FromSoftware's black sheep of the Soulsborne games is arguably its most overlooked when discussing the whole lot, and I would attribute that to its extremely abrasive accessibility, which if you can't click with, will make for one of the defining moments of misery for you in any game ever. But when it clicks? You're going from playing a game that feels like it's deliberately bad to playing one of the most compelling games of all time; equal to, if not better than, the best the genre has to offer, not just from the Souls-like formula, but from action action games as a whole.
When I got this and played it for the first time in 2019, I hated it, the parry/block system felt delayed, and it felt uncomfortably difficult consistently throughout the entire playthrough, where nothing within its progression got easier. You couldn't be any other class than a lone Shinobi swordsman (No jolly cooperation), and you couldn't walk away in order to level up significantly because leveling isn't really a thing, and you can't switch weapons because your sword is your only tool besides some quick stun items or a shield - both having limited ammo - that isn't useful for most of your playthrough. No, Sekiro faces you head-on and if you don't beat its challenges that it asks of you with the tools it gives you, that's it, you can't go further. That structure is so alien to what the other Fromsoft games offered in terms of challenge that I found myself getting extremely frustrated with it and left it with a very bitter taste after finishing its normal ending and its evil ending, 2019 passed and I blacklisted it in my mind.
But I came back to it again in 2022 after watching a reel of it being played by someone who mastered the Owl Father boss and realized that I was playing it wrong. For some reason, I found my save for the game was at the Sword Saint (The last and arguably the hardest boss in the game), and I had to re-learn the controls, arsenal, tricks, and so on from fighting him legitimately, not the way that the Sekiro Guru method guides you to do with the shield that takes forever like I did the first time, just straight up 1v1 skill. It was glorious, and that's when it clicked for me.
See, the Souls games generally let the player decide if they want to be up close to enemies in combat, Bloodborne encourages close and aggressive play, but Sekiro demands it without hesitation. Once I let that go, and I started to appreciate the finer design of the combat, I realized I was playing something true to the phrase, "It feels like you're ______ from the movie," because those boss battles? Definitely felt like I was playing in a Lone Wolf and Cub movie at the climax where equals meet to duel to the death. And that's what Sekiro nails where other action games have seldom touched.
Too, each area feels like a distinct homage to both Japanese classical and pop culture - almost a melting pot of the two - you have a lone samurai section at the beginning, the ginormous castle, sections of betrayal and political theater (Like Kurosawa films), section of fighting kaiju, a section of spooky ghosts in a foggy village, mystical mountaintops with martial arts, the jaw-dropping beautiful divine realm paying homage to upper class Japan and how they leeched off of the poor, anime fighting moves and techniques, parasite horror, etc. All of this melds into something that's truly unique and rewarding to discover and it's tied together by phenomenal graphics and the best soundtrack that FromSoft has produced.
So, what could be improved? Honestly, I think an easier setting would've been helpful in cultivating a larger audience for this game, but how that could've been done in practice is beyond me and quite frankly, the best parts of this game come in the form of feeling the intensity of the fights. Co-op wouldn't have worked because the game is designed to be 1v1 in most fights. Maybe less repeating mini-bosses would be nice, though the areas and surrounding enemies more than make up for reusing those because they *mostly* feel like new fights at that point (Some don't, but I don't think fighting an enemy again once or twice is inherently bad). Status effects like poison or deathly-terror are never fun to deal with, I will say it's in this game in parts, but not consistently problematic and a couple of times, it's used to guide the flow of the fight rather than hinder your progress.
Sekiro is still a brutally difficult game, demanding patience and a drive to improve your strategy and change your play style(s) that other games might have ironed into your mind and reflexes, however, when you finally get the groove and rhythm of the game and begin to play it as it ought to be, Sekiro is nothing short of a masterpiece and an exhilarating experience, one which has not been matched to date.
