IGN has published exclusive new boss fight gameplay captured from Nioh 3. The third installment in KOEI TECMO's action RPG series was announced around three months ago during Sony's June State of Play presentation. It is already relatively close to release, being scheduled to launch in early 2026.
Unlike the prior two games, which debuted as PlayStation exclusives for a few months, Nioh 3 will launch right away on PC, too. The game even already has a Steam page, although it doesn't list the PC system requirements yet.
Compared to its predecessors, which featured fairly linear environments, this new entry will offer players an open world-style map to explore. Another significant change will be the ability to switch at any time between the Samurai and Ninja fighting styles. According to the developers, the Samurai style offers a gameplay experience similar to previous Nioh titles, though new actions have been added, such as Arts Proficiency, which enhances the power of martial arts, and Deflect, which allows players to block enemy attacks at the last moment. These new actions help create intense and deadly face-to-face confrontations.
Meanwhile, the Ninja style excels in quick movements like dodging and aerial actions. This gives ninjas the advantage of attacking from outside the enemy’s range by utilizing various "Ninjitsu" techniques according to the situation on the battlefield. Players can use techniques such as Mist, which leaves a clone after an attack, and Evade, which allows players to narrowly avoid enemy strikes. These techniques help players outmaneuver foes while delivering devastating speed attacks from behind.
Fans already got their hands on Nioh 3 thanks to the limited-time Alpha demo that KOEI TECMO released back in June. The demo was also useful for developer Team Ninja to gauge player satisfaction in the game's various areas. According to the Alpha report published on the official website, these are some of the improvements that the team is working on for the final game:
- Improve controls in response to high demand from players.
- Improve problem areas in control responsiveness.
- Make controls more customizable by adding options.
- Adjust gimmicks and enemies that were unreasonably difficult.
- Add and improve tutorial visibility.
- Adjust the performance and balance of various actions.
- Improve the overall quality of background graphics.
- Improve the visibility and balance of stages and the open field, and make exploration elements easier to understand and more well-balanced.
- Make notifications and other elements that appear on screen during combat less distracting, and make it possible to dismiss such notifications via button/key input.
- Improve the balance of progression elements.
- Improve the quality of the multiplayer mode.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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