In the long history of the gaming industry we have seen dozens of titles inspired by the legendary samurai warriors and the Sengoku period (1467-1615), during which various daimyos, such as Oda Nobunaga and Tokugawa Ieyasu, tried to dominate medieval Japan. This period is characterized as one of the bloodiest in the Land of the Rising Sun, but it did not have as drastic an impact on the culture, culture and society of the country as the Bakumatsu period, which saw the fall of the Tokugawa Shogunate. Despite this, games that chronicle the events leading up to the Meiji Reform and those that took place during the Boshin Civil War, such as the Battle of Toba-Fushimi or the Fall of Osaka Castle, are few and far between. .
Team Ninja decides to change that with Rise of the Ronin, which takes place in the turbulent Bakumatsu period and tells the story of a ronin, a samurai who does not serve a specific lord. Your journey in this new Action RPG begins in 1853, the year that the “Black Ships” of American Rear Admiral Matthew Perry arrive on the shores of Japan. The bloody Bossin Civil War may not yet have broken out, but the entire country is in turmoil and all walks of life are divided. Many want to break free from the oppression of the Shogunate, others remain loyal to it, and others oppose it not for political but cultural reasons, fearing that its foreign policy is altering the country’s cultural heritage and traditions. In this period of discord and inner turmoil, the player is called upon to forge his own path, searching for the traces of an enigmatic figure.
Unlike Idea Factory’s Hakuoki series, which is also set in the twilight of the Tokugawa Shogunate, Team Ninja chooses to give voice to both factions, both the one supporting the Shogunate and the opposing side. Although at the beginning of the game it is implied that the Shogunate’s hegemony is tyrannical and wants to suppress all resistance, in Rise of the Ronin there are no heroes and villains, just as there is no black and white, only shades of gray. Before we tackled him we wondered if Team Ninja would take a stand and push the player towards a certain faction. The Japanese developer does the exact opposite, leaving the player completely free to chart their own path and draw their own conclusions.
The fact that the main character’s motivations don’t depend on who’s in power and what politics they’re doing is a very clever trick by Team Ninja, as it opens the door for you to interact with all the main NPCs, regardless of their faction to which they belong. And this is exactly where all the beauty lies, as you never know if a character is friend or foe, or where your relationship with them will end up. Some relationships may start out on the best of terms and turn cold along the way, and others may lead to… bed.
Rise of the Ronin may not have the depth of options of a traditional RPG like Disco Elysium, but it offers an authentic role-playing experience. All the choices in the dialogues and the decisions you make at various pivotal points in the story have a significant impact on the development of events. These decisions can include choosing a camp in a skirmish or even whether to take the life of an opponent. Also, depending on the social skills you have unlocked you can lie to camouflage your true intentions, bribe or even intimidate certain characters in order to get out of a difficult situation or avoid a battle. It’s worth noting that your decisions are final, but you can, through a mechanism that unlocks at the beginning of the 2nd chapter of the story, retry various missions in order to experience all aspects of the story.
Based on Team Ninja’s recent writing samples in Nioh and Wo Long: The Fallen Dynasty, several players are questioning whether Rise of the Ronin is a soulslike. As we pointed out in our preview, Rise of the Ronin has more similarities with Ghost of Tsushima than with Nioh or Wo Long. What is missing from Sucker Punch’s Action-Adventure is the struggle of emotions experienced by Jin Sakai as he was forced to betray his code of honor to save his homeland from the Mongol invaders. Your nameless hero cannot be described as a samurai in the strict sense of the term, as he has no code of honor, and does not hesitate to strike from the shadows to achieve his goal. Another important difference between the two titles has to do with the artistic approach of its creators, since Ghost of Tsushima is more “cinematic” and clearly inspired by the work of Akira Kurosawa, while Rise of the Ronin is more violent, more raw and rawest.
The combat system primarily revolves around how you manage to stagger your opponent in order to deliver a critical blow. In practical terms this means you will have to drain your opponent’s ki (stamina) while managing your own as best as possible. The ways you can drastically reduce your opponent’s ki are martial skills and parries, the former consumes your own ki when executed, while parries or countersparks as they are called here require good reflexes. Stances soon enter the equation, as each stance gives you access to different martial skills, some of which have an advantage over others.
Sword fights may take center stage, but there are many more ways you can use to take down your opponents. There are several ballistic weapons, including bows, rifles, pistols and shuriken, which allow you to take out ordinary enemies from a distance. Unfortunately, mini bosses, or some stronger opponents, tend to parry these attacks, so you’ll need to blood your daishō or whatever melee weapons you’re carrying anyway. The stealth approach is also viable, as you can hide in tall grass or bushes, quietly sneak up on your opponents and take them out in one fell swoop or deliver a critical blow. Depending on the skills you have unlocked you can perform even more elaborate sneak attacks, either by jumping from a tall building or using your grappling hook.
In general, the combat system left us very satisfied, on the one hand because it gives the player the freedom to approach each conflict and skirmish in any way he wishes, and on the other hand, because there is nothing more fun, addictive and addictive than fending off three consecutive attacks from the opponent you and then slice him with your sword! A rung down the porosity scale is parrying projectiles and countering with a flaming katana. Not to mention the gore, where Cannibal Corpse’s entire discography pales in comparison. Heads and human limbs are hurled left and right as your blade cuts through the flesh of your opponents and rips through their guts.
Unlike Nioh, the world of Rise of the Ronin is open world, and the player can move around it on foot, on horseback, or… by flying. You can also use your grappling hook to climb onto rocks or the roofs of buildings. In each area of the map there are several optional activities, such as exterminating bandits and fugitives, discovering various temples and attractions, and… petting cats.
There are also some spots where you can raise your banner to “save” your karma, and replenish your healing items and hit points. Then you can also fast travel to these points. It should of course be noted that when you raise your banner the enemies respawn. Karma is similar to souls in Dark Souls, but in this case it is used exclusively to level up your character. In the event that you are defeated before saving it, it opens a feud with the enemy that killed you, so you will have to kill them to recover your karma. If you die before you recover your karma, then it will be lost forever.
Aside from the optional missions, which we found quite interesting as they allow you to develop your relationships with the other characters and delve into the lore, the rest of the optional activities are woefully repetitive. The only positive is that you are richly rewarded every time you complete all the activities in an area of the map, as you earn rare skill points. Rare skills fall into four different categories, strength, dexterity, intelligence and charisma, and cannot be unlocked with the conventional skill points you earn every time you level up. So if you want to fully upgrade your character you are “obliged” to engage in all activities and explore every area of the map.
When it comes to loot, Rise of the Ronin is overly generous, which is a double-edged sword. When you have 50 different katana in your inventory and each of them has 3-4 different modifiers it is impossible to choose the best possible weapon. The 2,000 available slots in your inventory fill up much faster than you can imagine, so you often have to spend time managing it, selling or dismantling the items you don’t need. There are also mechanisms for crafting or upgrading your equipment, but we honestly didn’t find the reason to bother with them.
Moving on to the graphics area, we find a very decent result, which, however, can only be described as next-gen. Despite this fact, Team Ninja has managed to render with mastery both the climate of that time and the rare beauty of the landscapes of the Japanese countryside. In fact, when you arrive in the city of Yokohama, where traditional Japanese architecture collides with 19th century Western architecture, it is certain that you will feel awe. On the technical side, there are no significant frame rate drops (at least in Performance mode) and the controls respond immediately to your commands. The soundtrack is quite pleasant, and puts you in the mood of the time, but you will hardly distinguish or remember any of its compositions.
The review was based on the digital version of the game, which was provided to us by Sony Hellas.
VERDICT
Team Ninja’s first open world Action RPG tells a very compelling story, giving you the chance to forge your own path through the tumultuous Bakumatsu period. Unlike other creations of the genre, the RPG element is strong and substantial and is what will mainly keep you hooked until the end credits roll. This of course does not mean that the action is sidelined, as the battles are porous and accompanied by a delirium of blood and gore.