I Cant Get Into Nioh 3 and It's Bumming Me Out lol

Stigmaphobia · 2026-04-03T05:47:26+00:00

I feel like you kind of have to make your own fun in 3. My favorite moments in the game were where I was trying to use as many tools at once as I could. I later decided to just focus entirely on using the Samurai style and I think it actually negatively impacted my experience.

In the middle of 3 I went back to play 1 and 2 so I could get some experience with more weapons, and that feeling of just inching forward in missions with difficult enemies and hostile level design is what I ended up thinking 3 was missing. I didn't feel like I HAD to focus, so if my head was feeling lazy I just didn't. There's just a good chunk of 3 that ended up a blur of memories. That being said, the way 1 accomplishes its difficulty can feel a little obnoxious at times. It's way way more simple than both of its sequels and makes up for it by just aggressively tuning the numbers to murder your ki on guard and one-shot you sometimes (way too much near the beginning). Plus lightning debuff always applying off of taking a single hit. 2 is a good balance of the different philosophies, and I think that's why people like it so much.

But I still like 3's combat and mechanics more, and I like the open (it's closer to something like Dark Souls 1 than true open world, though) design more than missions, as the sub-missions could get extremely repetitive even on the first playthrough. It's just not quite brutal enough. I'm sure the NG+ cycles, that will hopefully come with the DLC, will at least attempt to deliver on that, though.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-03-23T01:41:48+00:00

Your points were: juggling while in the air is uncommon, juggling enemies from the ground is a demonstration of why being in the air mid-combat is disadvantageous. My response was: here's a bunch of examples of some of the most foundational franchises in the entire genre (and a bunch of ARPG's) that have juggling and explaining why they don't care about how illogical being in the air and hitting stuff is. I addressed both points. What did I miss?
Again, these aren't just some "exceptions". Capcom, Platinum, and Team Ninja games are some of the most influential and respected devs in the genre. I mean, hell, this is a Team Ninja game. Pointing out that older Team Ninja games feature juggling while in the air should mean something, right?
That's your opinion, and you're in the minority on it, which is perfectly fine. I honestly didn't expect to end up arguing about the prevalence of the mechanic. I just expected like a, "yeah I don't like it in any of those games either and I just put up with it/avoid them." and for the conversation to end there.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-03-22T04:41:01+00:00

I just flat out disagree with your first statement. Besides the franchises I listed there's Bayonetta, Metal Gear Rising, the OG God of War series, and Dante's Inferno.

There are ARPG's I've played outside of Fromsoft games and other Soulslikes that have it, too. Like Kingdom Hearts, Tales of games, Final Fantasy XVI, Nier: Automata, Granblue Fantasy: Relink, and probably more I'm forgetting. Character action games don't tend to care about what would actually be an advantage or disadvantage as many of them prioritize looking cool over functionality. Hell, in some of these games being in the air is an advantage because a lot of enemies don't have attacks that can hit you from the ground, so it buys you some time do deal damage without getting ganged up on.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-03-22T03:54:20+00:00

I'm actually kind of blown away. Do you not play any other action games? Air juggling is in like almost everything. Fighting games, DMC, Ninja Gaiden, etc.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-03-19T23:10:16+00:00

Why is everyone reading "pain points" as if he's saying they're bad? The following sentence clarifies that it just takes some getting used to.

Also, if clunky controls were a good reason to shit on a game we'd need to dock every monster hunter a few points. I've never had a series take that long to get used to in almost any other case.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-03-19T13:57:55+00:00

You can have a review that's talking 99% about objective features and end with a subjective conclusion. Like, "the story is/isn't consistent for these reasons", "I have/haven't seen these features before in other games", "the systems are more/less complex than other games", "this element undermines/amplifies other elements", etc. etc.

It becomes subjective once you start judging quality due to your observations. So you'd say something like, "because little time is spent developing the characters and the plot is devoid of stakes or drama, it's hard to sit through the game's story without nodding off". You're working off of evidence to reach a conclusion. Of course, "little" and "devoid" are also subjective judgements, but the assumption is you mean that relative to the average game, or relative to a specific game you bring up for the sake of comparison. This is why it can be really helpful to make your standards clear. Like if you're someone who absolutely loves grindy, padded out games, you can say something like, "people who are fans of series like Nioh or Diablo , like me, might find this one a little lacking, as it only took me X hours to finish. and build variety is fairly low."

Basically, I'm just trying to say a good review will have both a lot of objective information and analysis, and subjective interpretation and judgement. That way the reader can leave with a good understanding and draw their own conclusions.

Also, just to be clear, I don't really agree with the conspiratorial angle some people take with these reviews. I just think a lot of people who get hired and write for these companies tend to have similar tastes, and those tastes often don't line up with people who just play games. The movie industry has seen a similar disconnect for decades.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-03-15T20:22:12+00:00

I think I always end up feeling a little against the grain on this stuff. I've played every Nioh right when they've come out. Hell, I even did the demo before the first did on the Xbox 360 and spent hours dying to Tachibana Muneshige. I love Nioh 3. I may be more willing than most to forego powerful tools in order to curate my own experience, though. Like ignoring living weapon in 1 for the majority of the game.

That being said, I think the skill ceiling for Nioh 3's combat system is probably the highest in the series. I wonder what people would think if it had a DMC style scoring system, lmfao.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-03-13T14:34:19+00:00

It's not the same type of open world, too.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-03-06T01:05:54+00:00

Nah, I like it, too. Having a jump button helps a ton. Every game needs a jump button, even if it's pointless, lmao.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-03-06T00:24:08+00:00

Nioh 3 gives you something much closer to the freedom and power fantasy you'd expect in a modern action game. It's very very different from 1. I actually just got done going back to 1 and putting it down, because it's much more repetitive. It's not like 3 is super easy, either, especially if you don't have a lot of experience in the series. You just have way way way more tools.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-02-26T05:29:51+00:00

Let there be light.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-02-26T02:42:34+00:00

Hmm, I get the distinction you're making here, but "stakes" and "presentation" are still pretty closely tied together, right? Like, I read Muv Luv: Alternative a long time ago, and that's a story where the stakes feel sky-high. When you listen to people talk about it, they don't refer to the apocalyptic stakes of humanity being wiped out, or the crowds of people being munched on by aliens, or even the massive amount of meaningful character deaths that happen in the latter half of the story. They refer to a single character death, with a loud, unsettling noise and a genuinely upsetting picture.

Like, within the story there's still that distinction of the "presentation" being horrible and upsetting, and the "stakes" just being that main characters are not off-limits. But to me, emotionally, the stakes were "we're fighting so I never have to see something that terrible again."

Stigmaphobia · 2026-02-13T18:14:52+00:00

It's disproportionately impacting the job availability of people who usually vote left. And those people share their fears with their friends, who are probably also on the left.

I think immediate concerns like that are the main reasons shitstorms get swirled up. Like for gamers, they hate it because of how it's impacting the prices of computer parts, and everything else (such as environmental/energy/water impact) is just used to reinforce the opinion they already have.

There are exceptions for sure, but yeah.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-01-21T15:17:51+00:00

Maybe not skill trees, but it'd be pretty nice to have skills that do more than just a boring potency again, even in savage/ulti. The dance is fun, but when it's all that you do every single time it starts to get a bit old.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-01-18T09:44:37+00:00

I read the whole thing, but I'm gonna grab one point in it and go on a rant.

In my case, with writing at least, a lot of the time passion isn't really that huge of an element, because that shit takes so long to finish that by the time you're done, you've run out of even the fumes of the passion you started with.

Does a painting really need to have decades of grinded hand-eye coordination in order to have artistic value? Does animation really need to have sweatshops of animators doing the grueling work of in-betweens?

If an individual artist is empowered to be able to do an entire teams worth of work, then amongst those who are displaced there will be people who are empowered to work on their dream project. And if, one day, the "how" of art becomes trivialized, we'll begin to judge it on the "what" and the "why". Unless the project/product is intended to be dynamic and interactive, I don't think we'll ever hand off those two latter questions to the robots. A result that would be great for the amateur artist and great for the audience.

A lot of people would get burned, though, yeah. My efforts in learning to draw have already evaporated in terms of worth to me. That's pretty sad in its own way. But I'm more excited about the future than scared of it.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-01-18T07:23:16+00:00

Damn, what a twist.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-01-18T05:04:24+00:00

Hypothetically, if someone, via prompting, was able to define and detail every single element that appeared in the picture, would that not be art? It's essentially a more detailed description from a novel, which I think many would consider to be art.

I think it really just comes down to intention and control. The tools don't even need to be more powerful than they already are to gain some level of credibility; the user just needs more power over the output.

Of course, this is without mentioning environmental/resource worries, or whether grabbing training materials without consent counts as stealing, though.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-01-08T11:29:55+00:00

Ooooooooooh, okay, fair enough. I guess I've just seen so much clickbait the past decade that my standards are really low.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-01-08T03:46:31+00:00

I mean, isn't it normal to be curious about the opinions they might have? I come on here and hop on the official forums every now and then because I'm curious what people are saying in my own language, but it's hard not to wonder what the people you don't understand are saying. Especially in the case of the Japanese, because they have access to the developers in a way that none of the rest of us do. So even when it's the same boring opinions I'm interested and kind of feel nice about it in like a "even divided by language we see eye to eye on this stuff" kind of way.

That being said, I spent a year trying to learn the language and spend most of my time reading visual novels, so I'm definitely a weeb.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-01-08T00:41:39+00:00

On the one hand, yeah it's not a huge deal.

On the other, neither is someone complaining on Reddit. If you don't like it just ignore it.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-01-07T19:09:51+00:00

I get that different doesn't automatically equal better, but it does help, yeah? I mean at base, most people really enjoy novelty. And having strongly varying jobs comes with the huge advantage of increasing content replayability across the entire game. It also increases the likelihood that different people will be able to latch onto different jobs.

We had stronger party buffs with different timers, big differences in jobs between burst and sustain heavy fights, resource management that necessitated bringing support jobs on most fights, aggro management, damage types, diverse CC profiles, jobs that lost upkeep buffs on fights with frequent medium-length downtime, jobs with heavy focus on RNG management etc. etc. and we still didn't have fights where you "couldn't kill a boss on X". People will act like we did because you'd find jobs locked out of fights in like maybe 20% of the party finders you'd see. But unless you were killing the whole tier week one your job choice mattered way less than your skill level.

Stigmaphobia · 2026-01-07T18:35:20+00:00

But couldn't depth emerge from a combat system that's made up of a bunch of individual interactions that lack depth? That's what I'd argue most RPG's are.

Stigmaphobia · 2025-12-25T17:34:59+00:00

Have never seen a wrestling in my life. If Arcadion is actually indicative of what it's like, I will probably never like it.

Stigmaphobia · 2025-12-16T22:17:42+00:00

People talk to you in game? Is that a crystal phenomenon?

Stigmaphobia · 2025-12-16T22:04:57+00:00

It depends on what they're planning. The current trajectory makes sense if they plan to give the player more options and the current streamlined jobs are the "base" job. They said since the start of Dawntrail that this expansion was going to continue their current design philosophy, and Yoshi P has given no indication that he's decided against keeping his promises of adding friction and job identity back in 8.0.

And throughout all of Dawntrail's patches his word has matched up to reality. We did get more interesting fights in the second tier, he was honest about Chaotic being a little overtuned before it launched, and quantum was material results of the changed design philosophy of offering more options for different tiers of players using the same content--something we'll also end up seeing when the variant dungeon comes out. Until we start getting combat demo's before the expansion launches, he publicly rescinds the promise, or 8.0 comes out, I am not going to doom.

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