Describing games as “X meets Y” is often considered a little gauche. At its worst, it’s a lazy and reductive habit – and one that can result in some truly awful headlines, in which two popular games with tenuous connections to the one actually being written about are unceremoniously smashed together.
However, some games are so clearly built from bits of other games shoved together that it’s impossible not to think of them in those terms. Again, at its worst, that can result in a hack job – lots of barely-understood elements clumsily magpied from games that used them with more intention. Rise of the Ronin is one of the exceptions. While I spent my few hours with it reminded of other games, it was with a smile on my face. It’s a remix, not a rip-off.
Rise of the Ronin is built on the foundations of Team Ninja’s recent pseudo-historical action RPGs, Nioh and Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty. The (superb) character creator is near-enough identical and the combat riffs on the same themes, with a focus on using parries to break an enemy’s stance so that a critical blow can be delivered. Blocking and dodging can get you through the vast majority of fights, but a well-timed counterspark, to use the game’s specific lingo, can see you make mincemeat of enemy health bars. It’s tricky, but there are an array of difficulty settings and accessibility options to make the game more approachable. There is still some Soulslike DNA there, but no more than most action games these days.
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