I have recently flipped my views for Nioh and Lords of the Fallen. Plaued through LOTF two more times for the Umbral and Inferno endings I never saw and to get item descriptions I didn’t get my first play through (they tie some flavor text to having high enough stats, all in the magi schools and my first dude was an ungabunga caveman) and I started to hate the game for its infuratingly bad design decisions that were done on purpose to make things artificially difficult or obscure.

Now I am giving Nioh another shot and it’s actually clicking this time. Still a bit awkward, but taking it slower than even Dark Souls 2 makes a big difference and feels like I was just trying to rush things before. Still not a fan of how the levels are done, but I kinda get the feeling this is improved in Nioh 2 which I will try after getting through Nioh 1. I have always liked its more complex fighting system, with the stances and how casting spells is more fluid than a Fromsoft game, it was mostly the Ki recovery thing that gets annoying (Ki is stamina and you can recover it by tapping a button at the right time, but being hit reduces it and it also gets slowed by certain enemy uh… things) but that’s not really being an issue as I play currently, except in some cases where I am clearly hitting it at the right time from the SFX and visual on my dude, but not actually getting the purification thing cleaning the yokai gunk off the ground which messes with positioning (thats the stuff that slows your ki regen for those who haven’t played).

It might actually have been better to have played Wo Long before Nioh, as it has many of the same mechanics and gameplay, but more simplified by not having the Ki system since it is only after absolutely demolishing that game in under 20 hours that even had me entertain the idea of giving Nioh a second shot.