Rise of the Ronin: The best action game from Nioh and Wo Long’s father on PS5?

Game news Rise of the Ronin: The best action game from Nioh and Wo Long’s father on PS5?

After years of linear action games, Team Ninja (Nioh | Wo Long) finally accepts the call of the open world with Rise of the Ronin! The action-adventure game, in development for nearly eight years, marks a new phase for the studio and sets the scene for it. An era almost never seen in video games, the Bakumatsu period in 1850s Japan. “We had that in mind from the very beginning of the product,” explains Yosuke Hayashi – the producer – whom we spoke to through the team… “We felt it was the most suitable framework for our open world”.

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An ideal period

For good reason, in 1850, Japan was at a critical juncture! After 250 years of Tokugawa rule the country opens up to the rest of the world and enters a more modern era but also suffers from unrest. Not everyone welcomes the arrival of foreigners, who – along with technological advances – bring back new ideas (and even a few diseases) with them. brief, An ideal breeding ground for Team Ninja to develop its narrative And in passing, the player is forced to choose between “pro” and “anti-Shogunate”. A formula that required a lot of testing from the team.

“For Rise of the Ronin, we were confident about the combat, but the other gameplay elements (open world, branching narrative, editor’s note) took us a long time, we had to try, fail and start over. To find the right concept” – Y. Hayash, creator of Rise of the Ronin

Finally: The studio believes it has managed to “blend combat with other aspects” of Rise of the Ronin, while staying true to its identity…Team Nina’s signature is to ensure that everything is pleasant to usewhether it’s the action stages, or the mechanics for moving around the world,” sums up the project’s director – Fumihiko Yasuda. And at this point, the deal is done. In our testing, we noted “super fluid movements” and encounters that are “strategic, were both readable and visceral”, clearly showing impressive richness.

Successful fights

As always, the action gameplay of Team Ninja has been the subject of special care here, and in a way is a synthesis of Nioh and Wo Long Fallen Dynasty… On the one hand, the player must monitor his stamina bar (which decreases with attacks. , dodges and special abilities). On the other hand, there is a heavy emphasis on parrying which, mixed with certain powers, allows you to drain the enemy’s energy and deliver devastating finishing moves. Rise of the Ronin is also credited to the “combat style”, an evolution of Nioh’s stance.. Each of the 9 weapon families has several styles, with an arsenal of systematically unique attacks.

“In this game, most of the enemies are samurai and ninja (unlike the supernatural creatures of Nioh and Wo Long, editor’s note) and We want to create a system where players can immerse themselves in very interesting battles“, Fumihiko Yasuda explains… “Of course, we looked at what we did well in the past (…) and what we could improve, to add these changes to Rise of the Ronin”. In many ways, this latest game offers enormous possibilities. Together with the combat system is the culmination of Team Ninja’s vision. But, in our opinion, the team would like to do “much more”. To find out everything, we invite you to consult our test.