A high-intensity brawler that’s best played with a controller, Sifu is not to be underestimated by its level count. Its non-regenerative health, tough bosses, and emphasis on learning from past mistakes make for a sizable summit. To boost my point, Sifu uses a respawn mechanic that has you age more each time you fail, lowering your health but upping your damage as you grow older, and providing a firm game over after failing past age 70. Since your health carries over from your best runs between all five missions, your ultimate goal is to complete the game with the lowest possible age. This is the ultimate source of Sifu’s challenge. The fighting itself is sufficiently difficult, and my best advice to give is to practice defense before focusing on offense. Learn the basic mook moves, and then move up to memorizing the boss timings. If you can consistently parry and dodge, and use weapons whenever you find them, you’ll have a huge leg-up in the game.
To be clear, even knowing this you will fail a lot. You will have moments of frustration. You will memorize every room in every mission. Yet it never got old for me. Sifu is the type of game that cultivates determination. I spent hours replaying the same level over and over without getting bored of it. I could feel the progress I was making as I did better each time. Of course, It helps that each mission has a distinct theme that works perfectly to encompass a unique element and vibe. Simply put, Sifu isn’t a game you play. It’s a game that plays you. I don’t even want to know how many gallons of sweat I shed trying to improve my runs. But after over a dozen runs I could finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. I went the spare all enemies route and eventually managed to beat the final boss at only my early 30s. Let me tell you, scarce are the moments above finally hitting those end credits after over 20 hours playing the game. I can comfortably say that Sifu was well worth the 30 bucks.
If you fancy the relatively simple but reactive combat of Sifu and are still itching for content, there’s also modifiers and a recently added Arena mode for more scenarios to pick from. Those are all auxiliary bonuses though. The game more than stands on its own.
To be clear, even knowing this you will fail a lot. You will have moments of frustration. You will memorize every room in every mission. Yet it never got old for me. Sifu is the type of game that cultivates determination. I spent hours replaying the same level over and over without getting bored of it. I could feel the progress I was making as I did better each time. Of course, It helps that each mission has a distinct theme that works perfectly to encompass a unique element and vibe. Simply put, Sifu isn’t a game you play. It’s a game that plays you. I don’t even want to know how many gallons of sweat I shed trying to improve my runs. But after over a dozen runs I could finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. I went the spare all enemies route and eventually managed to beat the final boss at only my early 30s. Let me tell you, scarce are the moments above finally hitting those end credits after over 20 hours playing the game. I can comfortably say that Sifu was well worth the 30 bucks.
If you fancy the relatively simple but reactive combat of Sifu and are still itching for content, there’s also modifiers and a recently added Arena mode for more scenarios to pick from. Those are all auxiliary bonuses though. The game more than stands on its own.