Ghost of Yōtei Review – Exploring the Price of Vengeance in 17th-Century Ezo

Sucker Punch's eleventh game since its foundation, Ghost of Yōtei, launches in a week on PlayStation 5. It's been well over five years since the launch of Ghost of Tsushima, the longest time span between Sucker Punch games in the studio's history, but that's no big surprise considering that the development of triple-A games continues to get longer and more challenging. Make no mistake: Ghost of Yōtei is absolutely a triple-A game at its core, and it couldn't be any different given the enormous success of its predecessor (which I loved, as you might recall).

Ghost of Tsushima wasn't just the studio's best-selling game ever; it even managed to become PlayStation 4's fastest-selling new original IP debut, though it did have the advantage of launching at the very end of the console's lifecycle, with a huge install base of PS4 consoles available. In short order, Sony decided to adapt the plot to a live action film, selecting none other than John Wick creator Chad Stahelski as its director.

Sony is clearly heavily invested in the franchise (there's also an anime in production) and counts on Sucker Punch to expand it with Ghost of Yōtei, a spiritual successor that, however, changes time and place. Gone is the 13th-century Mongol invasion of the island of Tsushima, against which Jin Sakai stood heroically and at the cost of abandoning his samurai code. In this sequel, players are transported to 17th-century Ezo, the ancient Japanese name for modern-day Hokkaido, Japan's northernmost island.

This time, the protagonist, Atsu, is not a samurai but the daughter of a blacksmith. She returns to Ezo after sixteen years spent as a mercenary in the south, including her participation in the historic battle at the Battle of Sekigahara. Her motive is pure, unfettered vengeance: as a teenager, she experienced the brutal massacre of her family at the hands of the so-called Yōtei Six, a group of rogues led by the renegade samurai Lord Saito, who sought to punish Atsu's father for leaving his retinue after the Saito family fell in disgrace. Atsu herself was pinned with her father's katana to a burning ginkgo tree and left for dead, but was able to free herself and vowed to one day kill all those involved in the murderous plot.

In Ghost of Tsushima, Jin Sakai had to largely leave behind his samurai code and adopt the ghost persona out of necessity. He was massively outnumbered and had to embrace stealth as his biggest advantage against the Mongol invaders. Here, Atsu's lust for vengeance makes her an onryō, a wrathful spirit from Japanese folklore and literature who seeks to right terrible wrongs, in the eyes of enemies and allies alike. The legend of the onryō's vendetta against the Yotei Six starts spreading right from the beginning of the game, as killing the Snake, the group's weakest member and a drunkard, is literally the first thing you'll do in Ghost of Yōtei.

There are pros and cons to this for Atsu. Her exploits quickly garner the attention of not only the forces of the Yotei Six but also many ronin bounty hunters, who can be randomly found while exploring the game's open world. Sometimes they'll be around campfires talking about the onryō as you approach, but on other occasions, they may even lay traps for Atsu. The gameplay upside is that Sucker Punch has given players an actual ultimate-type skill to manifest those fears, making a single (non-boss) foe drop their weapon and fall on their knees as they stare helplessly while Atsu impales them to death. This ability is called Onryō's Howl and can be activated by pressing both sticks after killing five enemies in a row without taking any damage, so you cannot exactly spam it. Much later in the game, an upgraded version called Ghost Stance lets Atsu slaughter several nearby enemies instead of just one, but it shares the same counter as the Howl and requires eight consecutive kills without taking any hits. It's up to the player to activate Onryō's Howl as soon as possible or risk waiting for Ghost Stance to be available.

Another addition is Atsu's connection with wolves, and a specific wolf in particular. The wolf saved her when she was young, and over the course of the game, that affinity can be built upon by visiting wolves' dens and freeing other endangered members of the pack. In return, the wolf can randomly save her when she's down and about to be executed. Later in the game, Atsu can also call the wolf for help as she nears enemy outposts, and the wolf will even stand by her side during stealth assassinations and standoffs.

Ghost of Yōtei's combat will no doubt feel very familiar to those who played Tsushima. It is based on the same great foundation of fast-paced, melee-based gameplay where timing is everything, especially if you want to pull off perfect parries and dodges. Enemies are almost always very aggressive and can pull off quick combos, removing big chunks of your health in the blink of an eye. Granted, common foes generally don't have that much health of their own and can also be dealt with from afar, thanks to ranged weapons like the Yumi and the Hankyu (shortbow and longbow, respectively), not to mention the Tanegashima matchlock gun that was absent in Ghost of Tsushima for obvious reasons.

Stealth is also an excellent option, especially when liberating towns and villages from the yoke of the Six. Nearly every stealth tool from the first game returns, such as quick assassinations, smoke bombs and the spotting ability (which is only unlocked later in the game), although the distracting firecrackers are missing. It's still possible to distract enemies, but only if you find an empty bottle of saké lying around. If you drink one of those Atsu carries on her person, you will regain Spirit, the resource to heal yourself or trigger active skills, and then be able to use the saké bottle either as a distraction or just as an improper weapon to throw at an enemy and stun them.

Jin Sakai's classic samurai training only gave him access to swords (katanas), but Atsu has no such qualms. Over time, in addition to dual-wielding katanas, she unlocks other melee weapons such as the large two-handed ōdachi sword, the spear-like yari, and the kusarigama, which mixes a metal chain and a sickle. The unlocking process is part of the story: each weapon can only be taught by a master located in a specific region of Ghost of Yōtei. After learning how to use the basics, Atsu can return to the masters (who all have plenty of reasons to oppose the Yotei Six) to unlock a special skill. Each weapon in the game has its own skill tree; the method of acquiring skill points differs greatly from Tsushima, though.

In that game, Jin increased his Legend and consequently gained skill points by completing various tasks, such as liberating outposts, finishing tales, etc. Here, Atsu can only gain skill points by finding Altars of Reflection across the map. This perhaps highlights the increased focus on organic exploration, arguably the biggest difference in the open world experience of this sequel. Granted, discovering the altars isn't hard, and you can also buy maps at a cartographer NPC to learn their locations.

But the key point here is that you won't find your map neatly filled with points of interest from the get-go. Instead, in most instances, you'll have to seek high ground, pull out the spyglass, and slowly roam the land from left to right, scanning for places like the altars, fox shrines, enemy camps, and a lot more. Together with the free-form approach to content (you can go after some of the Yotei Six in any order), it creates a more believable experience of actually finding your way across Ezo. Of course, just like the previous title, Ghost of Yōtei also features a wealth of side activities and content, some of which involve a fair bit of platforming. There are bounties to collect, optional fun side stories to go through, and even the Zeni Hajiki mini-game that I found surprisingly engaging. However, disregard any comparisons to Gwent you may have heard, as the two are really nothing alike. Overall, when it comes to length, I'd say Ghost of Yōtei may even be slightly larger than Tsushima - it took me 58 hours to complete almost everything in the four main regions.

Despite the open world design, this is also a game with many boss fights, not just against the Yotei Six. Over the course of the main story and as part of several side stories, Atsu will face off lots of enemies and even a few allies in dramatic duels. Just like in Ghost of Tsushima, these are given a highly cinematic flair, with the two contestants facing one another on a usually stunning environmental backdrop, like a massive mountain, a forest of red leaves, a stormy sea, and many more. The camera also shifts to become more akin to a 3D fighting game. Needless to say, stealth is not an option in these duels, and neither are the ranged weapons, as the bosses will easily deflect projectiles in almost all instances.

You are therefore forced to engage in melee combat, carefully dodging red attacks and trying to parry blue attacks as well as standard attacks. These are the game's most challenging encounters by far, punishing even the smallest mistakes (at least on Hard difficulty, the second highest level after Lethal) with quick combos that can leave Atsu dead in a couple of hits, forcing you to start anew. Each boss has its own fighting style and move timing that must be memorized if you are to succeed. There are often multiple phases to the fights, separated by taunts from both sides.

Unlike games such as 2018's God of War and its sequel, where the toughest challenges were relegated to optional boss battles, Ghost of Yōtei's most brutal fights are arguably found in the main narrative, especially in the final two members of the Six. It's an interesting choice and also one that generally makes sense. By and large, the boss fights are finely balanced, delivering a spectacular display of the game's satisfying combat. They force players to play well without getting too frustrating. That is, until the very last fight against Lord Saito himself, which features a key difference from all other fights in the game: during the third stage of the boss battle, you are repeatedly forced to parry Saito's blue attacks. Unlike everywhere else in the game, dodging these blue attacks is not an option, and if you fail to find the right timing for the parry, you are basically dead as the boss starts a combo that only ends with Atsu's death. Honestly, it is an unexpected difficulty spike that did not sit well with me. All in all, though, it is a minor nuisance in the grand scheme of things, even if it happens during the most important fight of the game.

When it comes to the narrative, Ghost of Yōtei is a bit less historically accurate than its predecessor, which depicted the actual Mongol invasion of Tsushima in a fictionalized way. Here, the Yotei Six are obviously an entirely made-up group that seeks to wrestle control of Ezo from the Matsumae clan. In real history, the Matsumae had been given the area surrounding the eponymous modern-day city as a march fief in exchange for defending the land and southern Japan from the Ainu, the indigenous ethnic people who were considered to be barbarians. A few decades after the game's events (which takes place in 1603), an Ainu chieftain called Shakushain roused his people against the Matsumae in rebellion for their occupation. In this game, the Ainu are depicted as a peaceful minority that lives off the land, largely apart from the troubles of the others.

Of course, this was never meant to be a historical game. It is instead largely a classic type of revenge play, where the main character is nearly consumed by their desire for vengeance. Unlike in Greek tragedies, though, Atsu eventually heeds her allies' warnings and understands that the way of the onryō can only bring death. There are a couple of major plot twists surrounding that fated night of the family massacre that keep things interesting. The presentation itself is excellent, and so is the voice acting.

From a technical standpoint, just like with the rest of the game, Ghost of Yōtei is a thoughtful evolution of Tsushima. The 2020 game already looked great on the PlayStation 4 Pro, mainly thanks to its wonderful artistic choices, and so does the new one on the PlayStation 5 Pro, which offers an exclusive 'Ray Tracing Pro' preset that delivers ray traced lighting at 60 frames per second and an 'intermediate' rendering resolution. This is also the preset I chose, as I could not bear playing at 30 frames per second in a game where you must be very precise with the parry and dodge timings. Do note that the game is locked at 60FPS in this mode, rather than taking advantage of variable refresh rate (VRR) to adapt to your display, and cutscenes remain locked at 30FPS. That said, the game ran at constant 60FPS during gameplay with very few instances of frame drops and, of course, none of the stuttering we see regularly on PC.

The environments look fantastic, especially with HDR enabled on an LG G5 OLED TV that supports over 2000 nits of peak brightness. However, I have to note that HDR calibration for interiors is lacking, or at the very least, it was not conducted on an OLED screen, taking into account its infinite blacks. The interior environments are too often extremely dark, to the point that it is difficult to see anything, and that's applicable even to inns and buildings, not just natural caves. The DualSense controller's haptic feedback, touchpad, and adaptive triggers are all smartly applied to various aspects of the game, granting an extra sensorial touch to the experience. Finally, the soundtrack is simply great in fitting so perfectly with the atmosphere of Ghost of Yōtei.

Reviewed on PlayStation 5 Pro (code provided by the publisher).

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