Rise of the Rōnin is Butter Spread Too Thin | Review

Rise of the Rōnin is Butter Spread Too Thin | Review. Team Ninja are my favorite developer. I know over the years they have received a lot of criticism, especially of the Dead or Alive Series, for their signature mixture of brutal battling and beautiful ... women. The Ninja Gaiden Series, even among casual game journalists, is still beloved and respected. However, since the departure of Itagaki in 2008 (right after the release of the true masterpiece Ninja Gaiden 2 on the Xbox 360), it seems like the team has struggled with re-establishing their signature brand of game design and seem to be moving in a new creative direction since the release of the excellent Dark Souls-influenced Nioh in 2017.
The issue with this new creative direction, however, as Ronin clearly illustrates, is that following along and being the secondary Pepsi to Fromsoft's Coca-Cola was a novel and interesting idea seven years ago. Since that time however, and especially since the release of the Parry Focused Sekiro in 2019, copying the current Fromsoft formula of Parry + Stamina + Stagger is far from being original or interesting -- especially because this has essentially become the action game standard. Even Armored Core 6, a supposed mech game, utilizes this formula to some degree. With other new developers, like the creators of The Lies of P, copying Fromsoft isn't surprising, but in the case of Team Ninja, who were once on the cutting edge of combat design only a few years ago and who made some genuinely cool innovations with the Ki-Pulse system of the Nioh franchise, the Rise of the Ronin feels like creative burnout. When discussing their vision for the game, the thing that stands out the most is Team Ninja discussing expected sales figures and it certainly comes across when playing Ronin that the move to this expanded open-world setting is much more of a commercial choice rather than a creative one.
The open-world aspect of the game's design is certainly underdeveloped, even casual reviewers have pointed this out, but what is even more of an issue with Ronin's world/level design is that for a combat focused game, all the time spent wandering around and doing fetch quests devastates the gameplay density and all of the open ended space allows for players to effortlessly siphon away enemies from groups and slowly pick them off one by one. Bayonetta and Devil May Cry have locked in combat areas for a reason Team Ninja.
Right now Rise of the Ronin is a PS5 exclusive and goes for the absurd price of $70. And being a Sony Published game, it seems unlikely they will be releasing it on Steam (PC) anytime soon (Sony wants another Bloodborne I think). But hopefully in the near future it will drop on sale because buying it full price seems steep.
Very cool thumbnail created by the master, himself ‪@boghogSTG‬
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STG Revision 2020 Discord:
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00:00 Chapter 1: Team Ninja Are Lost
09:19 Chapter 2: Open-World Dilutes Combat
16:54 Chapter 3: Stagger and Parry Burnout
29:03 Chapter 4: Style is AGGRESSIVELY Bland
33:05 Final Thoughts
#teamninja, #riseoftheronin, #sekiro