I wonder if the level design felt convoluted and exaughsting because of the lack of mobility to move around the environment? Like if you could jump and move around more freely it'd be less of a chore? But with bosses that is purely subjective on my part, I personally find it kind of lazy even if the boss fight is decent. The Toad and Nue were both pretty good fights, better than some of the base game bosses but overall with a new location I much prefer a new boss. I really loved this DLC and I hope most of the Nioh community plays it because I think this is the ultimate Nioh content for me. I'm glad you left your comment, I really enjoy having these types of conversations!

"I wonder if the level design felt convoluted and exaughsting because of the lack of mobility to move around the environment? Like if you could jump and move around more freely it'd be less of a chore?" I can definitely buy that as a core problem. It wasn't really a bother to me in previous levels because of the perks I stated before in regards to the base games overshadowing the gripes, but with the issues I stated before, it definitely added to the overall issue for me with the DLCs. The other one being the enemy placement. I can cite the mission leading up to the Nue in particular being an absolute nightmare because of the expansion and the overwhelming enemy placement. I was not having a fun time until the boss. And this would be a repeated issue for me in other levels, too. "But with bosses that is purely subjective on my part, I personally find it kind of lazy even if the boss fight is decent. The Toad and Nue were both pretty good fights, better than some of the base game bosses but overall with a new location I much prefer a new boss." That's fair. I can admit I'm wired different with these things, since once I'm finished with a boss battle, part of me just wants to face them again. Unless they're Gyuki or Umi-Bozu. And I also just really enjoyed the majority of bosses I faced in both games. On the bright side for Nioh 2, at least, we no longer have to run across a boss fight just to pick up your guardian spirit after each loss. That was just awful in the first game, and is kinda part of why I wouldn't mind refacing them in Nioh 2. "..." Honestly, same. Despite my gripes, I really did have a fun time with each DLC by the end of it. Especially the second one for not only the callbacks to the Ninja Gaiden series, but also the neat, though bittersweet tie-in to the base Nioh 2 game that I really wasn't expecting. I love these kind of discussions too, and I'm always open for discussing something I love.

Yeah I get the enemy placement critism, it's actually quite surprising how little people notice how enemy placement can change how a level feels. I find that one of Dark souls 2 biggest problems compared to 1, they just scattered enemies everywhere. I wonder if I had come into the first ans secomd DLC a bit over leveled because I didn't struggle with any of missions until the third DLC, besides from the occasional death on a boss. Fighting bosses is such a difficult thing to balance in games like this because I feel like half the community like the whole package, traversing the level, fighting fodder enemies then arriving at the boss. And the other half really enjoys the sense of fighting bosses, kinda like they want a boss rush mode, which it sounds like that's the category you fall under. While I'm in the first category and that's where my "re-use of old bosses" critism always come from. Overall those you're right, if we didn't love Nioh or if Nioh didn't have enough content and quality we wouldn't spend this much time critiquing the games.

​@@ryanphillips7863 I consider myself a fan of a balance of both, but with a lean towards that latter category, as you noted, and a heavier lean when it's the second time around on a mission. Like part of me likes that exploring when it's not TOO overboard. I think the best way I can put it is that Nioh and Nioh 2's levels work best for me because of the mechanics and shorter paths, while something like, say, Horizon Zero Dawn can absolutely grab me more on the open world exploring because it promoted just absolutely running wild with all the tools at your disposal. And that's one game in particular where beyond just robot dinosaur variation Rex or Dactyl, I don't remember any of the bosses that clearly, if there even really was any. I just remember having fun being free and exploring new diverse areas with a character as new to it as me.

The guy who made this video doesn’t even know about Ninja Gaiden, he thinks it’s just taking after souls games.

Thanks man I apprieacte it! That's the #1 upside to reusing old bosses, new players get to experience them.

Right! The DLC for Nioh 2 is easily my favourite content in the franchise

@@ryanphillips7863 Same. As a Japanese folklorist if they were their own games my mind would've exploded.

they are, its called nioh 1

Thanks mate! That means a lot. I feel like my videos have certainly come a long way since I put out this one so I you enjoy my newer ones as well

Cheers for that I really appreciate it! The DLC is well worth it and I don't think you'll be disappointed.

Thank you for all the nice words. Yeah I graduated a couple years ago and I have a bunch of free time on my hands so I decided to finally create content. Nioh is quite hard to dislike or think little of because of how great the core combat design is but I think it's smart to critique its weaker points so they can improve in the future. And that's what this DLC did, it absolutely blew me away with the level design/bosses. Thanks again for the sub and your support!

Almost 2 thousand subscribers today. 👍

Thanks for watching mate! I'm glad I could help with your decision, are you enjoying the DLC so far?

@Ryan Phillips Yes, very much. Even though I can't say I enjoy the extra grind elements, that new "star effect" on equipment is a terrible design IMO. But the overall experience has been great.

That is true but if a game makes you actively think about that, then something went wrong in their design. A large portion of Darks Souls is destroyed castles but I could pick every single one out from one another because they're so much more memorable. And this is what the DLC of Nioh 2 got right, distinct locations that stand out from one another.

@@ryanphillips7863 what I got from this video is you want nioh to be more like dark souls when they are largely different games. I personally find dark souls level design tedious and would argue a good 40% of the games environments are contenders for worst levels of all time. There are also different design goals, yea nioh has more linear levels but it also has a playable framerate and fast loading. Nioh is 100% gameplay driven and everything is built around that.

@@sexymajesco While i disagree with you on Dark Souls I completely acknowledge that I WANT Nioh to be more like Dark souls than it is. Nioh is gameplay driven and has all the focus on that, and I really like the gameplay, quite a lot actually. But everything seems to suffer under that, most egregiously is the level design and mission structure. Perhaps it's the expectations I have of Nioh and the general buzz around this franchise and the "souls-like" label that was instantly thrown onto it. Regardless though, this has too many similarities and Dark souls influences to not be compared to. From what I've gathered from my short time on KZfaq and many angry comments about my opinion of Nioh (Not saying yours is angry, this is a good conversation) is that people either love Dark Souls or Nioh but very rarely both.

@@ryanphillips7863 fair enough, my memories of dark souls are slow poison swamp or sewer. I can see why people call nioh a dark souls clone but this is weird to me because it implies that souls is unique or the first of its kind. I would compare nioh to diablo more then souls, while yes it has third person dodge heavy combat i feel its pulling from the work they did on ninja gaiden.

​Ryan Phillips yeaahhh nioh fans HATE dark souls for some reason and get super butt hurt when ppl compare them. I love both so idk why they are like that

Amazing to hear!! Welcome!

haha Yeah Nioh can be like that sometimes but it's well worth the struggle. Thanks for watching!

@@ryanphillips7863 don’t mention it man. I subbed and I’m glad to see you have different quality content also . Keep churning them out man, you’re ACG levels of good 👍🏻

@@Idkwhtpsipto Wow that's a huge compliment and I really appreciate it. I think I've made some really good progress in terms of quality over the last few months and I'm still learning a bunch of new things on every review. Thanks for watching and supporting my content!

Interesting, I have to admit that I never really looked at this DLC from that point of view. I'm someone who loves the souls-borne series and loves complex level design, especially in games like this. So when the DLC was the closest to that design that Nioh had ever gotten I was extatic, but I see how someone who was happy with the base games level design would be put off or annoyed by the maze like areas.

Thanks mate!

I completely understand your reasoning with how you approach Nioh. I wish I could go back to when I first played Nioh and strip away all my preconceived notions and expectations because the more I play overtime the more I realise I should be viewing this much more as a looter/action game rather than a souls-like. If the internet discourse around this franchise from the beginning was more centered around comparing it to Diablo or games of that nature I think I would feel a lot different towards each game. Nevertheless I still think Nioh 2 is a great game that has a ton of amazing features and reasons to play it. The DLC being so fantastic just adds to that as well. Perhaps when Nioh 3 comes out I'll go in with comepletely different expections or I'll replay Nioh 2 in a few years and have a very different outlook on it. Thanks for the comment by the way, I really appreciate it!

I've been playing Nioh 2 for the past week and to me, it kinda feels like a more Soulslike loot-based Monster Hunter.

Thanks mate!

Thanks mate I really appreciate it!

I hope you enjoy it mate!

That's great man, I hope you enjoy it!

Oh for sure, I haven't covered any of the souls-borne games yet as I don't think my writing could do those games justice yet. A real personal thing I know. But I really do want to cover all those games and like you said a long critique of all of them could be really fun. Thanks for commenting and watching by the way, it's awesome to see and I always appreciate it :)

Exactly, that's one of my biggest issues with Nioh and why I dislike the mission based structure. Since there isn't enough resources and dev time put into map design and creation you are stuck with side missions reusing areas but lazily flipping the map and putting arbitrary blockades in place. If the world was interconnected with quests as the now side missions I think it would all flow so nicely. Nevertheless the DLC is the best level design in both Nioh 1 and 2. Let's hope Nioh 3 learns from this.

Honestly I whole heartedly agree with you. No games needs to be 80 hours to complete. Nioh could have been 40 hours and the experience would be better for it

Thank you so much man, I really appreciate it!

I can't quite tell if this comment is meant to be positive or negative. But all I can say regarding the restricting of the outcome is; Isn't Sekiro set in the same time period? Because it's bosses are far far better and it's world/level design is leagues ahead of Nioh.

@@ryanphillips7863 I mean like, that doesn’t really say much. Most enemies in Sekiro are just humans, monkeys, or undead people, and one dragon. All with a similar parry until they are open style. And at that, Nioh has far more varied enemies objectively usually without annoying gimmicks (except those crabs) which is something that is quite impressive since they still had to make the context and areas based on real places mostly. Sekiro takes place in a fictional province. The level design in Sekiro isn’t perfect either, while yeah it’s still quite a bit better than Nioh, it still isn’t that special. And has some annoying mud pits and stuff like that just to slow you down. And lastly, the combat in Nioh 2 just really is leagues ahead of Sekiro or Bloodborne I’d say. Not repetitive and annoying like the latter two often were.

@@Aiden-Ed Wow that is a unique hot take on Sekiro but I respect it. I disagree with almost everything you just said expect I do agree the combat system is better in Nioh but only on the players side. See when fighting regular enemies I could see how someone could easily say Nioh is more fun as it has way more divseity and player freedom. But when you compare the boss fights with Sekiro I feel they get so much more range out of its combat system, like those boss fights push the combat system to its breaking point through their complex move sets. I also find the level design basically flawless in Sekiro, it's not as maze like like I prefer but that just comes down to the fact you can jump and grapple almost anywhere. Interesting opinion you have on Sekiro but I can understand why you think it gets repetitive.

@@ryanphillips7863 ohh yeah I get what you mean. Each boss in Sekiro did feel like they pushed the combat to its limits, and I do really wish that there were more bosses like that in Nioh. All I can say in Nioh that do that are the Minamoto pair, in the dlc. I’m happy to reached back though, I do think your video does have a lot of nice stuff mentioned. There are a lot of areas that mesh together and have the occasional differences. But I do personally think Nioh 2 stepped it up from Nioh 1 for sure, and yeah Nioh 2 dlc is just amazing. Maybe with Nioh having such a deep combat system then it would’ve been a better idea to make unique levels instead of retreading assets and levels already, didn’t mean to sound rude earlier btw. Both have their flaws and good reasons for people to have different thoughts, I love both games a lot despite how much I talk about bad aspects.

​@@Aiden-Ed I don't think you were being rude earlier, just expressing your opinion which I enjoy! I really like having conversations about the games instead of just trying to convince someone they shouldn't like something I dislike. But I also cannot deny the fact of expectations vs reality, I love the souls-borne games and Sekiro might be my favourite. So I always want Nioh to try and match Froms style but that's not what Nioh is going for. They definitely put a lot more emphasis on their combat system, which I love but it does unfortunately force the other elements to fall by the way side a bit. I suppose what I prefer is the enemies/bosses getting every little bit out of the combat system much like God of War 2018 or Hollow Knight. Where as I feel like Nioh could push so much further with those elemets.

Thanks mate!

I definitely want to as well. Along with Bloodborne and the rest of the souls series. FromSoft is my favourite developer and they've inspired me a lot when it comes to game criticism and gaming as a whole really.

Nioh 2 better then all from software game ? Interesting i played nioh 2 and the only good thing about the game is the combat everything else is average at best

I've heard a lot of people mention that over the years. Unfortantly I was wayyy to young to play Onimusha when it came out

Yeah I seem to have gotten a lot of messages questioning my review of Nioh 2. I guess not many reviews have criticised this franchise

@@ryanphillips7863 hi. true, if you think about it most reviews are done with very little critical thinking and are instead lists of contents.

@@goncaloferreira6429 You're not wrong, it can be quite hard to find deep dive reviews without going into a full spoiler filled critique of a game

Eventually I'm pretty sure there will be but it won't be for many many years since Ninja is currently working on Strangers of Paradise.

That boss was done pretty well, I think it took me 2 or 3 attempts to beat him. But I did use his soul core throughout most of NG+. I'm glad you enjoyed it!

@@ryanphillips7863 I really think the story could use some work, Imagine for the last dlc rather than being on Suzuka’s perspective towards her brother, we’re given the chance to experience what’s going on in Otakemaru’s head & seeing he did nothing wrong by killing those bandits in order to protect the people of his village thus leading towards the villagers fearing him. Giving him character & depth on why he turned evil rather than just telling us that he killed those bandits making him a feared man

@@tengkuhafiz4174 very true mate. There's so much that could be done with the story of Nioh. It's why I feel like it's a big let down that they try to follow history closely while adding in supernatural aspects. I would prefer them to go full fiction and create some interesting and compelling characters.

@@ryanphillips7863 amen to that, it’s sad that this is going to be our last Nioh in a very long time. It’s not the games fault, for me personally it came out during the peak of Monster Hunter World Iceborne & there’s no competition with a game series like that

@@tengkuhafiz4174 Yeah I saw that but from the article I wrote the lead designer/director, not sure who it was exactly, said they were happy with where the story finished off and the franchise as a whole. I think Nioh was actually really successful for them and pushed their studio into the mainstream just a little more

Thanks Man!

story,cheap difficutly/ambushes/grab atacks,insanely agresive enemies where you are glad you have 1 sec to sip your elixir/same 5 locations over and over,insane button layout probably made for octopus,overly complicated skill trees which adding very little. 1000000 stats from 100000 items.

@@critical-thinker666 Bitching bitching complaining more complaining. Seriously though nioh 2 isn’t hard.

I definitely agree, this pass offers great value to content ratio. With added weapons, enemies, bosses, locations and base game changes makes it an easy recommendation. Im Not to sure if Nioh 3 is going to get made based on what the developers have said but their next title is in development, Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy origin. I have an impressions video on my channel if you're interested

That's chill man if you're not into the structure of this review. I like my introductions to encompass what my final thoughts of a title are. For example, I value world design and bosses most in souls like, and this DLC finally serves up a good offering, something that Nioh as a franchise has yet to do. But if it's too slow for your liking that's totally fine

100% I consistently found it the most satisfying weapon to use

You honestly hit the nail on its head. I don't want to sound like a dick with my next statement but I honestly do not care for the historical aspects of the Nioh franchise or anything that takes historical accuracy and modifies it to fantasy, especially when it hurts the level design and visuals of a specific area. I will always prefer Sekiro's visual design becuase they had more creative freedom by not following history at all and creating a pure fantasy world. But hey everyone has their own opinions and preferences, perhaps if I was well-versed in Japanese history I would be a little bit more charitable with my opinion but at the same time I would like to think something like that wouldn't blind me to the issues here. Thanks for being level headed though and still being able to enjoy the video, too often people will instantly dislike and leave a comment as soon as they disagree.

Honestly It's a bit ridiculous. And if you played Nioh 1, where they reused a lot of content as well, and then came to Nioh 2 where they did the same thing but also took a bunch of content from the first game makes it a bit absurd. I'm really worried about Stranger of Paradise (their next title), it seems to be taking all of Niohs problems and running with them

That's fair. I always wanted Nioh to be more like Dark Souls but ultimately it was missing many of things I love about Dark Souls. Then the DLC came out and was the closest piece of Nioh content that was like Dark Souls and that's why I loved it. If you didn't want it to be like Dark Souls or liked the boring, uninspired and corridor filled levels then I can completely see how you would dislike this. All personal preference really.

I actually thought this review was quite positive, what do you think was so negative about it? And I don't hate Nioh 2, I just think it has a lot of flaws and easy areas to criticise, especially considering the glowing reviews all over KZfaq.

@@ryanphillips7863 you spent the whole review bashing the base game. Yes, you were positive with the DLC, but it doesn’t make sense to take advice from someone who didn’t even like the base game.

@@LeeoGoneWild But I did like the base game, just because you criticise something doesn't mean you dislike it. But if you love the base game and don't have any issues with it shouldn't my positive review show you the quality of the dlc?

@@ryanphillips7863 no, your constant negativity towards the base game, which I thoroughly enjoyed made the positive aspects of the DLC fall mute. The whole time I was questioning why someone who clearly hated the base game would even give reviews on the DLC and if I should take advice from someone that has such extreme contradictions. Based on this review, you also did not like NIOH1, so I thought you making a review was completely pointless.

@@ryanphillips7863 oh and to speak on you liking the base game, there was absolutely no hint in this review that you liked it. I’ve never watched your videos before and I just started the season pass, so coming from someone that has no ties to you and only based off this video, it’s clear you hated both games and ONLY enjoyed the DLC, that doesn’t help me at all.