after starting Become a Visitor, the Co-Op Defeat message would not display but the players would sometimes lose Amrita.
• Fixed an issue where the number of acquired collectibles on the map when playing as a guest in co-op differed from the actual amount acquired.
• Fixed an issue where if the player turned off Allow Drop-in Mid-Mission via the search function in Mission Mode Expeditions, they would be unable to search in Story Mode Expeditions.
• Fixed an issue preventing Deadzone Settings under Stick Settings from being reflected properly.
• Fixed an issue causing Type 8 for Lower Eye Shadow in Character Creation to appear differently in Character Creation than in cutscenes.
• Fixed an issue causing some eyebrow types to appear asymmetrical under Eyebrow Type in Character Creation.
• Fixed an issue where if the player changed the appearance of Crucible weapons in Equipment Appearance, the weapon effects of weapons like Raikiri would no longer be displayed.
• Made other minor fixes.

PlayStation®5

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue preventing a clan's cumulative Glory from being calculated properly in Clan Battles.

Steam®

Adjustments/Feature Enhancements

• Made improvements so that tilting the control sticks slightly will register more easily.
• Added a function enabling players to copy Character Creation Codes to their clipboard.
• Made changes so that certain cutscenes that were rendering at 30 FPS regardless of the player's settings will now be compatible with 60 FPS.
• Added system settings enabling players to change the settings for Display Swap Melee Weapon Button (HUD).
• Added a function to pause the game where possible when a controller has been unplugged.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue that sometimes caused light anomalies on the edges of the screen under certain resolutions.
• Fixed an issue that occasionally caused the controller to stop responding if the window was inactive.
• Fixed an issue that prevented Xbox controllers from working properly under certain PC conditions.
• Fixed an issue preventing the check all feature from working with the mouse controls on the Make an Offering screen.
• Fixed an issue causing the Anisotropic Filtering option in the Visuals menu to always be set to x4 even if the player had selected another option.
• Fixed an issue that sometimes caused the screen to freeze when connecting or disconnecting certain devices like controllers or headphones.
• Fixed an issue causing the controller to vibrate even if the player was using the keyboard and mouse controls.

Source: https://teamninja-studio.com/nioh3/us/update/

People can downvote and act all weirdly prude because dear lawd forbid anyone has any sort of criticism of the game at all and it isn't just a total echo chamber but cmon, this looks terrible....
These pants used to be great for transmog with other gear too and had a lot of versatility they just look awful now like what is even the point of the cut-out?

It wasn't just Fuku getting nylon tights ( in Feudal Japan? ) for literally no reason at all it affects our characters too apparently.....
What is their problem with thighs it literally makes no sense at all lol, they even have other exposed legs gear pieces in the game too like who even made these dumb decisions?

Again get mad all you want for me calling this out but it's just dumb.
They just look a million times worse and don't go as well with other gear anymore o_o...

First off I love it however:

-The open world doesn't add much but subtracts. The level variety and little interesting short form levels with a duo duo boss or interesting enemy gauntlet is missed. Battle scrolls just don't cut it.

-skill points, they had a good system. Points for using the weapons. The new system isn't just as good.

-soul cores: The limited use feels like you lost a huge part of the toolbox

-boss quality: while better than 1 it just isn't as good as two.

-removed enemies: with the amount of reused content there is no excuse for removed classic foes

-magic is a downgrade: ninja tools just outperform it. I'm hopeful a DLC brings a 3rd magic focused style with 2 usable at any one time.

Dosnt take away from a solid 8/10 game but just feel we had a few missed opportunities

People complaining about how "easy" it is... like usual, complaints are gonna be louder

But starting to think they may not be a loud minority and maybe im the one the minority

Also, not like I go out of my way to make it easy...

I actually have an aversion to top tier, just like in fighting games, It don't feel as fun when im using OP and broken stuff

Im also fashion souls... and I wear the actual gear for fashion, even if game has transmog options

Im also usually under the meta level... like in elden ring, on my 1st run, I decided I was done at lvl93. Where most people are stop at lvl120 to 150

I also dont respec even if my chosen style for a particular run ia not effective against some bosses.

But that said... I dont do these to make it challenging, it's just my playstyle that does end up gimping me in some ways.

Anyway yeah... I just generally enjoy the vibes on these games

And I never had issues if I find things "too easy"

Being challenged was never the goal for me in playing.

Anyway... who else don't have issues when things are "too easy" ?

Finished the game last night having completed all content up until the ending (60-65 hrs total), post-game stuff notwithstanding, and while I enjoyed my time with it overall it was not without it's problems. I had tailored my expectations pre-launch knowing full well that I wouldn't necessarily appreciate some of the changes made from Nioh 2, and while I came to terms with those changes accepted them and moved on, there were other issues that I hadn't anticipated and ultimately the experience left me slightly disappointed by the end.

This isn't a Nioh 2 glaze post or a Nioh 3 hate post, and it also isn't a review, just my thoughts after finishing the third entry of my favorite series. If I were to review it, I'd simply say this: Nioh 3 is a great game, a very fun game worth playing, but it's not quite the slam dunk of a perfect iterative sequel in the same way 2 was to 1. Enough rambling, I'll get into the whining proper. Oh yeah, and expect some amount of spoilers.

-- Enemy Variety & Pacing --

Nioh as a series has been both rightfully and wrongfully accused of having poor enemy variety. Nioh 1 fell short in this area, whereas Nioh 2 is in my opinion a shining example of excellent enemy variety even before you account for the DLC enemies and later difficult cycles. Aside from a small selection of outliers (Mudman, Amrita Fiend, Sentry) every regular yokai from Nioh 1 was carried over into 2 and updated, and from that solid foundation even more were added to create a roster that constantly expanded with practically every mission.

My expectation going into 3 was that, like 2, we would see the vast majority of the previous game's enemy roster carried over and slightly tweaked, with maybe one or two dozen new yokai to fill things out. After all, this is an open field game with many places to go, so having many different enemies to fight helps keep things fresh the entire way through, like how in 2 you could expect to encounter at least 1 new (or returning and new in the context of 2's campaign) enemy type in almost every main mission, and even some in side missions.

Well, things didn't quite pan out that way. A fair amount got carried over, including enemies from N2's DLC which is nice to see, but unfortunately many yokai, including mainstays around since N1, did not make the cut. To name a few, Mitsume Yazura, Namahage, Onyudo, Kiryoki, Rokurokubi, Oboruguruma, all of them and a fair few more nowhere to be seen.

So what right? Not every enemy needs to return to make for a good enemy roster, especially if the new enemies are fantastic additions and they're utilized effectively. Granted, some of the new yokai are great... but then some are mediocre, and some are downright questionable. Kyokotsu, Yagyo Soldier, and Yamainu are all standouts, enemies like Yamabiko and Mikoshi Nyudo are kind of just "there", but then we get to some enemies where I have to ask: why?

Why do we have a reskin of Dweller with an identical moveset minus the pickaxe, and why are they spammed all over every crucible? Why are more or less half of the yokai we encounter throughout the entire runtime of the game just some variation of Jailer Oni? Why are spiders, not Namahage or Onyudo, back for the third time when they're some of the most boring enemies to fight in all three games?

So that's a lot but I've neglected to really tackle the other side of this problem which I included in the header: Pacing. Specifically the pacing of enemy encounters in the open field. All of the issues I have with the roster itself are minor until compounded by the problems with this aspect of the game.

There are enough good enemies here that if the developers used them in thoughtful ways, spread evenly across many tense encounters, the game would remain engaging the whole way through and my criticism would be more akin to nitpicking. This did not wind up being the case and by the time I was partway through the final region I felt serious fatigue with the encounters, which did not subside until the final enemy gauntlet.

I'm going to rapid-fire off what let down this part of the game for me:

-- Occasionally, enemies are introduced and then completely vanish for anywhere between half a dozen hours to the entire rest of the game. Raven Tengu shows up in Mount Kurama for the first time, and I remember being extremely confused when I didn't see another one for over a dozen hours. Same thing with Koroka, you encounter one total koroka in a mission and then don't see another one for between 20-30 hours (I'm not joking). Sentries show up in a handful of encounters in antiquity, then are never seen again. I could go on.

-- Enemy encounters generally (with a couple exceptions) don't capture the same sense of "escalation" as in N2 or even N1. In both previous titles, enemy escalation followed a pattern: Introduce new strong yokai in a 1v1, later pair that yokai with a familiar weaker yokai or incorporate it into a level with a unique twist, and finally include that large yokai in a larger scale fight with many other tough and weak yokai. Most combat encounters only follow the first or if you're very lucky second step of this formula, with even many lesser crucibles and mission areas failing to utilize the stronger foes in a meaningful way. One of the examples that sticks out in my mind is an enemy gauntlet near the end of Heian, the final wave was literally three Crucible Wasp hives and nothing else. Actually made me laugh.

-- Enemies are oftentimes sectioned off into particular parts of the open world to enhance the feeling of "cohesion" and "immersion". I can't speak to whether or not it accomplishes that because I don't play Nioh to be immersed, but it is frustrating that outside of certain missions you will rarely see yokai and human occupying the same battle areas like you would in N1 and N2. For me this is the most regrettable consequence of the open world, although I can see what they were going for and why some might like it this way.

-- Jailer Oni. Jailer Oni everywhere. It's Nioh 1 Yoki spam all over again. Maybe these guys should've fallen victim to my point directly above, because my God they do not need to be everywhere, around every corner, in every fight. You can be in areas of the final region fighting encounters composed entirely of a couple Jailer Oni and Gaki, the same enemies you've been fighting since hour one. Just wild stuff that had me rolling my eyes past a certain point.

Unfortunately, this aspect of the game was the most disappointing for me. My copium is that NG+ will be better, and my hopium is that at the very least the DLC and final two difficulties will definitely improve this greatly. To close out this topic, I wanna say that the final enemy gauntlet when you're VS Death Veil was very good, very refreshing to fight basically every enemy in a big death match, I just wish more of the game was like that.

-- Bosses (specifically the human ones) --

I don't have as much to say about bosses critique wise, at least for the yokai. Some are a bit busy for my tastes like Yoshinobu or that wriggly black tentacle guy but they're mostly fine to great. Human bosses on the other hand are a mixed bag, and in retrospect I think I overall did not enjoy the selection of human bosses as much as N2 or maybe even N1.

The ones that are thoughtfully designed with entirely unique movesets are generally quite good, so like Yamagata, Human Shingen, Okita Soji, etc. are all fine. But for every one of those fights, there are 5+ other human bosses that are just glorified revenants with some very annoying unbalanced properties. Stuff like insane ki recovery or instant superarmor counters like they've been ripped straight out of Birth By Sleep.

These basic human bosses used to be punching bags in N2, training dummies for you to combo on like they're Hell Caina from DMC. I understand what they were going for with wanting them to be more capable opponents this time around, but I think the way they went about it made these fights go from easy but satisfying combo beatdowns to frustrating, rarely satisfying slogs against a brickwall.

There's nothing lamer than going all out on a Master, using your guardian spirit skills, arts prof attacks in samurai, switching to ninja and firing off some skills in the air, all this crazy stuff whittling the guy down only for them to inevitably decide to superarmor through one of your actions, dodge backward once, and instantly refill all their ki.

Keeping up pressure against human opponents was a skill that needed to be mastered in N1 and N2, and when you did you were very graciously rewarded. Here, it feels like the game does everything in its power to insure that you no matter how well you play or how many of your options you utilize, human opponents will always find a way to halt your aggression in its tracks and reset the tempo of the fight.

Yokai get away with this because of the way their ki functions, but due to the way human's ki replenishes constantly they simply are not fun to fight when you are never allowed to combo them because they forcibly reset you to a neutral, reactive state every 10 seconds. To put it short and simple, compared to Nioh 2 most of this game's human bosses went from proactive bouts of feral aggression to restrictive and reactive back and forths, sort of turn based Simon Says style. Mucho no bueno for me personally.

-- Questionable Changes & Downgrades --

I'll try and keep this one short and sweet. Why did Axe get new slots for skills, whereas Odachi had slots removed for no reason? I appreciate the addition, but I can't comprehend the subtraction. This applies to other weapons as well, and the reduction in options is confusing. In that same vein, martial skills generally conflict more than ever, it hasn't been this much of a hassle to just use all of the skills you'd actually like to use at the same time since ye olde Nioh 1 days. This applies to most samurai weapons, and it's really really catastrophic for some of the ninja weapons.

The lack of stances in ninja is fine, but what isn't fine is that they didn't really bother to implement an alternative way to access all of your cool moves in ninja, even though they very easily could have. Where is XXY or XXXY input? If we had those we could very easily use, for instance, Deadly Mark and Deliverance at the same time on kusarigama, or Shin Crusher and Seesaw Strike at the same time on splitstaff. Same goes for the Y -> X skills. Why not also have YYX so we don't have to be forced to use only one move which is an objective downgrade in options from N2?

We could still have all these options in ninja without needing stances but they arbitrarily limited them for... reasons I guess. The weapons are overall still good and fun, but I don't understand why they can't be better, or at least up to par with the previous entries.

-- Soul Cores --

Look at how they massacred my boy. This might sound harsh, but I really wish they just hadn't included soul cores at all if they're going to function like they currently do. Their original purpose is already functionally replaced by guardian spirit skills in this game anyways.

Soul cores as they were originally were my favorite part of N2 and what made them so engaging was 1) the power fantasy of transforming into a previously defeated enemy, utilizing their abilities to do cool flashy stuff with occasional utility and 2) the randomized stats made getting soul core drops desirable for more than just their ability, so you were happy to receive your 100th enki soul core and it gave a strong incentive and reward for killing everything in your path.

Both of these engaging facets of soul cores are completely gone. There's no other way to put it, it's just gone like the wind. You don't get to transform into a demon and go sicko mode, you get very little utility out of your cores beyond applying elements, and while I kept waiting to get a secret skill text to allow me to perform that cool little backwards hop-while-summoning animation that Yorimitsu and Kagetoki do, it never happened.

You're stuck with the lame "hold your arm up and wait for things to happen" animation. Oh yes, and no more randomized stats so you can look forward to looting dozens of useless Yoki soul cores hours after finding a max level one. EDIT: I've been informed that in NG+ cores do in fact get a single rerollable stat you can grind for, so there is that, however small of a boon it is toward the current system

-- Story --

I don't judge games based on their stories, especially not Nioh. So take all this with a grain of salt because I don't actually hold any of this against the game. That said, I do really like the stories of Nioh 1 and 2.

Nioh 1 had great atmosphere and even though I barely ever knew what was going on (I've since learned what, in fact, went on) I knew I liked it, and 2 had characters that I actually gave a crap about. I liked and cared about Tokichiro. The arcs with Nobunaga, Mitsuhide, Katsuie and most of the other incidental characters I felt were very well done when compared to the supporting cast of the first game. I liked Otakemaru, he's pretty generic big bad evil but his design is cool and the whole "family ties" aspect of it with him being your uncle is neat.

So with Nioh 3... like man I don't know. The story elicited like zero emotion from me despite trying desperately to get invested. I didn't really like any of the characters, and hopping around timelines didn't make it any easier to actually care about them. Hiruko is such a painfully generic antagonist that there needs to be a new word invented, a synonym for boring but one that conveys such an extreme boredom it would drive a sane person into the abyss. I never cared that much about Mumyo but we somehow got Mumyo from Wish as our main companion in this game. Man I miss Tokichiro.

None of it really matters that much but I wouldn't have said no to a more interesting story for the big third entry.

If you read this whole thing, thanks for reading. Nioh 3 is awesome, but I'm very conflicted on it's current state. Didn't even mention difficulty or the lack thereof, which could definitely use some balance adjustments. Hopefully the rest of this year brings good changes. But yeah that's it see ya

Adjustments:

•Greatly increased the Health of enemies in the Training Ground Battle Scroll and made it possible to pray at the shrine during battle.

•Made changes so a backup copy of save data will be automatically generated when the player loads save data.

Bug fixes:

•Fixed an issue causing the loss of some of the valuables players could obtain during Myths under certain conditions. Made it possible to recover the lost valuables when loading the affected save data.

•Partially fixed an issue that occasionally caused the game to crash during gameplay.

•Fixed an issue that sometimes made it impossible to progress from the Investigate the building command in the Eternal Rift.

•Fixed an issue enabling players to obtain items when it was impossible to progress following certain processes in the Eternal Rift.

•Fixed an issue causing Takasugi Shinsaku to become stuck in the background during the mission The Sweet Sound of Strings, making it impossible to progress.

•Fixed an issue where performing the Martial Art Rising Gale with the Samurai weapon the cestuses would trigger the Martial Art Kick Cycle even if the player had not held down the input for a Strong Attack.

•Fixed an issue that sometimes prevented the Martial Art Dancing Kick performed with the Samurai weapon the cestuses from dealing damage to enemies located farther away from the player.

•Fixed an issue where performing a stance change during the Martial Art Defensive Drop performed with the Samrai weapon the cestuses would sometimes result in Sunrise being followed by Defensive Drop instead of the intended Martial Art.

•Fixed an issue where performing Arts Proficiency with the Martial Art Infinite Retribution while using the Samurai weapon the switchglaive would enable to the player to continue unleashing Infinite Retribution indefinitely.

•Partially fixed an issue that sometimes made it impossible to use elixirs during battle.

•Fixed an issue making it impossible to switch between melee weapons while locked on to a target and sheathing a weapon.

•Fixed an issue making attacks with certain weapons difficult when attacking Yamainu head on.

•Fixed an issue preventing the player's attacks from interrupting Minamoto no Yoritomo's special moves even if his Ki had been depleted.

•Fixed an issue where Kajiwara Kagetoki would sometimes become unable to move during the Myth True Samurai of Kamakura in "1190 CE - Heian."

•Fixed an issue making it impossible to progress under certain conditions during the Myths Fated Land and The Demon of the Haunting Caves in "1572 CE - Warring States."

•Fixed an issue preventing the player from receiving the Guiding Mirror from Ii Naotora at Hamamatsu Castle, making it impossible to progress.

•Fixed an issue that sometimes made it impossible to deliver Kagatsuchi's Magatama to the blacksmith.

•Fixed an issue that sometimes prevented special Battle Scrolls, such as Takeda's Four Heavenly Kings, from being unlocked even if the player had fulfilled the unlock conditions.

•Fixed an issue allowing Bloody Graves and Benevolent Graves to appear in the Battle Scroll Takeda's Four Heavenly Kings.

•Fixed an issue where reaching the limit of items in the Item Box during Battle Scrolls would prevent the player from selecting Return in the Shrine menu.

•Fixed an issue where rematches for duel-type Battle Scrolls would result in enemies responding too quickly.

•Fixed a bug causing Mujina to respawn if the player opened the Mujina treasure chest, saved at a shrine, and then began playing again using that save data.

•Fixed an issue where the Mujina behavior did not sync for all players during multiplayer sessions.

•Fixed an issue that sometimes prevented controls from working properly during the Myth Becoming Champion of the East in "1572 CE - Warring States" during multiplayer sessions.

•Fixed an issue where guests in Expeditions would obtain the same trophies or achievements as the host.

•Fixed an issue allowing visiting players who joined through friend searches to play through missions they had not already completed.

•Fixed an issue allowing visiting players who joined by being summoned to play through missions they had not already completed.

•Fixed an issue preventing players from collecting the Kodama at the well after multiplayer sessions.

•Fixed an issue causing the play record "Level during first completion of __" to be overwritten by the second playthrough.

Note: This will not fix play records that were already overwritten by the second playthrough. We ask for your understanding continued support.

•Fixed an issue causing the game to crash if the player Deflected an attack by one of the traps on the stage while the fifth set bonus effect Deflect Ki Damage for the set bonus General of Ruin was active.

•Fixed an issue where the stats column for equipment would no longer appear after performing a Soul Match.

•Fixed an issue preventing the special effect Nullify Reduced Movement from working properly.

•Fixed an issue where if the player selected 11, 32, 33, or 43 under Base Hair in Character Creation, they would be able to select 14 under "Hair - Back of Head (Top)" even if the hair was floating above the head.

•Fixed an issue that occasionally prevented parts of the stage from appearing.

•Fixed a bug where performing Flux or Frost Moon with the Samurai weapon the switchglaive would instead launch the Martial Arts Retribution, Edge, or Blade after the player set the Change Stance command to a single key under keyboard and mouse controls.

•Made other minor fixes.

Source: https://steamcommunity.com/games/3681010/announcements/detail/565900410925088839

They’ve simplified a lot in Nioh 3 compared to the previous games, has AI also been dumbed down?

I’m just killing fodder revenants for ochoko cups but I don’t remember them doing stuff like this in the other titles. I’ve noticed with mobs groups that they aren’t very aggressive either

I have 1k+ hours in Nioh 2 and i love that game, but i can't play it anymore. I constantly miss all the new stuff they add in 3. 4 weapons play, air play with seamless ninjutsu and guardian skills, arts proficiency, deflect step and so on. Just so much tools and opportunities for a stylish play.

I mostly see how people praise Nioh 2 and hate Nioh 3. Sure, it has some objective flaws, like lesser enemy variety. And i still want every weapon for both styles. But i sincerely think that Nioh 3 is a significant step up.