Ghost of Tsushima is one of the few open-world games I've played that feels like it actually breaks the mold in certain regards. It leads you by the nose to different locations in more organic ways than "follow these markers, you dumb fuck". One aspect that assists this is how the UI basically doesn't exist until it's necessary. Even when it is onscreen, it's very unobtrusive. Maybe you'll come across a fox den in your travels that'll lead you to a shrine. Maybe you'll be casually exploring when a golden bird catches your eye, and following it leads to a new area. See clouds of black smoke in the distance? That's a Mongol camp, go fuck 'em up. Rescue a peasant from a group of mongols in the open world, and they'll usually tell you where an enemy outpost or sidequest can be found.
The lack of UI also draws attention to the fact that this game is breathtakingly beautiful. There's so much life in everything, from the leaves blowing around, the flowers and trees swaying in the breeze, rivers flowing; the game's a god damn work of art, that's for sure. The world's beauty is punctuated by moments like the haiku spots, or the hot springs where you reminisce on what's happened up to this point.
The combat is so god damn cool. You can initiate fights yourself via a "standoff", opening a fight by slicing a guy moments before his own strike makes contact with you. You can swap styles of combat on the fly to better deal with different types of enemies. There's no lock-on (unless you turn it on in the accessibility menu), and it helps combat flow from one enemy to the next. Duels are the true highlight of the combat in my eyes, essentially serving as intense one-on-one boss fights. Aside from dodging and blocking, you'll gradually gain a decent amount of other toys to play around with, helping spice up the combat and give you an edge.
All this being said, I have a lot of gripes with this game. Standoffs are an easy way to open any fight with maximum resolve, and take out three whole enemies before any real fighting begins. They are also not hard to continuously perform once you've done them a few times. Despite all your options in combat, doing the same thing repeatedly enough times can make anything feel stale. The game is beautiful, but good lord, can it feel empty at times. The grappling hook is a tool that reminds me of another Sucker Punch franchise, Sly Cooper. I just wish the grappling hook wasn't so damn contextual. They try to give you plenty of places to use it in outposts, but I feel like not having more uses in the open world was a missed opportunity. The golden bird's presence can be pretty obnoxious when I can tell it's heading toward my marked destination, an area that I'm already headed toward. I kinda wish foxes were a completely random occurrence, and didn't emerge from specified dens. It would make the surprise more pleasant, and the journey to follow the fox more meaningful.
The main story of Ghost of Tsushima was actually fairly enjoyable, even if the parts I remember most were related to Lord Shimura and the samurai code of honor. A lot of the side stories just weren't interesting to me. It's a lot of walk-and-talk, following tracks, fighting some enemies, etc. They feel pretty formulaic. I feel like this issue is again, exacerbated by the open world. I spent so much time away from the side stories that I always forgot the plot by the time I reached the next one. The side stories that I adored though were the "Mythical Tales". These ones had you learn about a local legend from a storytelling musician, leading to you seeking out the artifact from the legend. They have you compare maps/drawings to your surroundings in order to find locations, provide extremely cool duels, and other unique challenges. They were the most fun part of the game for me, and it's a damn shame there's only five of them.
The eternal problem with the open-world genre is populating your game with enough meaningful content to last dozens of hours. Ghost of Tsushima does its best to avoid the pitfalls associated with this dilemma, in a variety of creative ways. I just can't shake the feeling that I would've enjoyed this game more if it were a little more compact. Instead, I walk away feeling like I kind of tricked myself into playing a Sony-trademark 3rd-person open-world cinematic action/adventure title. Still a good one though.
Also, as a bonus, thanks to the advent of gaming consoles recording footage as you play, I compiled a montage of all the weird stuff that happened to me as I played this game. None of it is a knock against the game's quality or my overall rating, just some amusing stuff that I wanted to share. You can find said montage here.
The lack of UI also draws attention to the fact that this game is breathtakingly beautiful. There's so much life in everything, from the leaves blowing around, the flowers and trees swaying in the breeze, rivers flowing; the game's a god damn work of art, that's for sure. The world's beauty is punctuated by moments like the haiku spots, or the hot springs where you reminisce on what's happened up to this point.
The combat is so god damn cool. You can initiate fights yourself via a "standoff", opening a fight by slicing a guy moments before his own strike makes contact with you. You can swap styles of combat on the fly to better deal with different types of enemies. There's no lock-on (unless you turn it on in the accessibility menu), and it helps combat flow from one enemy to the next. Duels are the true highlight of the combat in my eyes, essentially serving as intense one-on-one boss fights. Aside from dodging and blocking, you'll gradually gain a decent amount of other toys to play around with, helping spice up the combat and give you an edge.
All this being said, I have a lot of gripes with this game. Standoffs are an easy way to open any fight with maximum resolve, and take out three whole enemies before any real fighting begins. They are also not hard to continuously perform once you've done them a few times. Despite all your options in combat, doing the same thing repeatedly enough times can make anything feel stale. The game is beautiful, but good lord, can it feel empty at times. The grappling hook is a tool that reminds me of another Sucker Punch franchise, Sly Cooper. I just wish the grappling hook wasn't so damn contextual. They try to give you plenty of places to use it in outposts, but I feel like not having more uses in the open world was a missed opportunity. The golden bird's presence can be pretty obnoxious when I can tell it's heading toward my marked destination, an area that I'm already headed toward. I kinda wish foxes were a completely random occurrence, and didn't emerge from specified dens. It would make the surprise more pleasant, and the journey to follow the fox more meaningful.
The main story of Ghost of Tsushima was actually fairly enjoyable, even if the parts I remember most were related to Lord Shimura and the samurai code of honor. A lot of the side stories just weren't interesting to me. It's a lot of walk-and-talk, following tracks, fighting some enemies, etc. They feel pretty formulaic. I feel like this issue is again, exacerbated by the open world. I spent so much time away from the side stories that I always forgot the plot by the time I reached the next one. The side stories that I adored though were the "Mythical Tales". These ones had you learn about a local legend from a storytelling musician, leading to you seeking out the artifact from the legend. They have you compare maps/drawings to your surroundings in order to find locations, provide extremely cool duels, and other unique challenges. They were the most fun part of the game for me, and it's a damn shame there's only five of them.
The eternal problem with the open-world genre is populating your game with enough meaningful content to last dozens of hours. Ghost of Tsushima does its best to avoid the pitfalls associated with this dilemma, in a variety of creative ways. I just can't shake the feeling that I would've enjoyed this game more if it were a little more compact. Instead, I walk away feeling like I kind of tricked myself into playing a Sony-trademark 3rd-person open-world cinematic action/adventure title. Still a good one though.
Also, as a bonus, thanks to the advent of gaming consoles recording footage as you play, I compiled a montage of all the weird stuff that happened to me as I played this game. None of it is a knock against the game's quality or my overall rating, just some amusing stuff that I wanted to share. You can find said montage here.