continually bowled over by this game into NG+. how humbling it is to realize that I was basically just Not Good until Isshin forced me to truly start learning the game at the end of my first run, and that it would not be until my second rodeo that I could actually begin to apply that burgeoning mastery and deepen my understanding of how the game works. I'm sure many will lament the lack of character builds that made the Souls series so easy to return multiple times, but I found the additional bandwidth to explore the many different shinobi arts and prosthetics deeply enriched my experience, creating a wealth of approaches to combat scenarios that I had previously only tackled in ways that fit my comfort zone.

I feel I can say with more conviction now that this is one of the greatest action games of all time, and one that boasts what is perhaps the best, most finely tuned combat system in any game. just impeccable on all fronts.