From darkness, the Shadow clan has returned.Introducing Aragami 2, a beautifully crafted story offering a unique ninja gameplay experience brought to you by Lince Works.

Taking place 100 years after the events of the first Aragami game published in 2016, a new story unfolds amongst the chaos born of tensions between rival factions and an insatiable thirst for power.

Fans of the Aragami franchise and stealth games alike will find in this sequel a fresh new action stealth experience with more agile stealth mechanics, new combat features, and gripping narrative. Aragami 2 also encourages players to engage in their ninja power fantasy alongside friends: Ninja groups of up to three players can tackle the full campaign together or hop in and out at their leisure.

“It was as important to us as it was for players, to bring back Aragami and this time we wanted to bring it all in. Multiple features, such as the combat system, were scrapped in the early development of the original Aragami game since we didn’t have the resources to build them” says David Leon, Aragami 2 Game Director. “This sequel will bring a sensational new world, story and fresh gameplay mechanics to create a total new experience adding combat and cooperation to our core stealth mechanics. We think players are going to love it and we can’t wait to show you more of it.”

Aragami 2 sets players off on an action-packed adventure that takes place in a fantastic world with influences from Asian culture, mythology and folklore, in which powerful military factions rule the lands. It is a time of war, unrest and conflict in which players will live out their ultimate ninja fantasy as Aragami; encountering vivid stealth sequences and epic battles with stunningly choreographed combat.

Lince Works’ first Aragami title was launched in 2016, a Tenchu-style stealth game that was able to revitalize the classic ninja genre by introducing unique gameplay mechanics that felt both challenging and fast for players. With a striking art style inspired by Japanese mythology and culture, Aragami positioned the studio in the global landscape with a well-accomplished ninja stealth game that would take the reigns within the genre. Since launch, Aragami has sold over 600,000 copies worldwide on all platforms – a remarkable accomplishment for their first self-published title considering the size of the studio.

In 2019, Lince Works raised $3.4 million in a funding led by Game Seer, a German venture capital firm focused on early-stage gaming companies.

The game is set to release in early 2021 on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One and PC.

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The post Aragami 2 Promises Magic, Blood & More appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Before I start, I’d like to point a few things out. Sekiro will likely already have a feverishly loyal user base, and they will love the game, just as they loved From Software’s Dark Souls games and Bloodborne. This review is not for those guys, who should go out right now and pick up Sekiro. This review is for the rest of us.

Ninjas and samurai are cool. And it’s to feudal Japan that From Software take us to for this punishing stealth/combat game. As the one-armed Wolf, or Sekiro, players must utilise the abilities of a special artificial arm, the shinobi prosthetic, to free the Divine Heir, Kuro from the clutches of Genichiro. Genichiro wants to use Kuro’s Dragon Heritage, the same power that kept his mortally wounded bodyguard, the shinobi (ninja) Wolf after losing his arm, to create an immortal army.

The plot is esoteric and either natively mad or lost in translation. But it is Japan, with ninjas and samurais. The perfect setting for a sword-fighting action game with a sprinkling of the supernatural about it.

The game uses that awful, dated 90s-style user interface favoured by the likes of Capcom. Why Japanese developers can’t send their people on decent UI design courses is a mystery to me. To be honest, it’s not a nice-looking game. It looks better than Dark Souls I-III, but probably not as good as Bloodborne or 99% of other recently released supposedly AAA titles.

The general gameplay visuals are acceptable, but offer little of note, as with the UI, the animations, and general polish all feel very dated. If From Software just don’t seem to offer the same level of finesse of their peers.

Sekiro is all about the combat or avoiding it. I never worked out when I should be taking which approach. Nine times out of ten I got the same result…death. The combat is OK, better than I found that of Dark Souls et al, probably only because it is easier. Likely alienating those players. The stealth makes no real sense, the game offering literally no explanation.

You die a lot, sometimes it seems as if you are supposed to die, like your death propels the story. It’s not clear, what is clear is that every time you die the world, especially those that you have come into contact with start to succumb to a sickness. This adds some narrative guilt to your already bruised sense of gaming prowess.

The grapple is fun, like a feudal Japanese Batman, you can swing into, and out of, combat and climb onto rooftops to traverse the huge open world. It is an extra control that adds to a very unintuitive control scheme.

There is a glimmer, and I say a glimmer, of genius in the game. As you fight, die, rinse, repeat, the game starts to grant players a small insight as to how it is supposed to be played. The poorly communicated on-screen prompts start to make a bit more sense. All I could think, though, was what a wasted opportunity to make a break out game, rather than just another niche effort.

I want to like Sekiro. I like it more that Dark Souls and it is much better than Bloodborne. But it’s still a chore to play. Sekiro’s chaotic player immersion system, whilst better than the usual From Software game, is at the opposite end of the careful, skilful-to-the-point-of-clinical way Ubisoft eases player into the gameplay. It’s basically bad game design masked as a difficult game mechanic for a more discerning player. Elite gaming snobs will, no doubt take issue with this. Well, I don’t care.

If you seek the challenge missing from your general hum-drum existence, and enjoy using video-games to give your life meaning, you are propably going to like Seiko: Shadows Die Twice. But you’d be better off seeking real life challenges that improve you as a person.

For the rest of use that cherish our time playing games, but don’t have the twenty-odd hours required just to “git gud” on Sekiro, forget it. There are plenty of other games out there far more deserving of your time.

The post Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (PlayStation 4) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

In the hustle and bustle of today’s gaming environment where most games are built using a speed / spray and pray type mentality, it’s refreshing to find a game that rewards precise planning and execution all whilst stealthily hiding in the shadows.

Aragami: Shadow Edition is and a stealth action game developed by Lince Works where you are a  spirit called upon to exact revenge on a clan who overthrew and murdered its way to power. You must harness the power of shadows to move quietly and quickly through each level either killing everyone in your path or staying undetected and completing the objective.

You goal to recover six talismans which will lead you through a variety of different stages and encounters on your way to rescuing Yamiko, an orphan who is held captive in the main protagonist’s temple. Each of the talismans provide you with a set of memories that seem to have a strange and familiar feel to them but you’re unsure why just yet.

The gameplay is fantastic in the way it makes you really think about the way you approach each guard. Do you watch their movement and strike at the right time? Do you leave them alone and move past? Are there any other guards around? Will they see you? Or hear you?

Mix in great art styling of traditional Japanese water colour anime with the gameplay and you’ve got a pretty great basis for an amazing game.

There have been very few Ninja games that have come out recently that live up to the tradition of stealth and even fewer games that incorporate both stealth gameplay and the intense action of perfectly timed kills. Thief and Dishonoured are the closest games to come out recently but either of those don’t quite live up to the level of Aragami.

Aragami is easily one of the best (if not the best) stealth Ninja game to have been developed in the past 10-20 years. The unique blend of stunning visuals, fantastic storyline, excellent gameplay and variety of play styles is truly something to behold.

This game is captivating in all the right ways and definitely one you have to play.

The post Aragami: Shadow Edition (PC) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.