Neha K. reviewed Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice

I have beaten every Souls game. I could not beat this one and it has caused me to reassess what I thought I was good at.

The realisation, about twenty hours in, was that I have never actually been good at these games — I have been good at being patient, overlevelling, and rolling. Sekiro removes all three of those and asks a question about reflexes that I, at 38, cannot answer. Every attempt at Genichiro was the same. I was not getting closer. I was getting the same result faster.

The game is not at fault here. It's beautifully made, the sound design on a successful deflect is one of the best noises in the medium, and I completely understand why people call it a masterpiece.

A B is me saying: this is excellent and it has a hard requirement I cannot meet. I'd rather write that than pretend I bounced off it for design reasons.