Sekiro - Shadows Die Twice - is just doubly frustrating

Okay, ninja-esque games are a fave of mine.  Shinobi, Ninja Gaiden...

I had seen this game on some sites doing a playthrough and it looked epic.  Sekiro - Shadows Die Twice.

It was on Stadia, so let's give'r a whirl.


Immediately, it's frustrating.  Cool cinematic beginning - not sure what really happens, but suddenly I'm in the game and I gotta jump around and hug a wall and then I'm seen by a baddie and dead.

Okay... find a way to sneak in the tall grass, but don't too close to him and then I can eventually meet the 'heir' and get a sword.  Now let's kill some baddies.

The combat in this game is just ... atypical.  I've not run into one like it before.  It's not a hack and slash, the style is to fight in such a way as to break the other person's stance and that gives you the opportunity for a killing blow.  Okay... it's different for sure.

Then you're up to your first miniboss.  Tough, as he takes 2 of those killing blows to kill him ... but I can get through.  Then you go up against another bad guy and you think you can do it... don't bother, it's meant to kill you and crush your soul and you're reborn with a weird prosthetic hand.

Keep pushing on - and it's tough to tell where you're pushing on as there's no real map to follow or tell you where to go, but eventually you fumble your way into finding another mini boss that teaches you about the dodging and counter attacks. 

This guy took me a LOONG time to figure out how.  Too long for a 2nd miniboss.

Then you're up to the ogre in chains and I just give up.  It's ludicrous to think that someone playing the game for such a short time can take on such a challenge.

I like challenging games, but not frustrating.

And to top it off, the more you die, the more 'rot' or something happens, but there's some holy 'aid' you get or something... it's all confusing and it's just death after death after death.  Sometimes it's at a tough boss, sometimes it's because you didn't time the counter block on a simple baddie at the perfect exact time so you lost a lot of health or heck, I've had a chicken kill me.

There's no room for error in this game whatsoever, it's be perfect, or start it all over again.

I can't do that, not after the frustratingly terrible Battle Toads jetski levels... not again.

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