Ghost of Tsushima (2020) [PS4]

A warrior is worthless unless he rises above others and stands alone in the midst of a storm.

– Yamamoto Tsunetomo

Ghost of Tsushima seems to have shown up at just the right time. As the current generation of videogames prepares to make way for the next, it’s time for developers to really show off what is possible on the hardware we already have. I admit I am a big fan of games that arrive during this stage of a console’s lifespan, with late SNES and PS2 titles among my all-time favourites, so my excitement levels are currently through the roof. Here we are in the PS4’s twilight months and 2020 has already provided a real showcase of the machine’s ability. Final Fantasy VII Remake took us on a new yet familiar journey, The Last of Us Part II showed off one of the more interesting narratives of recent years, and now Ghost of Tsushima has swiftly approached to continue this finely sharpened barrage of latter-day PS4 exclusives.

Ghost of Tsushima is a game I went into as blindly as I possibly could. I had been determined not to engage with any of the trailers or hype-building that preceded its release. From the E3 reveal, I could tell that this was going to be something quite special. Now, having played the final product through from start to finish, having explored every inch of what Tsushima Island had to offer, I am pleased to say that Sucker Punch have not let me down.

Admittedly, I was expecting something along the lines of From Software’s mighty Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, my personal pick of 2019’s crop of excellent titles. Whilst that’s not a bad reference point to begin with, Ghost of Tsushima takes a great deal of influence from more open-world titles such as Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey. That’s not to say it’s a carbon copy of the Assassin’s Creed formula but if this game had been called ‘Samurai’s Code’ or something similar, it would have been believable as a spiritual sequel to Ubisoft’s epic saga.

You spend a lot of your time in Ghost of Tsushima exploring the three distinct regions of the titular island. As you do, you can uncover various markers, most of which are either side-quests or slight diversions to keep the player entertained. As you explore, more of the map becomes visible and you can see question marks on it to direct you towards more activities. Unlike The Witcher 3 and its abundance of question marks on the map, Ghost of Tsushima makes sure that every single one is purposeful in some way. It never feels as though it is shepherding the player from one point to the next purely for the sake of traversing a giant dot-to-dot puzzle across the world map.

These points of interest can range from fox dens where you must follow a small friend to a hidden shrine, or a beautiful vista where you can stop to compose a haiku. There is undoubtedly plenty to do in Ghost of Tsushima without even touching the game’s storyline, and it is to the game’s credit that as a player I wanted to experience these moments. Every time I saw a prompt for a bamboo cutting mini-game, I found myself excitedly gasping “Bamboo!” It’s only a quick and simple diversion, but complete enough and you add an extra point to what is essentially your stamina meter: a very important reward.

The life of a samurai is not an easy one, and there are a lot of different aspects of the game-world your attention must be divided between. Thankfully most of the abilities in the game are rationed out over the course of the story so there is no worry of it bombarding too much information at once. Once the tutorial is complete, the first of three large areas opens to you and leaves you to decide whether to follow the story or to explore a little. Both are viable options but since completion of the first story missions grants you stealth-kills and archery abilities, I would advise following the game’s lead at first.

As a result of my exploring, I found myself struggling with the battle system at first, but the more I practiced the more I understood. And the further I progressed through the main missions; the more options became available to me in battle. By the time I reached the third main area, I was swapping between battle-stances on the fly depending on the enemy type, firing arrows at hornets’ nests to create distractions, and launching into multiple stealth-kills from rooftops. I was no samurai… I was a ninja!

This, of course, is where the game’s plot takes its focus. You are Jin Sakai, a proud samurai whose uncle, Lord Shimura, has taught him the noble art of swordplay: to face the enemy head-on and to fight with honour. When the Mongolian warlord Khotun Khan invades, proudly boasting of his relation to all the other legendary Khans (Genghis, Kublai… Chaka?) he strikes Jin down on the battlefield and takes his uncle hostage. Jin is rescued and brought back to health by Yuna, a thief whose methods of sneaking and stabbing enemies in the back Jin initially abhors but reluctantly learns. Despite them being in complete breach of his uncle’s teachings, these are methods unknown to the Mongolian invaders making them the perfect retaliation.

Jin battles with the fine line between honour and effectiveness throughout and the game could quite easily have taken on a morality system from this point out, but it appears biased towards the less honourable route through a lot of guided story missions. The narrative arc of each area funnels you towards one climactic mission wherein the storyline itself moulds the player towards being stealthy as opposed to facing the enemy head-on. A major plot point at the end of the game’s second act, forcing Jin to wildly abandon his code of honour in order to save lives, could well have been a big moral choice for the player in a game like Mass Effect. However, Ghost of Tsushima has its story to tell and does not stray too far from this structured path.

In fact, the only decisions Ghost of Tsushima directly offers to the player are dialogue-based. There are occasions where a couple of options appear in response to trivial pieces of dialogue that don’t initially seem to have a great deal of consequence. The major choice presented in the game is how you approach enemies. You can walk straight up to the front gates of a stronghold and start a standoff, in which Jin and a few enemies will stand apart and enter a test of nerves. You hold the triangle button until the enemy makes a move, at which point you release the button for a glorious one-hit kill. I found this to be a lot of fun, especially when the tougher enemies later in the game start to use psyche-outs, causing you to lose the standoff along with most of your health bar.

The alternative, of course, is to sneak in through a hole in the enemy stronghold’s outer fence, take out the archers silently with arrows, hop across rooftops, duck into narrow crawlspaces and silently assassinate enemies in the dark. There doesn’t seem to be any specific reward for playing either way, aside from one detail that was brought to my attention at around the half-way point of my playthrough. The more “Ghost” tactics Jin uses, it seems that the weather on the island becomes stormy, whereas if he sticks to his samurai code the sun will keep shining. This is a little redundant since Jin can change the weather at will using a flute, Ocarina of Time style, but it’s nice to see a little bit of pathetic fallacy used so subtly in a videogame.

Whether rain or shine, Tsushima island is jaw-dropping to witness. Every area of the game is so packed with detail that it’s hard not to enlist the game’s Photo Mode to capture some of the more evocative screens you can encounter. In one instance I paused the game to answer the phone and when I came back, I just looked in awe at the glorious moment I had left the game standing at. This wasn’t a cut-scene or directed point-of-view; this was just a random bit of gameplay, and it looked like a work of art. The way the light caught the tall grass, blades of which clung to Jin’s cape… I was mesmerised! Even though I’m not a “Photo Mode” kind of guy, in a game like this where every screenshot is a potential masterpiece waiting to happen it’s hard not to be taken aback by its beauty.

One of the graphical options on offer is Kurosawa mode, which offers players the opportunity to play the game in black and white with Japanese audio and English subtitles, in the style of classic samurai movies. Whilst this perspective is a cool addition, I personally found that the novelty wore off a little way into a second playthrough. Since the character models in cut-scenes are clearly synced with the English audio (you can even lip-read the English dialogue) and it being difficult to tell friend from foe on the battlefield thanks to everyone wearing grey armour, I’d say the mode is worth trying but not recommended. It’s a neat addition that I may dabble into a little more on an eventual second playthrough, but I’m thankful the filter can be toggled quickly and easily in the options menu.

The game’s missions are a varied and entertaining selection of stories, often asking Jin to accompany one of his allies on one of their own unique revenge stories. These multi-part tales take place over the course of the whole game, starting in Act One and most of them reaching their climax just before the game’s final set of story missions. My personal favourite of these involved Sensei Ishikawa and his renegade tutee Tomoe: a great side-story, made even more memorable through a series of excellent missions and character interactions.

It seems that a lot of criticism directed at Ghost of Tsushima seems to be that the side-missions are more interesting and engaging that Jin’s main story arc, which is being seen by many as too formulaic. Whilst I can’t disagree that the overarching theme of revenge is played out in more unusual ways in the side-quests, the fact that they all parallel Jin’s story in some way or other is possibly what makes them so memorable in the first place. Jin learns from his allies and takes their lessons on board in order to influence his own actions in becoming the titular Ghost. I would personally say that the side-missions are rich and detailed enough to be main quests in their own right: a rare thing to find in games such as this.

The missions themselves offer a variety of specific objectives, mostly revolving around killing all enemies or rescuing a hostage without being seen by any guards. There are some missions which commit the Assassin’s Creed sin of halting and resetting progress if you are seen, however most will offer this as a bonus objective to offer a greater reward if completed. Other optional rewards, such as using a specific item in battle or completing a string of stealthy kills without being spotted, also enhance the experience and encourage the mixing-up of tactics without penalising failure.

The reward for completing missions and enemy encounters is basically ‘renown’ which builds Jin’s level of fame / infamy throughout the island until he becomes the Ghost of Tsushima himself. This is basically ‘level-grinding’ as you unlock ability points to spend of the game’s many skill-trees as you make progress through the story. To push the JRPG metaphor a little further, there are ‘random encounters’ with groups of Mongolian troops on the roads, which can be fought or avoided. The reward being a little extra renown ‘EXP’ and either supplies – the game’s currency, used to upgrade weapons and armour – or a hint as to a point of interest yet to be uncovered on the map.

Suffice it to say, there is a lot to do in Ghost of Tsushima. I haven’t even touched upon hunting bears to collect predator hides, needed to upgrade sub-weapons; the shrines with their excellent Tomb Raider inspired climbing and grappling-hook sections; collecting dyes and saddles to customise the aesthetic of Jin’s armour and horse… the list goes on! Thankfully everything in the game is explained clearly and an absolute joy to participate in. For gamers like myself who enjoy the catharsis of ticking-off points on a game map, this is well worth the investment.

It may feel smaller in scale than Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey due to there being no sailing between islands – and any missions taking place on boats at sea are instantly warped to. However, the three areas of the island are so vast, varied and filled with things to do that it’s hard to imagine that anyone would be bored during their visit to Tsushima.

Visuals: 10/10

Put simply, Ghost of Tsushima is a visual masterpiece. Every single screenshot is worth saving in Photo Mode, the vibrancy of the colours naturally draws you in and makes you want to spend time in this magnificent setting. Even slight videogamey imperfections such as sword hilts poking through capes can’t hinder the plain and simple fact: Ghost of Tsushima showcases the Playstation 4’s graphical capabilities at their finest.

Audio: 9/10

From a simple breeze to the sound of a character’s beads clacking together as they walk. Everything is accounted for and very little is taken for granted. There are musical interludes that fit very well within the mood of the storyline, and barely noticeable audio cues within battle that enhance the overall experience in such a subtle way. It’s not something that blew me away in the same way the visuals did, but I have a lot of respect for a game that uses audio in this way. Very impressive.

Gameplay: 9/10

Ghost of Tsushima is addictive in its gameplay. It takes the Assassin’s Creed formula and pushes it forward in the right ways, reining in the scope to focus on the parts that are truly golden. There is never a dull moment when exploring the island and whilst it may start to slip into a little repetition by the end, it never stops surprising with new abilities and ideas thrown into the mix. I have happily spent many extra hours of playtime on this game after thinking “Just one more question mark!”

Narrative: 8/10

Jin’s primary storyline may seem a little on the unadventurous side, especially to players coming into Ghost of Tsushima after the twisting and shocking narrative of The Last of Us Part II but the simplicity of the game’s main tale is in how powerfully executed it is. There are themes of betrayal, loyalty, honour and deceit all wrapped up in Lord Sakai’s quest, not to mention the countless side-stories and Tales of Tsushima that are all equally as interesting. It’s certainly a story worth experiencing.

Accessibility: 8/10

The tutorials given are simple to follow and becoming a samurai is a lot of fun to master. Thanks to a steady flow of new ability unlocks, there are always new ways to solve problems. The controls are easy enough to remember so that even someone like myself, who struggles with remembering button combinations, could switch between weapons and items easily to devastating effect in combat. Additionally, whilst paling in comparison with The Last of Us Part II’s suite of accessibility features, there are still a wide range of options to toggle in the menu to suit most gamers’ needs.

Challenge: 8/10

A lot of Ghost of Tsushima’s challenge comes from the range of enemies encountered. New enemy types are introduced on a gradual basis and can take some time to learn how to counter. Once you learn the appropriate combat stance through play-progression, it becomes a matter of hot-switching to the appropriate stance to deliver a stagger-attack appropriate to exploit the enemy weakness. Once this is mastered, there is very little in the game that poses much difficulty. I would have liked to see more sections akin to the battle against the final boss, which really test your range of abilities, but perhaps these could be included in a DLC chapter or sequel.

Uniqueness: 7/10

Ghost of Tsushima is unique in that I can’t think of another samurai video game that does everything quite as skilfully as this. However derivative it may be with ideas passed down from Assassin’s Creed, this game is more of a refinement of the formula, cutting through the more experimental parts of Ubisoft’s series and pushing forward hard on what it does well. In that case, you could say this is to Assassin’s Creed what Sleeping Dogs was to the Grand Theft Auto games. In which case, I do hope it is remembered as fondly as Sleeping Dogs in the coming years.

My personal grade: 9/10

Ghost of Tsushima is a triumph not just of the genre but of the Playstation 4’s output in general. It’s one of the few games this generation that has held my undivided attention when playing it and had me thinking about it even when I wasn’t playing it. If you are a fan of the direction the Assassin’s Creed series has taken in its past few entries, then this game should surely be on your ‘to-play’ list by now. Plus, even if you are not a fan of that style of game, I would still say Ghost of Tsushima does enough to still be entertaining in its own way. If the idea of donning a straw hat and slicing smoothly through waves of enemies as the sun bathes you in shades of red and gold sounds appealing to you, Ghost of Tsushima has you covered.

Aggregated score: 8.5

The Regional Exclusive Mage is an avid video-game collector and literature enthusiast. When he isn’t educating the younger generation, he can be found sharing a wealth of obscure gaming knowledge as TeacherBloke85 on Twitter.

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