Ghost of Yōtei, the successor to 2020’s samurai action adventure Ghost of Tsushima, is an ambitious sequel. It takes everything the original did well and makes it better, with improved combat, more natural and vital side content, and a darker story. While there were some minor performance issues, they never detracted from the overall experience. Sucker Punch Productions crafts a confident and excellent follow-up that finally makes the PlayStation 5 feel truly next-generation.
Tales Of The Onryō
Ghost of Yōtei takes place 329 years after Ghost of Tsushima, switching both location and protagonist. Leaving behind the island of Tsushima, players follow Atsu to Ezo, a region in northern Japan that is now known as Hokkaido. Atsu is known as an onryō, a vengeful spirit or ghost out for revenge against the Yōtei Six and their leader Lord Saito, a group responsible for the murder of her family 16 years prior. Atsu hunts each member, hell-bent on avenging those she has lost. Ezo is embroiled in conflict, with the Saito at war with the Matsumae clan, seeking to thwart his plan to become Shogun in the North. The Edo period is a time when danger permeates throughout the land, with little order to stop the influx of bandits and mercenaries.
What follows is a dark story focused on violence, trauma, family, loss, and revenge – along with its cost. While Ghost of Tsushima had its fair share of dramatic moments, Ghost of Yōtei is more brutal and bloody from the onset. Atsu is an incredible main character, played to perfection by Erika Ishii. She’s more than just her anger, as her journey through grief and focus on revenge give way to small, quiet glimpses of amusement, depending on who she interacts with. It’d be easy to make Atsu seem like a constantly brooding character, and while she is definitely mostly serious, the moments of humanity that shine through stuck out the most.
The narrative is a fantastic ride throughout, with an epic conclusion that lands perfectly. Starting out, Atsu can interrogate enemies that she defeats to learn more about the movements of the Yōtei Six. Players have a choice on who to pursue between a couple of them at the beginning, depending on who you ask about and how much you engage with the world around you before heading for the first target. Almost every antagonist has a dedicated area. For example, the Oni controls the battle-scarred and burnt hills of the Ishikari Plains, while the Kitsune hides in the snowy mountains of Teshio Ridge further north.
As Atsu arrives in a new area, she becomes involved in the wants and needs of the locals. The people stuck living in these areas suffer at the hands of Lord Saito, looking to the mysterious onryō for help. The supporting cast is as strong as Atsu, from a commander in the Matsumae army to a musician with a twisted past looking to write wrongs, to the weapon masters who teach Atsu new skills. Each new character brings a new perspective to the conflict and is memorable. Helping the locals is essential, as each quest and conflict rewards Atsu with genuinely valuable information, loot, or a clue on where to go next.
One criticism of Ghost of Yōtei’s narrative is that it can be somewhat repetitive. While each new area and Yōtei Six is different and carries different thematic consequences, the general flow across the first handful is quite similar. Atsu arrives in a new area, learns of her adversary’s location, and gets close. They escape, with Atsu in pursuit again, until she catches up to them. All of these missions are incredibly interesting and expand on Atsu, her history, and the world at large, but it can be hard not to notice that the structure doesn’t really change until the final portion of the game.
Meaningful Side Content
Much of the secondary conflict is so engaging that it becomes indistinguishable from the main plotline. Everything Atsu does feels purposeful and adds meaningfully to her progression. It feels more inspired by the likes of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, where exploration is more organic and natural. Looking around, Atsu can see clouds of smoke billowing, which lead to points of interest, or birds and foxes, indicating helpful locations. The map doesn’t feel cluttered with an overwhelming number of markers that boost one stat or make a specific weapon better; instead, it helps the player explore to find meaningful upgrades.
Much of the side activity from Tsushima returns, but there’s also less of it, in a positive way. Hot springs raise maximum health, bamboo strikes raise spirit, fox dens lead to helpful points of interest, and enemy camps reward valuable loot or gear. Shrines also return, this time upgrading a node in various skill trees. There’s no experience bar to worry about. Instead, each shrine is a welcome find that adds a little more to Atsu’s combat kit. All of the side content is meaningfully tied in, expanding the world around Atsu while also making her a stronger character. Every in-game system and activity feels important because it is.
Atsu can also bounty hunt, picking up bounties in towns. You get a general location and some hints on where to look, with each one bringing a challenging fight and a worthwhile reward. Each of these fights is fantastic and a highlight, taking place in beautiful locations otherwise unseen. One fight underneath a waterfall still lives in my mind, as light shines through the water, as we exchanged strikes. Most of the time, rewards are money and new armour or charms that can augment Atsu’s combat kit. New armour sets have different buffs and advantages. Some offer bonuses to stealth, making Atsu harder to spot, while others can increase stagger when the right weapon is used. Charms, similarly, offer a ton of different effects, completely changing Atsu’s combat capabilities depending on what’s equipped. Some make your arrows stronger, others increase your health, while some offer a chance of terrifying nearby enemies with assassinations. Some can also be upgraded, making them more effective as you complete sub-challenges while using them. For example, some of my favourite charms boosted arrow damage, with the bows being some of my go to weapon options.
More Weapons, Fewer Problems
Ghost of Yōtei ditches the stances that fueled Tsushima, instead giving Atsu several different weapons. At its core, the system remains similar, still a rock-paper-scissors system where one weapon is more effective than another, with the katana serving as the all-rounder. The Ōdachi, for example, is a massive sword that is effective against bigger enemies, while the sickle ball and chains of the kusarigama wreck shields.
Each new weapon is found at a weapon master, requiring training to learn. These segments are awesome, using creative ways to teach both Atsu and the player how to use the new tools. The dual katana master, for example, makes Atsu strengthen her left arm with bamboo strikes. The twist here is that all the inputs are only on the left side of the DualSense. Up until this point, all the bamboo strikes made use of mainly the right side of the controller, bringing the player closer to Atsu’s awkward experience of using their hand in ways they hadn’t before. There are special moves for each weapon type as well, learnable either through the skill tree or from the weapon masters on repeat visits. Some cost spirit, choosing between a strong offensive move and holding some in reserve for healing an important one.
Combat rules in Ghost of Yōtei as you flow between weapons depending on the foe standing in front of you — a constant dance of death. Atsu can parry strikes that flash blue, while hits that flash red need to be dodged. A newly added wrinkle is disarming – when enemies attack and contain a yellow flash, the player needs to hit Triangle fast enough, or Atsu’s weapon goes flying. Hit it properly, and the enemy’s weapon takes off instead, allowing Atsu to grab it off the floor and whip it at an opponent, usually taking them out in one hit. This mechanic is easily my favourite new addition to combat, as weapons can be found lying around as well. Atsu becomes the closest thing to Marvel’s Bullseye in these moments, taking out enemies with weapons sent flying through them. Atsu also gains blinding powder, being able to toss powder at enemies to stop their attacks and give Atsu a minute to heal or get some attacks in.
Atsu also has access to ranged weapons, including a short bow, long bow, guns, and throwables such as different bombs that can ignite, blind, or cause other effects. The bows are killer, one-shotting enemies stupid enough not to wear any helmets in the face of the onryō. The guns are also deadly, blowing through armoured enemies with ease, but the musket has a long reload time, making choosing your shots all the more critical. There are other tools as well, including kunai, flame oils that alight your weapons with fire, and others.
Atsu also has a super move, which is charged by killing enough enemies without taking any damage. Hitting L3 and R3 together when the bar is full sends the screen into grayscale, with a free brutal kill. This upgrade will later include additional features as well. Activating it can turn the tide of a battle quickly, but waiting too long for the right moment can leave Atsu vulnerable to being hit, resetting the bar. It never fails to make you feel like a badass, along with some critical strikes in life-or-death fights.
Rounding out Atsu’s combat sandbox is a wolf she befriends at the beginning of the game. As you explore the world, you can stumble on wolf dens, working with the wolf to take out enemy camps that have trapped other animals. Doing so will upgrade Atsu’s relationship with the wolf, making them summonable at different moments, increasing their damage, or applying other effects.
The partner wolf is a formidable addition, offering assistance when it is most needed. It can even save Atsu right before death, stopping a killing strike and letting Atsu heal for a second and keep fighting. It has its own skill tree that is exclusively upgraded by these wolf den side quests. As you do more, the wolf becomes a more present partner, while at the beginning it’s more sparse, an almost mythical companion that shows up when Atsu needs them most. It nails the tie to nature that permeates across the Ghost games, where the nature around you is as important as the people who live there.
Ghost of Yōtei‘s combat sandbox is fantastic, with both stealth and all-out combat being entirely viable paths to most instances. The thing is, if the combat in Ghost of Tsushima didn’t resonate, nothing here will change your mind. The new weapons are fantastic, but unless you’re using them against the specific weapon type they’re strong against, they won’t be anywhere near as effective as the single katana. I wish there were ways to make them more effective overall, as I’d love to default to the odachi or dual katanas, but they just get parried or deal far less stagger damage when not used appropriately. When you’re actually in the flow of combat, it all works and flows as you dance around the battlefield with the weapons in tow, but I do wish they were more viable as a whole.
Ghost of Yōtei Is A Graphical Showcase For PlayStation
Graphically, Ghost of Yōtei is one of the most beautiful games I’ve ever played. The lighting is incredible, casting realistic rays of sunlight as you travel, while filling indoor spaces through window grates. The sky box and amount of detail present in the environment are staggering, with loose leaves and petals floating around everywhere. The contrast of colours used here is striking, with bright yellows and reds standing out against a sea of green forest. You can see the emotion all over Atsu’s face, from the furrowing of her brow in anger to the joy in her eyes when she’s amused. It’s a massive graphical achievement, and that even extends to the photo mode, which is rich in options to take gorgeous pictures everywhere you go.
While I never had any frame drops or significant performance issues on my playthrough of Ghost of Yōtei, I did encounter some minor technical issues along the way. At one point, for example, Atsu jumps and runs in a set piece, jumps, and lands below to continue running. However, when she lands, she freezes, standing still for a few seconds before she can run again. The wind seems overtuned as well, with Atsu’s clothes constantly whipping in the wind, regardless of where she is, along with the tassels on the end of her sword. It’s fine in motion, but when stationary and interacting with other characters, it can be distracting as the tassels whip around almost violently. It’s things like this that can momentarily take you out of the experience.
Verdict
Ghost of Yōtei is an incredible sequel, filled with moments that will stay with me for a long time. It feels like the first party exclusive we’ve been waiting for, with Sucker Punch continuing to hit its stride. The combat, despite minor issues, is a blast. Atsu is a whirlwind of death, each weapon playing entirely differently from the others. The narrative is dark and thrilling, with the side content being more meaningfully tied in to the core experience than before. It’s one of the most graphically stunning games I’ve ever seen, with the PS5 Pro’s Ray Tracing Pro really packing a punch. While there were minor technical issues along the way, they never affected gameplay and were more distracting than anything else. I was completely absorbed into the world of Ghost of Yōtei from the jump, and it’s an easy game of the year contender, and one of the best games on the PS5.
[The publisher provided a copy of the game for review purposes.]
Reviewed on: PlayStation 5 Pro
