Impressions on Ghost of Tsushima

First off, I will just get this off my chest. Why did they make this game an open world instead of semi-open world or linear game is beyond me. Nothing in this game warrants for it to be as big and as bloated as it is. Everything could have been condensed in to up to 15 hrs story-mission and a couple of hours side mission.

Secondly, the graphics, the atmosphere, even the optimization of the game is top notch. During Act I and for some time in Act II I was really impressed with them, and then that impression worn off. What was left was a: "Thank you devs for giving me the opportunity to fast travel from limitless icons on the map, and that you made fast travel loading times 1-2 s long at best. Lord praise thee".

Thirdly, while at first the combat and its stances seemed complex, but after a while (5-10 hours in), I've noticed that: "Wait... [hold block, enemy staggers, mash triangle, enemy is hit, rinse and repeat on everyone]". You don't even have to switch stances this way.

Fourthly, the missions, side-missions and side-activities. I began to dislike everything about them some time during Act II, because the formula of them just became too noticeable: talk with someone, walk/ride with someone, fight mongols, talk some more, follow tracks, fight mongols. Every mission revolved killing mongols, there was no variety to it (I mean, I get it, it's war, but... do you really need a bloated open-world game for this with everything the same throughout?). Side-activities... man, by the middle of Act II, I simply did the main mission and some side missions, if they were on the way to the marker, disregarding any fox dens, shrines and banners sprinkled throughout the map. And in Act III I only did story missions, because I got fed up to my neck with this game, and wanted it to end.

Fifthly, the monotony. You don't notice it for the first 10 hours, because everything is awesome: you unlock these cool moves, cool abilities to kill your enemies (you have with fighting styles dedicates for each type of enemy, various tools - throwing darts, smoke bombs, fire-crackers, bows etc. to dispatch an enemy quickly), even that stand-off mini-game wherein you have a chance to murder one or up to three enemies at a time, and it's so novel, and so new to you... and... then... after ten or maybe dozen hours, you notice that it is all you do in the game. Everything revolves around this. Even in random encounters you cannot go two hundred meters without encountering an enemy and starting a fight. Somewhere in Act II I dreaded these segments, because I just knew that they are additional 5 minutes of added bloat time.

Sixthly, travelling. Yeah, that guiding wind mechanic is unique-ish, I'll give you that. But no mini-map is also a problem, especially in Act I, where you run around like a headless chicken inside enemy camp to find banners and/or dynamite caches to explode, because they only show up, if you are standing in front of them. It felt like I've been running around enemy camps for ten minutes straight in Act I just because of lack of mini-map on the screen.

I'm sure that I've omitted a bunch of things that was on my mind, but these were the most forefront points. In short, somewhere behind all this bloat and tediousness, lies a good game.

6/10

I feel its a pretty good game. Definite 8/10 from me its still an ubisoft type open world game but its pretty fun playing as stealth ninja/ samurai hybrid. Something that many asked ubisoft since the first ass creed game.

Unfortunately this is an ongoing trend in the games industry. The false assumption that huge open world = great game. Most of the time it's not. It's actually detrimental to the overall experience. But it's easier to market and sell a new video game with the promise of an enormous world to explore and 50-100 hours playtime. Apparently the majority of gamers is impressed by that.

Now I haven't played Ghost of Tsushima but I see where you're coming from. I have to admit the game looked cool in the gameplay videos they showed. Beautiful world, interesting lore, challenging (?) combat. But the promotional videos usually don't tell you that you'll be wasting tens of hours grinding away on boring activities in between the cool parts.

I liked it, mainly the art style. I never did finish it. I played around 20hrs and got past the first castle. I moved onto other games, haven’t played it for 1.5 years and hardly remember it. I know I liked the art style though.

8/10.

I loved Infamous Second Son, so I also look favourably on Sucker Punch.