This review contains SPOILERS! Click to expand.
Ghost of Tsushima
A dishonorable path
A slave no longer
Ghost of Tsushima Review
How is Ghost of Tsushima’s parrying system? Does the combat rely heavily on tropes? How is the open world? Is Jin as a character outshined? How is the narrative? These are all questions I had going into Ghost of Tsushima and questions I hope to answer in my review below. While preview coverage
Ghost of Tsushima
A dishonorable path
A slave no longer
Ghost of Tsushima Review
How is Ghost of Tsushima’s parrying system? Does the combat rely heavily on tropes? How is the open world? Is Jin as a character outshined? How is the narrative? These are all questions I had going into Ghost of Tsushima and questions I hope to answer in my review below. While preview coverage never blew me away, I was carried into my play by nothing more than peculiar curiosity. Shockingly, I fell for this game. Sucker Punch has really distanced themselves from other developers with Jin’s journey, a compelling ensemble of characters, and most of all the love and care put into the open world.
Combat and Gameplay
In this third person action adventure, stealth game you play as Jin Sikai, the last surviving member of Clan Sikai and one of the last samurai alive after the first Mongol invasion. Jin sets out with one thing in mind; saving his island and the people on it at absolutely any cost. As you engage in combat throughout Tsushima you always have one thing to fall back on; variety. You can approach any given encounter differently than that last. You of course have your trusty blade which can be used for both quick and heavy attacks as well as combos with such. Yet, as you progress you unlock different stances in combat. You unlock four stances in total, one for every enemy type you encounter. The Stone stance is effective against swordsmen, the Water stance is effective against shieldmen, the Wind stance is effective against spearmen, and the Moon stance is effective against brutes.
Combat with stances takes a little getting used to. When facing several enemies and fighting the camera from time to time, I would sometimes panic while trying and failing to switch stances. When surrounded by several different enemy types all attacking, you can defend against them just fine, but you have to pick who you attack as your stance dictates the effect it will have. As you progress, players will get the hang of it, but it might not feel as smooth as you’d like. However, the player can find feelings of being super rewarded once they finally take down a swarm of enemies where they previously lost.
Additionally, Ghost of Tsushima’s variety in combat doesn’t only come in stances, but the enemies you encounter as well. I very much enjoyed encountering either bandits, Mongols, or straw hats. You’re never bored, as each enemy type offers a specific challenge. Bandits are more sporadic with basic attacks, while Mongols are more organized with specialized attacks, and the straw hats, my favorite, are more patient and methodical. Each new combat encounter seems fresh or different enough when engaging separate types of enemies throughout Tsushima.
Whilst in combat you can stagger enemies as well as dodge and parry once unlocked. Staggering isn’t something new for weathered players, but it’s utilized well in Ghost of Tsushima. Once an enemy is staggered you know to finish them off quickly, move on to another enemy, change your gear, etc. Dodging is a perk you can unlock super early on and I suggest you do so as it feels right at home. You are able to dodge heavy attacks, indicated with red hands when attacking, sent Jin’s way with a specially timed dodge. Unfortunately, the timing for these heavy dodges never feels quite right. I never felt a sense of consistency when successfully pulling it off or when failing. You can also eventually upgrade your dodge roll to disregard fall damage if timed just right which comes in handy.
The parrying system is something I was very stoked to try out and utilize. Sadly, I never felt that the timing was quite right. Considering I felt this way about dodging heavy attacks, I could just need to improve as a player on the island of Tsushima. However, I managed to parry enemies on accident more than I did purposely which never sat quite right with me. Luckily, even playing the entirety of my time hardly parrying, I never felt at a disadvantage or that I was missing an aspect of the gameplay. I fell in love with the aspects of combat that resonated with me and I feel that that can be said for any player giving Jin a try.
An intriguing element added into the combat are standoffs. Standoffs are probably the most samurai thing in the entire game. Instead of running in and picking people off you can choose to call them to you for a duel of sorts. You stand feet from an enemy, both with hands on your blades. You hold triangle, then right as they initiate an attack, you let go and deliver one swift slice. Later on you can chain this to take out up to five additional enemies. Initially, I struggled to time these as they flinch to fake you out. I eventually learned to watch the attacker’s feet. This not only helped me with my experience, but gave an overall feeling of authenticity.
A combat segment I really enjoyed was the Incident at Hyoshi Pass. Such a unique fight. Jin is tasked with dispatching archers surrounding a bridge. At this point you only have a limited supply of arrows to use and quickly run out. From there you have to find the angle on the enemy and pick them off one by one. This segment had me learning how to fight with several aspects of Jin’s repertoire while also enjoying myself and the challenge it offered. This started a feeling that blossomed the more I played. Ghost clearly has an emphasis on targeted realism, especially in combat. In this Ghost succeeds, but worry not as it still always feels like a video gamey video game.
Not the samurai type? That’s where the stealth and Ghost elements come into play. Your Ghost weapons consist of kunai, sticky bombs, black powder bombs, smoke bombs, wind chimes, but most importantly a grappling hook for traversal. These weapons are meant for quick fire encounters or enhancing your stealthy approach. There are also two bows and a blowgun. The Half bow is for a short range and consists of two arrow types; standard and fire. While the Longbow is for long range and consists of heavy and explosive arrow types. The blowgun enables you to poison or hallucinate your enemies. If you poison them, they puke out blood and fall to the ground while the hallucination dart turns them on their allies.
For a game about becoming the Ghost, a particularly less honorable and stealthy warrior as compared to the typical samurai, it doesn’t support your progression into the shadows well in the gameplay or narrative until much later in the game. Unfortunately, your approach to stealth combat is very stripped down and doesn’t add a lot of flare to assassinate enemies. However, the more you play, the more the Ghost’s true purpose comes to light. While your stealth approach eventually blossoms much later with more skills and equipment as you level up, the Ghost is more of a through line for Jin’s inspiration and how its dishonorable ways affect him.
On top of samurai or ghost gameplay styles, the game offers segments of slight detective work. These segments pop up when following clues like observing footprints to track an animal or enemy. This seemed cool at first, but I assumed it would be better implemented or grow in complexity as I played. It didn't. Overall, it was a bit too half-baked. These either subtle or rare segments should have been better utilized or left out entirely.
Perks or techniques are available in the game as you level up Jin and find your own samurai. You can eventually unlock every technique in the game using technique points. Techniques are available in deflection, evasion, exploration, ghost weapons, mythic and stances as I mentioned above. There is a lot of variety here, but most are pretty straight forward with the exception of mythic. While techniques are utilized in ways players have seen before, they work well in practice and seem refined to a tee.
Some weapons have abilities that assist in stealth, combat, exploration, etc. One in particular I did not find enjoyable was the Traverler’s Attire’s ability. While wearing the attire it will vibrate when you are near artifacts or collectibles of which there are way too much of. This seems helpful, but its vibrations only infuriated me. It was subtle enough to go unnoticed, but when it didn’t it was merely annoying. Most of your time looking for artifacts is a frenzy of vibrations followed by you going from building to building looking into dark and dreary rooms barely seeing anything yet alone a small hidden item. I found it monotonous and it took me out of my groove often.
While the game opens up customization options later on, you could say I was able to get really accustomed to the beginning weapons and armor due to some odd level pacing. It took me upwards of twenty hours and the bulk of the first island to find an armorer or swordsmith. Now, this could be due to my endless pursuit to do and collect everything on the first island, but even so, I couldn’t help but feel let down aesthetically with my character customization options as well as my upgrade options early on. Even when I did finally find both the armorer and swordsmith, I wasn’t able to upgrade or change exactly what I wanted.
Ghost of Tsushima’s gameplay pacing, pertaining to the perks, techniques, weapons, or cosmetics, turns out to be done well despite my struggles early on. Even though I thought it was a bit of a drag not being able to upgrade early on, it shows in the end how much that progression was catered. Once I finally unlocked everything possible, I became The Ghost of Tsushima on my Legend, reached max level, and had practically every cosmetic outside of some obscure hidden ones.
My favorite aspect of the combat overall has to be the mythic arts you receive from completing Yamato’s Tales or Mythic Quests. My personal favorite mythic art is actually the first one you receive pretty organically; the Heavenly Strike. Heavenly Strike is holding down both triangle and circle to deliver the most dope samurai strike known to man. You shoot forward in a blur slicing whatever you come into contact with and even severing limbs when finishing off an enemy with the attack. Heavenly Strike is unblockable and deals extra damage to staggered enemies. Other mythic arts you can acquire are Dance of Wrath; an art that unleashes three unblockable slices that deal a lot of damage, Way of the Flame; lighting your sword and setting people ablaze as you fight, and Explosive Arrow which I mentioned earlier and is pretty self explanatory; boom.
Mythic Arts aside, forty plus hours in and the combat still manages to add another layer with Ghost Mode. Ghost Mode is unlocked way later in Jin’s story and requires you to kill seven enemies without taking damage or slaughter a leader. Leaders are one of the few enemies that can duel Jin head on or hang with him solo. Slaughtering a leader is when you sneak up on them and assassinate them, but because they are a special enemy type they have a special assassination. You activate Ghost Mode by pressing both R3 and L3. When activated, it terrifies enemies leaving them trembling in fear or at least not attacking Jin. Jin is then able to one shot everyone in his path or deal a massive amount of damage in a duel. You can even wear Ghost Armor once unlocked to change the number of kills from seven to five, but I wouldn’t say you need to. Seven isn’t an absurd amount of kills to activate Ghost Mode as I was able to do so often.
As I said before, Ghost of Tsushima’s combat offers one thing if nothing else; variety, but all of that variety can get overwhelming if you can’t get a hold of the controls. It took me a bit to get past a very prominent learning curve in the controls in and out of combat. They utilize every single button including the touchpad, but saying that doesn’t do it justice. You have several throwable items to choose from on the fly, arrows, interactables on every directional button, etc.
The touchpad isn’t only utilized, but it’s utilized super well. It’s split into directions. This essentially adds four more buttons. These buttons allow you to call for the wind as you directional queue, play your flute, focus your hearing in stealth and investigative moments, and bow to interact with unique environments. These are all really cool additions to the control scheme. The calling of the wind pairs well with the open world and really supports the lack of a HUD. It leaves me in awe every time with its presentation and the way it is utilized.
Overall, the combat succeeds in its goal. It gives you a more than serviceable way to play your way with loads of variety. Whether you lean on your stances, samurai specific weapons and abilities, ghost specific weapons and abilities, mythic arts, or systems such as staggering or parrying, your Jin will form your way. The stealth gameplay really ramps up near the end, but without the narrative angle to hold your attention, it doesn’t lend itself well to the flow of the combat. The leveling and combat pacing could not be more thought out and effective. Sucker Punch succeeds in combat with small, subtle missteps that take little to nothing away from the overall experience.
Open World
Everything Sucker punch implements in the open world isn't super different, but it is refined and used in new ways that fully engage the player in more than just combat. Whether it’s reminiscing in a hot spring, writing haiku to express your innermost feelings, slicing a bamboo stack in one swift slice, or following a fox to pray at an Inari shrine, the open world offers more than your typical activities to keep you engaged. Ghost of Tsushima is the most engrossing and engaging open world I have ever played in. Whether it’s very clear or in more subtle ways, the game strikes a perfect balance.
Like its combat counterpart, the open world offers an engrossing variety of things to get lost in, but I did find a slight annoyance in what its variety had to offer early on. Whether it be fox dens, haiku, hot springs, etc., it did seem to take longer for me to get a hold of these repetitive segments. While I came around on them ultimately, journeying the open world’s beauty and art style carried it home when I wasn’t feeling it. Getting to your destination is just as engaging as the destination itself if not more.
The world of Ghost of Tsushima is absolutely stunning. From textures to the art style and the atmosphere that follows, Ghost of Tsushima offers an appealing style that leaves you in awe at every turn. The environments really pop, especially when thrown into a field of flowers. I cannot stress enough how beautiful this game is even with the enormous scope it dawns. A nice detail I enjoyed happens when you walk in fields. Jin will delicately lay his hand out, allowing the flowers or grass to brush his hand just like in Gladiator, and don’t even get me started on the storms. The more dishonorable you play, the more the islands of Tsushima speak to with storms. If you lean more Ghost in your approach, the island storms giving the world a living and breathing feel.
My absolute favorite aspect of the open world happens to be a function mapped to your controller; the Guiding Wind. With a lack of HUD you need a way to find your next objective. Sucker Punch changes the game utilizing the wind to blow in the direction you need to continue at the touch of a button. Not only is this organic and keeps you in the world, but it's stunning and only adds more to the game rather than taking away. Something a need to open the map would constantly bring. The Guiding Wind paired with the environmental actions as well as dialogue or commentary from Jin that transpire when Jin bows at specific objects, offers a wonderful flurry of fun to the world.
While the organic feel Sucker Punch implements is wholeheartedly a feat, there is one thing about that frustrated me. Not having a mini map lends itself to the world they convey, this is true, but it hurt my experience in one aspect. When I arrived at a village or town with upgrades available, I could never find the vendor I was looking for easily considering each town has it set up differently. Taking me out of the experience often. It's a small price to pay for the experience the open world offers, but a price to pay nonetheless.
Continuing on a living and breathing world, the people you save on the islands of Tsushima will actually return and recognize you. As you venture you will run into groups of bandits, Mongols, or straw hats that have a hostage. If you save this hostage a mission might pop, but sometimes that very character will return in another location once you discover and unlock it. This once again lends itself well to not only the world as a character, but the sense of consistency and relativity the game strives for.
One thing about the open world I didn't enjoy is how you could travel to locations before a quest brings you there. My issue is with camps. You can clear out the entire camp and within a few seconds of leaving, it repopulates. For a game heavy in relativity, it just took me out of the experience a bit. I tip my hat to the attempts here, but it fell short. With a few companion AI exceptions, this is the only thing that took me out which is a feat in a samurai game actually featuring some fantastical elements.
Missions almost always feel off to me in open world games. They struggle to have a balance of meaningful side and main quests. However, Ghost of Tsushima’s quests offer both quick and lengthy quests. The quick quests succeed in feeling paced right. They don’t seem rushed or a means to an end. They move at a nice beat without sacrificing writing or gameplay. Normally side quests have to really trick or entice me to want to pursue them. Here I don't think they did anything spectacular to hold my attention, yet I didn't feel burdened by a single side quest. I just wanted to complete the map or segment I was in to the fullest. The world's presentation takes all the praise here.
Overall, the love and care put into the cohesiveness and beauty of the world alone sells this game. You can find an experience on the islands of Tsushima without any narrative at all, yet the missions they offer excel at building up Jin’s character as well as the connection with the most interesting character; the world. Sucker Punch’s world doesn’t do a lot that’s new, with the exception of the Guiding Wind, but what it offers is everything open world games have learned up to the end of this generation and they do it nearly flawlessly.
Characters and Narrative
In Ghost of Tsushima you play as Jin, a samurai who finds his own way in life. Unlike the samurai that came before him, Jin is basically Bruce Wayne, yet I am one of the few people not in love with the Bat, so my level of enjoyment sort of shocked me. Jin's story is becoming what Tsushima needs; the Ghost. Jin really is dynamic. He shows character outside of his typical self often. He even consoles a cowardice father who ran away leaving his family to get murdered. He kneels with him. Unlike the samurai that came before him, he isn’t shackled by tradition. He is open to do as he sees fit.
It is very clear early on that Ghost of Tsushima is a character piece. While they succeed in showing Jin’s journey, it is very arguable whether he gets outshined by others. While I am torn on the most compelling character present in the narrative, it is brutally clear that there isn’t a single character that acts as the driving force.
Yuna, formerly a thief for trade, shows her badasserie early on, saving you from the first battle of the Mongol invasion. Her intro even introduces the stealth gameplay without suffering any pacing or gameplay faults. Yuna’s relationship with Jin blossoms and I came to love her dynamics over time.
My favorite relationship with Jin comes with his Uncle Shimura. A lot of the narrative leans on the compelling through line that is this very relationship. Shimura represents tradition and honor while Jin’s newfound way represents adaption and hope.
My personal favorite character is Ryozu, the leader of the straw hats and the one who takes some of the biggest chances in the narrative. We learn that Jin has an already established personal connection to him from his childhood, which is the one of the few remnants of a laid back and fun Jin. This acts as a nice change of pace both in the narrative as well as for Jin as a character. We mostly just get driven-focused Jin.
Both Yuriko and Tomoe are characters I wanted more of despite their limited screen time. Each one was a nice change of pace and super well written. Yuriko is an elderly character that acted as a caretaker of Jin after the passing of his mother and her story beats tug at your heartstrings. Tomoe is the student of one of Jin’s Sensei, Ishikawa. While Yuriko covers your heart, Tomoe covers your mind as her story is the most divisive and mysterious. Ghost of Tsushima features a ton of compelling characters I didn't even mention like Kenji, Lady Masako, Taka, etc. This makes for a jumbled tone on who is the most compelling, but it’s a serious feat for the writing team.
Yet another feat for the writing team, the narrative is appealing to say the least. The narrative mends itself with gameplay well, but also adds hints without being too on the nose,
"Always fight with patience."
"Your father is the wind at your back... your mother the birds in the trees…”
Without being spoilery, the narrative is a juxtaposition to Jin's turmoil between saving Tsushima at all costs and breaking his uncle's image of him. It really is tradition or survival. It's Shimura or the Ghost. That point comes to a conclusion at the end, but is very present throughout while not being too on the nose. You aren't given a lot of stealthy assets early on and upholding the samurai doesn't only seem right but it's easier at the beginning. The more you progress the more those lines, both morally, in the narrative, and gameplay wise blurs together. I actually found myself leaning more towards Ghost gameplay near the end. I still had a good balance, but it took awhile for the Ghost to fully emerge for me but he wholeheartedly did.
A key aspect of the narrative on the first island happened to be the Shimura and Khan scenes. Shimura is caught early on and acts as the main form of inspiration for Jin. These scenes serve their purpose well, making Shimura doubt Jin’s resolve, but ultimately left me wanting more. We get more scenes reminiscent of strong characters interacting in this world with Ryuzo, but not enough.
Continuing with Ryozu, my favorite character, of which there are strong choices to choose from, his turn seemed rushed even when I did everything I possibly could with the narrative up to that point. I needed more time for Jin and Ryozu's relationship to blossom or show its hand before this came to be. That narrative beat was strong thanks to superb VO performances, but fell short for me personally.
I asked myself early on if I thought they would include fantastical elements. They do so in a concentrated fashion that feels at home in this world. Jin isn't superhuman. Even when the few fantastical elements are introduced, you never feel like you are overpowered to an obscene amount. Jin even pants in scenes after intense battles.
These fantastical elements I am referring to, or Yamato's tales, were among my favorite aspects in the game. It acts as an excellent way to introduce these small elements with the same character of whom I liked but would have appreciated more in depth and personal arcs for. I think it was a good choice to limit most of the rewards of these fantastical quests to cosmetic or relative ways of producing ie. stone on your blade to light it. Also, even when you use these abilities, you can't just spam them to win due to resolve. You still need to be strategic. The writing, pacing, and execution in these fantastical elements could not have been any more polished and spot on.
Some of my favorite moments, while beautiful, are paced oddly in the middle of combat. While this is rare, it still caught me off guard. Jin’s father’s death flashback was yet another oddly paced cut scene, but the material is more than serviceable. Jin’s father only appears in Jin’s flashbacks, so his death isn’t much of a spoiler. You learn of his death early on. These points are not what I expected from Jin's character, yet I enjoyed the substance more so than how then how they are introduced.
Overall, the narrative leans heavily on a compelling cast of characters and few through lines that they return to. That being said, what they lean on is pretty damn good. Jin’s journey is him coming to terms with the new him and the new island. Not accepting the samurai way means giving up on what his uncle holds the most dear to him; Jin himself as well as his honor.
Conclusion
Ghost of Tsushima is my game of the year as I write this review. Its combat isn’t super new, but its manner of engagement offers a more than serviceable way for you to play any way you so desire. The pacing in both the gameplay and narrative work in tandem with each other while also pairing themselves well with the through lines and characters the story offers. Maybe the most important feat, of which there are many, is the breathtaking and living open world filled with polish, relativity, and super engrossing elements.
👍👍
