NIOH 2 Review [Rurikhan] 

Hide + Yoshi. Your character basically like Venom Snake in MGSV. Taking a journey together & make a name for yourself & Tokichiro. In any case, NioH games actually have great story, a proper mix of fantasy + IRL Japan history. I think there will be more to come with the expansions DLCs for this game. the codex/world information definitely help a lot for people that really wanna go deep into the historical aspects. I mean you basically low key learning Japanese history in Sengoku era. historical nerds out there definitely gonna love it.

My biggest criticism is making me rebuy arrows and bullets at the shrine every time instead of just taking them out of my storehouse.

I personally loved the side quests in the game, they're a great change of pace and feel different because sometimes they take place in maps from Nioh 1 and 2 but mostly because they reuse levels in a very different way pretty much every time you go there. From traversing the map backwards to having just few sections of the map to explore they also have different environmental effects like rain, snow or sometimes the city is on fire, this kind of stuff. I really wish Monster Hunter did the environmental stuff to spice things up a bit in the side quests. The duels are where the combat really shines IMO... As for the Nioh 1.5 argument... Well if you like Ruri chances are you like Monster Hunter and if you like Monster Hunter you know that Monster Hunter 1, 2, 3, 4 and Generations (their Ultimate versions) aren't the same game even thought they have similar graphics, same weapons, same moves (although it adds every iteration), same monsters and sometimes same areas.

People who say this should be DLC for Nioh, are the same people who gladly pay for and play every Dark Souls/Elden Ring, and praise it to all heavens. Nioh 2 to Nioh is what Dark Souls 3 is to Demon's Souls when it comes to gameplay.

I enjoyed watching your play through on Twitch. I am enjoying the game as well. Keep up the hard work and thank you again for the content you create.

I just finished Doom Eternal and now im ready to put down the shotgun and pick up a samurai sword. Nioh 2 here I come 👍.

I really disagree with weapon balancing "issue" as it's really balanced, you can't really compare the hatches to an Axe when the Axe is a heavy weapon that's suppose to do big damage to hatches where they are equally as good and are stylish and is based on the skill stat, sure there are really strong active skills (looking at you Moonlit Snow from the Odachi that just destroys a bosses health bar but takes while to do and you need almost full Ki to do) All weapons are unique and balanced in there own way. Also do all of the side missions as you're gonna need those guardian spirits and goodies.

Yours is the only highly detailed review I've seen! Great work loved the whole thing

Pro Tips: Ignore side missions at your own peril, level when possible, NEVER face more than one foe if you can help it, master a weapon and learn easy ways to knock down human opponents/bosses for ground finishers i.e. breaking stamina... Only things that annoy are 1. The lack of impact your character has on the story/has no branching options. 2. How your character has no motivation at all, and 3. If you played Samurai Warriors you’re right at home, others are like *wHo Is tHaT GuY?*

Love this game ! Great review . My only gripe is that there isn’t a ng++ and so on .... yet . Other than that ... loads of loot and an ARPG is all I need ! Thanks for your hard work Rurikhan.

HDR is a new Visual feature for Nioh 2, and I must say after playing on a shiny HDR screen at PAX it looks very, very nice. On a standard display it looks more or less just like Nioh 1. The levels with music hype you up because in Nioh 2 the music is dynamic. It ramps up whenever you are low on health, facing a tough enemy, make it to certain parts of the level or of course during boss fights. It's extremely well done.

As someone who's currently playing through both Nioh 1 and 2, I can say honestly that 2 is just a MUCH better game, and the evolution in both GAMEPLAY and GRAPHICS is HUGE!

Love the chain weapon. Some of the yokai ablities are finicky when attacking on an unlevel surface but I love this game so far

I was waiting for this one!

Great review but I strongly disagree with one aspect of it. You said you would uncover side missions and then do them all before tackling the main quest but that you wouldn't recommend that play style for people on their first play through because it can distract from the story. The thing is though people running through the game for the first time and especially people new to the series absolutely need to be doing all side missions and before the main missions because those side missions allow you to level up before taking on the hard bosses.

I was watching your playthrough Live on Twitch and I can say the weapons are fairly well balanced. Like with in original Nioh once you understand and can apply the games more in-depth mechanics the performance difference between the weapons is pretty small. However where the difference lies is in the initial ease of use of a weapon and how forgiving some of them are to players who arent diving fully into the combat mechanics. Same thing happened to Tonfas in Nioh 1 where everyone thought they were the most garbage thing in the world till people actually figured out what to do with them and embraced the inner workings of the game's combat. I personally shredded through everything in my first playthrough using the new Hatchet and Switchglaive weapons. Which were fun additions to the game.

One of my all time favourites. Never played the original one, so maybe bcs of this I never really had any problem with reused content.

One thing that I noticed (and probably the only way Nioh 2 is worse than the original) is that there are a lot of minor text bugs. For instance the character directory that Ruri mentioned tends to update a few missions late (this is pretty persistent throughout the game) and there are two missions that display the same ending text.

Yeah honestly, I agree with the coherence issues regarding character names. I'm not Japanese and only have surface level knowledge on Japanese History. Up until the last few chapters I had no idea who anyone but Nobunaga, Dosan, Tokichiro, Hide and a few bosses were. After getting to the "Shadow" chapter I started to get a better grip on the story

Some side missions also give story details or guardian spirits.

Saving kodama dude is the best part😎

The game is amazing really, but there are somethings that I really don't like one is the loot system I hate how much time I take everytime to manage my inventory, I just do like that each equipment has a million version with a different ability and rarity, second and last one is the story is terrible I don't understand what the hell is going on it's not my story it appears to be happening somewhere else and my character is just dragged through it I really don't understand any of the events that happened in the story, like for example lady Oichi (not sure of the spelling) she is Nobunaga sister we see her at one point with Nobunaga and then there is a sub mission to take her to get married to some guy for political reasons and suddenly the person she is married to becomes evil but the after several mission she is married the other guy the one with the boar spirit and all this happens off camera somewhere else and this keeps happening to every character in the story one time they are fighting with you then they are fighting against you then you kill then you find out the person you just killed was your long lost brother it's confusing as hell, I'm just enjoying the gameplay and living out my Demon slayer fantasy :/

The dojo missions: couple chip hits>run around and bait out a combo>couple chip hits Rinse and repeat. Yes you can parry but most of the game is against yokai and your skill points could be better spent on stuff other than parries

Yokai Shift really could have used some work to make it feel better. The current implementation just feels like an emergency health bar...

The reason axe was a lot better was because that thing destroys ki, only takes a few well placed hits to make an opening. Hell the guzuki and mezuki fight, I was able to stagger them as soon as they got the stamina back. Only effective ki breaking move the duel hatchets have(that I've noticed) is the demon undercut. Fighting in low stance is okay, but dmg sucks compared to pretty much any weapon. I would say the weapons that make the game easy are Duel blades(my weapon of choice), Axe, and kuzarigama(shits on ki like the axe). These 3 weapons have amazing ki destroying moves.

A tip for farming in case you already are getting "tea items". Go to your hut and dispose them in a way that gives you the most luck possible, you can get crazy luck stats with some of thous tea things

Played nioh 1 for about half way. Didn’t finish it because I couldn’t stand the MC, but I’m loving nioh 2

100% farming sucks but they are listening the latest patch increases drop rates. This games gameplay is awsome but the grind and repetition for that one drop spoils it. I hope this patch improves it greatly

From watching you play, It was definitely a "good game", but I would not enjoy playing it. I get frustrated too easily from how easily I can die, even though the death does not seem to have serious negatives associated with it. I also wouldn't like the obvious lack of weapon balance, even MHW started to get mundane because of the lack of balance, and mechanics.

Personally I just enjoy going through missions by recommended level. I think it follows the story that way, but I do get caught up on them for awhile longer than main missions.

Love the combat i'm running tonfas + ninjitsu (Focussed on shuriken and kunai spam) but can't wait to try more builds.

Good review, thanks. We seem to have similar taste, and I'm considering playing this one until MHR Sunbreak

6:40 i see the "moonwalking" from Nioh(1) when sneaking up is still a thing 😁

ii havent watched your entire playthrough yet so im not sure if this changes. The way ive seen you use yokai form is not doing it justice. The loop they want the player to do is - build anima, use yokai skills to build the amrita gauge, Activate yokai form (bonus while done in dark/yokai realm,) hit the enemy to disperse amrita in the air. Once the amrita is in the air you can choose to either absorb it into your weapon with a charged Triangle attack or extend yokai shift by directly absorbing it with R1+R2. While in yokai shift you will also notice that yokai abilities drain your yokai shift form very little and your anima charge rate is very high.

I'm actually kinda disappointed the side missions aren't as cheesy as Nioh 1. The gauntlets were way tougher. I specifically remember those bridge gauntlets, the duel with the axe revenant with 1,000,000 hp and we even had a couple boss gank missions in tachibana/honda and yuki/nobunaga.

If I killed bosses in only 20 tries, I would consider myself a good player.

It's not necessarily a prequel actually, it does start before nioh 1 but ends after the last dlc.

I would like to see a yoki form buff. It doesn’t have to be op, but it also shouldn’t take 20 hits for me to drop a basic yoki with it.

You thought the dojo axe fight was bad? Try fighting Hattori Hanzo for the last ninjitsu training mission... really try that one... never has a game pushed me into the brink of madness like that fight did...

I honestly enjoyed it. I do feel like it was more like Nioh 1.5, but it was still enjoyable. Frustrating at times, but enjoyable.

18:50 I'm fairly certain that's not true. I've died in a few of those missions before and I just waltz past the areas where I've completed waves. Also, you're going to get your arse handed to you a lot worse if you're skipping side missions. While its annoying, it makes sense to me that the hatchets are weak since they boast the ability to do heavy damage from medium range, whereas the axe is just a powerhouse of a weapon that takes a heavy toll on ki.

Aww you didn't cover the co-op which is one of the biggest deal sealer for me. It's almost kinna like mhw minus the ally flinching. Also the other 2 burst counter didn't have a dodge build into it only feral, the phantom is a block which you could end up exhausting if done badly just saying. Otherwise love the review!!!

I think the axes like the kursigama. You need to level up the multiple skill bonuses. I had to have high skill and DeX before it was useful. Maybe get a 50 strength and 50 skill and hatchets might be able break ki and stagger better for yah

totally agree with losing the thread when doing all the side missions. I loved every minute of my playthrough,but sometimes you get a boatload of sidemissions after clearing a main mission. It also doesn't help that you actually get the same stage multiple times in those side missions, so may play the same layout three times in short succession if you do it all. These all are minor complaints though and as a whole Nioh 2 is the most fun i have had with a game probably since monster hunter world.

Glad to see you switched to heavier armor later on. As for the hatchets honestly unless you throw them they just feel like worse tonfas even in endgame. Although the R1+O hatchets get is great for farming main missions if you dont have tiger running.

Check out the Glamurai reddit for tons of character costumizations and requests

Don't worry about farming the masters, they will certainly give us the mission in which we chain fight every master....

good review

Not enough game for me. Didn't take me very long to plat, and shortly after I had completed all the missions in NG+ as well and I have made 3 builds (kunai, anima, and bare-handed). I wish there were more difficulty modes than just the 2. Dream of the Strong was way too easy, and I'm not saying that to boast or whatever, it just is (assuming you have a functional proper build). I realize it's just as big as the first game was at launch, but back then it took most people a hell of a lot longer to finish because it was entirely new. Many people had built up enough experience in the first game to fly through this one. Outside from just helping random strangers there just isn't anything left for me to do in this game which kinda sucks.

I understand changing from living weapon because some of the builds that were found were super op even after patch nerfs. But what they should've done was make Yokai shift attack damage alot higher if they didn't want the duration of shift to last long.

I would highly suggest writing your reviews specially with a game that has so much going on like nioh does. You missed so many things and some you slightly mention them at through out the review expecting people who have not played the nioh 2 or the first one at that to know what you are talking about.

Who the fuck said it could be a dlc? The game is literally twice as big as the first game.

i didnt do any side missions and was only 10 levels under leveled, completed story

How is the coop in this game? I was trash solo at the first game but I had a blast playing it in coop. I’m considering getting the game specifically for coop.

The game is fun. Even a hand cripple like me can enjoy it but i die a lot of times. Still in region 2 , i have died more then 200 X lol.

great video

yooo are you fucking kidding me im in the 4th-5th reigon and I'm just now knowing about English voices........

IMO this game is a step back from Nioh 1 in terms of balace and mechanics. They just took what made Nioh 1 good and added more stuff to it in such a manner that creates just a lot of chaos and "noise". Is a game complex and hard just for the sake of it. I played Nioh 1 more then 500 hours and haven't enjoyed a single hour in this game...

Is this one finished, the dlc was really undercooked for the original

goty 2020

I love review videos but man, 30mins is pushing it, maybe somewhere between 10-15mins would be better if you clean up the script

Builds? I might have missed something. Sorry, I cannot see any builds in the fucking sea of loot bukkakes that I have gotten. Never even finished Nioh1 :V Looter games are just not my thing...

PS4 exclusive :(

I honestly was very frustrated with Nioh 2. The start was especially difficult. Unlike Nioh 1 where they actually eased you in. Dark Realm, Yokai Abilities and Bosses feel undercooked to be honest. Most of the time when facing the boss you wait wait wait dodge run attack two time and then dodge back.... then we can spam Yokai Abilities to make it easier... it's just tedious and quite frankly unrewarding. Never felt like Oh yeah I beat that boss it was so cool... nope not a single time. Most of the time it was a waiting game. Now that is a bad game design. I like to be on offensive more rather than spam Yokai Abilities / Onmyo / Ninjustsu... if you simply use your weapon without anything then it gets significantly more boring. Bosses with two shot you and a lot of their attacks have almost 0 charge time. Dark Realm makes you feel like an old man.... Plus EVEN NORMAL ENEMIES have GRAPPLE ATTACKS with red lines that CANNOT BE parried! Just have to dodge them. I wouldn't recommend Nioh 2 to anyone. Nioh 1 was good but Nioh 2 is just average.

PSSSS i alredy have the platinum easy recommendation.

Great game but the worst bosses ever made. I swear Team Ninja has gotten worst at balancing bosses overtime which is actually really impressive considering how BS Ninja Gaiden bosses were.

I hear, "Coming at you with another video" so much now that I just stop watching any channel that uses it.

nah, disagree, it a nioh dlc, i spent 3000 hrs on nioh n feckin loved it, ive finished many runthrough and builds on nioh 2, even platinumed the game, 100 hrs, now its boring. i so wanted to love it, but, cant. all i can hope is dlcs round it out well. very very dissapointed

Game sucks compared to the first Nioh.

visuals are weak