Review Introduction
Last year Team NINJA's Rise of the Ronin was released as a PlayStation 5 timed-exclusive by Koei Tecmo & Sony with trusted sources saying Team NINJA's first fully open-world game never would have happened if it wasn't for Sony, but the time period in which it came out has finally exceeded the contract deal making this stunning release possible on PC for Steam. When you look at both versions of the game side by side it's quite apparent that the range and scale of this game on PC goes above and beyond the original PS5 version if you have the machine to run it.
While I've glossed over some of the PC reviews on Metacritic (which started off stronger than the PS5 version) I can't help but notice that people are writing Rise of the Ronin reviews as they would a minimum graphics report, and at Free Step Dodge, we're going to review the game on good hardware that is certainly more powerful than PS5 by a landslide and we're going to talk about elements of the game and we're going to talk about gameplay; not just the visual flair.
Storyline & Cinematics
Rise of the Ronin is the most detailed storyline ever composed for a single game at Team NINJA studios. Over the years Team NINJA told an incredible storyline for NINJA Gaiden & Dead or Alive while bridging universes, but this piece here is not only rich in the historical aspects that we've become accustomed to, but we can also craft relationships with these eccentric and mysterious characters we meet and there is a payoff and reward for paying attention to them. I really like the dialogue within RotR and it's an immense improvement over what we saw from Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty, another fantastic Team NINJA title, but I think we can all agree that the voice acting was a tad exaggerated and a little overly optimistic.
With RotR we finally have a fully-fledged storyline in one title, and it would almost be an abomination to give this game a sequel as this feels like a truly complete game at launch with no need for extra DLC and no need for a redundant continuation. Rise of the Ronin takes place in the 1800s and is set in the final days of the Edo period displaying the Ronin's disdain for Western domination with the rise of machines, intense pollution and mass distribution of powerful weapons. Truly one of the most interesting time periods in our existence.
You could see this storyline as a blend of Tom Cruise's epic The Last Samurai with the powerful narrative viewpoint of Red Dead Redemption 2. You begin your narrative with your blade-twin and create two characters instead of the traditional single character that we've come to expect from both Nioh 1-2 & Wo Long Fallen Dynasty. Though this game is running on the Katana engine and gives us the same character creation tool which hasn't been a problem and has constantly been praised by the players of these games.
These two blade-twins are a trained pair of assassins, and their latest mission is to board a black ship and assassinate Commodore Matthew Perry to retrieve military secrets. Most of their plan is thwarted by the 'Blue Demon' an assassin far more powerful than both twins combined and the two are separated. Your main blood-twin believes that his brother or sister is still out there and alive after an attack is placed on their village. This is where the player's adventure begins.
Some games only treat you to proper cinema at the beginning and endgame with something thrown in the middle to say a narrative has been composed, but the storyline presented here is more comparable to Mass Effect where you are constantly meeting new people and questioning them on their merit deciding whether or not they are worth your time. Now while the writing may not be as powerful as ME2, for this type of game it comes close and it's much better than what we have seen Team NINJA do before with character development.
You can actually format your character to be better in the art of deception through the skill tree and that should insinuate that there will be plenty of good dialogue with layers which would allow you to do that. RotR doesn't bombard you with choices to make that all come to the same conclusion, and this is what I like most about the storyline. There are plenty of characters to talk to and build relationships with, and they will fight alongside you as well. You can also romance characters which gives this game more conversational variety than ever seen before in a Team NINJA game.
RotR is a game that wants the player to explore a vast world while discovering mysteries, while observing the struggle of creating an industrialized society, and the team succeeds at making a powerful and captivating narrative that lasts throughout the entirety of the gameplay experience.
Graphical Capabilities
Now I've heard a lot of different things about the presentation of Rise of the Ronin's graphics, and while the difference of visual flair from PC to PS5 is obvious - RotR was never a "bad" looking game to begin with. The open-world scale is captivating at times to see that Team NINJA has finally done something like this. While the game is embellished with historical landmarks, idealism and characters Team NINJA has managed to also include all of their signatures impeccably well.
There is a level of grit to the look of this title through the smokey pollution of ships and industrialization the player will see visually that humanity had a long way to go to destroy the isolated beauty of nature. The vegetation rustles through the wind and makes the thick plants, grass and trees feel alive. Your character will traverse by swimming, horse, a glider and on foot so you will be engaged with many different environments, and they all look nicer on PC.
Not everything is perfect. The lighting doesn't bounce off the character skin as well as you might like and overall, when the lighting hits different environments the result is not always an attractive one and the lighting doesn't seem to cooperate in every way that it should. The raytracing adds to the illusion that it does, but the one founding weakness pertaining to visuals within RotR is definitely reflections and character/environment lighting.
The character models, while expressive do not match the quality of what was presented in Dynasty Warriors: Origins, but they still look relatively smooth and animate just fine. There is an odd adjustment phase to the look of the facial hair, but the expressions and body language of the characters work nicely in combat or in conversation. That being said the bosses don't have as many unique factors as seen in most Team NINJA games. They are typically kind of boring in appearance and there isn't anyone in this game that is as intimidating as Lu Bu.
While this isn't a specs review it should be mentioned that you will want to maintain the recommended specs for the graphical capabilities of RotR. Team NINJA has released an optimization update for the game, but it will still suffer from minor dips on Ultra for most builds. I recommend playing the game on High to start things off and if you feel like things are going smooth by the time you get to the first big city, update to Ultra and see how it works. I don't want anyone to fry their CPU so take it nicely and slow to reach optimal settings.
This game will make your PC scream for all the right reasons. You get a nice sense of scale, and the freedom and floaty feeling of gliding around the vistas is a delightful and relaxing experience in an otherwise stressful and challenging game. RotR encourages you to take a second to admire the environments before you embark on your next blood-soaked adventure. This is what Team NINJA does best visually with the game after all. The environments and animation are all top level. The PS5 version of the game needed some polish and this version here is the polish you were looking for.
Audio & Soundtrack Sample
Rise of the Ronin doesn't have the same amount of memorable audio tracks that Nioh & Wo Long have in totality, but this soundtrack is unique in its own right and it blends in with the atmosphere that you are currently involved with as a player and considering the world is ever evolving in RotR and spans different classes of people you're going to get a naturally varied symphony of sounds and that's a hard thing to knock out of the park and I think Team NINJA did a terrific job of blending these different people and walks of life using music.
We will take into account the separation of styles throughout the game and showcase two audio samples that highlight my claims:
With the audio provided here you feel like a bit of an alien or that feeling of isolation in the unclaimed wilderness. There is mystery to your surroundings as you explore through the forest or through tall fields of grass. Perhaps you come across a small village that has yet to feel the effects of the Westernization that these villagers hated and lived in fear to see. The old way is still secure here and their morals of today have been passed to future generations.
Then you leave those traditional avenues and venture off to find what you're looking for and you see the pollution of the Westerners as you try to enjoy the majesty of the ocean's depth. The pollution comes through from the ships alone and you can taste it in the now tainted air. This separation of identity is not only present with the visual flair, but the subtle soundtrack Team NINJA created for this game. Maybe my values and my morales don't mean anything at all to what the future of humanity will incorporate.
So, in this direction the soundtrack is absolutely perfect. The sound design is also incredible. Voice acting takes the forefront to other Team NINJA games, and the sound of swords clashing has always been a Team NINJA staple. I also like the sound of enemies in defeat. The grunting and the lopping and decapitations of limbs and heads it all comes through here from start to finish.
Replay Value
Team NINJA has definitely made a challenging game here, but in no way does it always have to be that way. You can glide around cities looking for stray cats if that pleases you, but for an open world game there is not an over cumbersome number of things that will destroy your mind and way of life. The team has managed to strike a balance with replay value so that the player has fun and progresses but isn't overwhelmed by ten million crappy side-quests.
Yes, there are some things to collect, places to explore and secrets that are fun to discover, but Team NINJA never makes things too out of reach. The sense of scale, and light exploration is something players should feel naturally. A lot of people are comparing this game to ONLY Ghosts of Tsushima but considering that the gameplay alone is ten times deeper than that game I find it to be a shallow point of inspiration. The overall structure feels more like a mixture of Ghosts, Farcry, Wo Long and Nioh.
There is a flag system similar to Wo Long's and each time you encounter one you now have another way to fast travel. They do a fantastic job of making sure you don't backtrack too often, and your eyes are always seeing something new. The side quests are scattered throughout in a way that strongly encourages stealth OR fierce combat much like how Farcry does it. That being said the gameplay is a lot more challenging than that of Assassin's Creed & Ghosts of Tsushima.
Gameplay & Mechanics
The heart of this Team NINJA experience is the gameplay and even though most enemies are kind of boring to look at - they will fight their hardest to desperately kill you. The tall vegetation comes in handy as prowling throughout this title is imperative for victory unless you are the most solidified warrior you will feel the enemy steel at some point. A stealth attack does not always mean that you will get a kill as stronger warriors have double to triple the HP of a normal soldier.
But you can also tell that stealth is a much bigger priority to Team NINJA in comparison to what was displayed with Nioh 1-2 & Wo Long. Enemies in these titles tended to have no sense of awareness to play with and succumbed to stealth with no challenge to the player. These titles were never really meant to be stealth games in the first place, but the option was there if you really wanted it. With RotR these NPCs are a lot more competent to their surroundings which in return makes the hiding and stealth mechanics a lot more fun and exciting for the player.
When you are in the heat of battle there are many various ways to kill your opponent. As you would expect from a Koei Tecmo published game, you are going to get a shit-ton of weapons to choose from. We're talking polearms, katanas, spears, odachi, sabers, rifles, bows, shuriken and plenty more. Not to mention the creative ways to kill such as your sword blazing fire after deflecting an enemy fire arrow or deflecting a shuriken right back to an attacking ninja's throat. Players looking for quirky mechanics that work are going to love what RotR has to offer.
The counter-spark is a new Team NINJA mechanic that feels similar to the parry of previous Team NINJA games, but it feels a little too different from what we are used to. First off, it doesn't feel as fluid at Wo Long's perfect parry so most players will opt out of the parry and choose the dodge instead. The reason it feels so different is because the counter-spark (contrary to the block parry) comes before the attack and Team NINJA players are used to chip reversals and right as the strike happens.
If you can master the counter-spark and deflect strikes during a sword fight, what you will see is a spectacle far more flashy than previous Team NINJA entries. The dancing with steel term is implied emphatically with this title and the look of combat is spot on. Team NINJA continues to take their combat mechanics to places few developers could ever hope to reach.
Keep in mind that certain weapons can be weak to other weapons with this title and while I don't think it was a necessary mechanic, it certainly adds to the thrill of certain boss fights and gives a reason for you to switch between your character and an assisting character. You can cover each other's combat basics, and this adds a layer of engagement so that you don't feel alone all the time in this fairly large world.
RotR's Skill Tree gives you a sense of security early on that you can really build your character up to your own liking and be decisive about what activities you want to pursue. For some players that might be world-exploration or crafting. I chose a balance of world-exploration, crafting and discussion prowess so that I could flesh out dialogue with other characters as quickly as possible.
I spent some of my early points on combat, but just to take care of the dirty basics. This game is good about making things even early on with the consideration of combat not being the only skill you would want to level up. I kept patient with my fights in the early going, but later on you will definitely need to make adjustments as enemies become stronger. Sometimes the flow of stealth and forced fights are contingent on where you are and also by how many powerful enemy characters are employed to a mission.
Missions feel like a more linear pathed experience added to take you away from being overstimulated by the open world. Other games in this genre intact on this method of variety and it's well done here. These missions are usually stuffed with powerful enemies that require battle and a boss that can take you an assisting character on at the same time. Completing missions is a satisfying experience for the player because it feels like a proper test of your skills. Manipulating enemies or avoiding them on the open world puts you into a bit of a power position and it feels riveting when it's taken away from you.
Photograph Section, Overall Summary & Star Rating is still being considered but the Written Review is Complete. Sorry for the delay I have been SWAMPED with projects.
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