Ghost of Tsushuma or "You're not nearly clever / good at games enough for this game" (Version tested: PS4 Pro)

With all the swagger in the world, sometimes you have to wind your neck in and admit that - as lovely as a game is - you're just not clever enough nor good enough at games to get the most out of it. 

Such is the case with "Ghost of Tsushima" - Probably one of the most gorgeous looking Samurai games ever made, and certainly one of those games that shows there's still plenty of life in ye olde PS4 (Pro or otherwise) despite its successor being around (or rather being conspicuous by its absence / unavailability). 

"Ghosts" starts off with huge sweeping battles, and two Samurai facing the overwhelming might of the Mongol Army as their island is attacked and invaded. From there it's up to you to take on the role of a guerrilla warrior, clawing together a small army to repel the invaders, rescue your uncle and put the world to rights. 

"GOT" demonstrates two things to me - 1) I've got lazy, REALLY lazy when it comes to the mechanics of gameplay in games. I expect combat to be almost done for me, to flow from one encounter to the next with a mere few button presses and 2) The same for stealth. I've always hated games that rely too heavily on punishing 'you're seen / you're dead' stealth gameplay and alas GOT has that going on in spades whereas quite a few recent games (Spider-Man: Miles Morales for one) take all the donkey work out of stealth, making it almost pleasurable to sneak-attack folk. That's really how it should be though, right?

Yet, for someone who read and loved all the "Lone Wolf and Cub" comics as a kid, and later as an adult, and has always loved the aesthetics and designs of Samurai and the world they normally inhabit (Feudal Japan, 13th Century or thereabouts) this game's too tempting to keep being grumpy at. Each night I balance playing this, and being miserably chopped to pieces and making hardly any progress with other games but this one does keep luring me back, mostly because it's such a treat for the eyes - it really is like an Edo-era painting brought to stunning life. 

Pretty as heck

I guess the main issue I have with the game is how multi-layered the control schema is. The main problem with trying to balance this with other games is that most games have a single flat control schema that mostly doesn't change. In GOT combat, and in particular attacking / defending against certain types of enemies requires switching between stances and when you get to my age, remembering which stance is effective without constant (immersion-breaking) prompting is tough. The game DOES prompt you from time to time, and a few kind Twitter folk have detailed the easiest way to remember the various stances. The UI does its best not to interfere with the action, adding to its atmosphere (the waypoint system, little animated puffs of wind and particle objects moving to show you which direction you should be travelling in is a stroke of genius). 

I spend an awful lot of the game looking like this, shortly before being run through - again - by spearmen

Sucker Punch obviously pulled out all the stops for this one and it's a game I want to persevere with and get better at, but just don't think I've got the stamina or brainpower to do so. It's huge, sprawling and well worth dropping the cash on if you've got the time to devote to it - but for me, the constant frustration of being run through again, and again, and again by spear-wielding Mongols just ruins the damned thing for me (and it's not without its own weird glitches here and there which undo all the good work done with the game's UI and break the immersion. Bodies handing in mid air and some spasmodic animation when you try to do things the game doesn't want you to are a bit annoying in something that's otherwise so polished). 

 Overall, "Ghosts of Tsushima" might not suit my approach to gaming, and sometimes it feels a bit counter-intuitive but the rewards for a dedicated gamer who is willing to put up with the odd annoyance are manyfold and it's certainly a game I'll keep plugging away at until I'm done.