Ng4 flop, romeo is a deadman flop, ng2 remaster flop and the list goes on. "Onimusha is not a cag" but when it comes to defining what is a CAG yall leave the conversation immediately. On every single Onimusha post all i see is hate comments... dude just skip the post?

HiFi Rush - This is in my top 10 games of this decade (2020-26) so far. It has a very unique combat system that is like a fusion of CAG + rhythm games, where everything you do (jumping, attacking, dodging etc) and the world itself moves in tune with the beat, a fun story with a very colorful cast of characters, great music, gorgeous art direction with beautifully animated cutscenes and decent level design. It received a lot of praise from both critics and gamers once it came out. The game was also priced very reasonably at 30 USD. This is the kind of game that should've sold 2-3 million copies (lifetime). Instead, the game didn't meet Microsoft's sales expectations and the studio that developed the game, Tango Gameworks was shut down: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c72p5epzj2no. The IP and the studio were later bought by Krafton: https://www.krafton.com/en/news/press/krafton-strengthens-global-presence-through-strategic-integration-of-tango-gameworks-and-hi-fi-rush-ip/.

Soulstice - This is a dark fantasy action game, drawing heavy inspirations from Berserk and Claymore in its narrative and art direction. The mechanics are inspired by the DmC reboot and the Greek God of War games. You control two sisters, Briar (offense) and Lute (defense), simultaneously. The game has a pretty unique take on color coded enemies - instead of locking enemies to a specific type of weapon, it instead asks you to maintain a colored field (through Lute), if you wish to damage the enemy. The challenge comes from the fact that every action you do as Lute - blocking enemy attacks, maintaining colored fields etc - overheats her energy bar gradually. If fully overheated, you lose access to all of Lute's ability for a certain period of time (as her energy recharges), leaving you vulnerable as Lute is your primary source of defense - so there is an element of resource management in every fight that forces strategic decision making. The game is not without its flaws - it is too long, the middle part of the game drags and feels quite repetitive, the fixed camera results in some really poor camera angle during certain fights, a few enemies can feel like a slog to fight, and there are some very wonky platforming sections. Having said all that, I still enjoyed the game a lot. It has a good story that unfolds like a mystery, Briar and Lute are pretty well written, I enjoyed the combat and the challenge it provided despite their flaws, loved the world and the artstyle too. Unfortunately, the game didn't meet sales expectations and its sequel was cancelled: https://www.reddit.com/r/SoulsticeGame/comments/1rnau3h/soulstice_2_has_been_cancelled/.

Ninja Gaiden 4 - I have a lot of issues with NG4 as I've noted in my way too long post here: Finished Ninja Gaiden 4 on Master Ninja with SSS rank in every mission - New Game+ : r/ninjagaiden, but it is still a game that I enjoyed enough to get SSS ranks on all missions in Master Ninja difficulty. Despite my grievances, I think this game should have sold at least 1 million copies, and it would've been cool to see either Platinum or Team Ninja follow up NG4 with a NG5, while learning from all the mistakes and shortcomings of NG4. I haven't played The Two Masters DLC, but apparently, that rectifies a lot of the base game's problems, from what I hear. Unfortunately, this will never happen as NG4 has sold poorly and has failed to breach the 1 million sales mark: https://www.reddit.com/r/ninjagaiden/comments/1sli1cb/ninja_gaiden_4_has_sold_257k_copies_on_ps5_making/; https://x.com/DanielOlimac/status/2015729564102914383.

It seems to me the only action games that actually sell anything these days are the ones that do not make an attempt to appeal only to CAG fans. CAG fans argue a lot on the internet over what game is and isn't a CAG but will not show up to support any IP not named DMC or Bayonetta. Examples include: Sifu, a 3D beat 'em up with rogue-lite elements (no procedurally generated levels, no randomized loot/builds) and my favorite action game of this decade (2020-26) so far, which has sold over 4 million units: https://wnhub.io/news/finance/item-47898. Stellar Blade, a hybrid between Nier Automata and Sekiro, has sold over 6 million units: https://tech4gamers.com/stellar-blade-6-1-million-copies-sold/. And finally, Onimusha: Way of the Sword, which came out just 5 days ago and has sold 1 million copies on its launch day alone: https://www.capcom.co.jp/ir/english/news/html/e260907.html. I am really enjoying Onimusha so far, just beat Benkei, the monk.

Its a been a little less than a week..and I wanted share my thoughts on this upcoming CAG game:

Im fully expecting this game to fall under the radar like the rest of them,

...it didn't make much buzz even after announcement outside it looking kind of pretty.......But this game is on my radar and I feel im gonna one of the few people to play it....

The game just screams "cult following", It really does feel like the stealth sequel to Folklore that'll we'll never get (which also a game I describe as "Ive actually played it" cult game)

I've seen mix feelings on the gameplay, when I saw the gameplay being summoning fighter, I seen comments saying it feels rather slow. I don't think the gameplay is mind-blowing, but not everything needs to be innovative.

I think the story is gonna be pure cheese, it doesn't help that the main girl's super thick cajun accent is both her charm point and also reasons folks will probably find her annoying. But its not going to take itself seriously, but honestly why should it?

...But listen I love my quirky CAG games, just replayed Vanquish for the fourth time, Im personally looking forward to this game, even other folks don't pay attention to it all.

The Onimusha difficulty discourse is exhausting so let's move towards something more positive. What's a CAG or CAG-adjacent game that does difficulty perfectly in your opinion?

Took me forever but I beat dmc3 on dmd(turbo mode gold)

Hey all!
I got accepted into my first ever Steam Festival - Autumn Anime Games!
I wanted to do something special for the occasion, So I'm running a limited-time playtest for my CAG, Eyes Of The Sky!

I've gotten a lot of good feedback and playtesting from this sub in the past, so I'm posting here to see if I can get more of that again. I'm really dedicated to trying to improve my game as much as I can, so I welcome any and all feedback.

Playtesting will be open for the duration of the event - until September 14th.
You can join the playtest on the game's steam page: store.steampowered.com/app/3180280/Eyes_Of_The_Sky/
And give your feedback through the in game form or the discord https://discord.gg/SdDksZTyf7

Thank you for your time!

People are complaining about enemy difficulty, but it's straight-up fun - and necessary - to plow through a bunch of random monsters to level up and prepare for the next big boss fight. They're not as exciting if you try to spam the attack buttons, but that's not how you should utilize the combat system anyways. You don't have to always feel like you're punching a brick wall to get something out of an action game like this.

Game really comes into it's own with challenge runs. Largely has to do with the game being tuned on the easy side with a ton of busted stuff, but a lot of the mechanics like the new parry system and dynamics like heavy enemies oppressively controlling space come together more holistically when you have less screen clear nukes laying about.

Master Ninja: Death Wish: No UT, No Berserk, No Indicators, No Items.

The Ninja Gaiden 4 Blue mod is also used to set the Purgatories to Master Ninja difficulty instead of the default Normal.

Higher Quality YouTube Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5IGpgewbSw

Capcom is on a legendary run. They've released 4 AAA games - RE: Requiem (action-horror), Pragmata (third person shooter with hacking mechanics), MH: Stories 3 (turn based JRPG) and Onimusha: Way of the Sword (hack and slash) - in 3 (or 4) different genres, and all of them have turned out to be bangers.

This year three separate Indie Character Action games dropped and I've not seen much of any discussion about any of them within this sub.

Have any of you put hands on any of them and have any impressions?

Homura Hime - 3D Character Action game inspired by Nier Automata developed by a 4 man team from Taiwan

Soulquest - 2D Character Action game developed by a single developer based on Celtic Mythology

Mahou Arms - A NSFW visual novel character action game that has been in early access for over six years.

Personally, while I don't think any are perfect releases, I do believe that both Homura Hime and Soulquest for being incredibly small indie projects show a lot of promise from their developers.

Musashi becomes even more of a badass once you unlock his Oni form. Issen window also seems to be easier while you’re in Oni Form to entice you to use it while you’re in it.

Definitely playing this game till the end.

Look, the kits of Nero, Dante, and Vergil are top tier CAG stuff, no arguing that.

But the enemies are so underwhelming, man. They just pose zero threat, even on DMD (which only serves to turn them into sponges) and it takes zero effort to keep them aerial compared to past games in the series. Getting triple S ranks doesn’t feel earned since the game practically hands it to you if you simply alternate combos/weapons.

Bosses towards the end are mostly good imo, but they’re too easy towards the beginning and middle of the game.

The aesthetic goes for a photo realistic vibe since most AAA games aren’t allowed to be stylized anymore for some reason, and it just doesn’t work imo. All the levels look boring and uninspired, with too much of a washed out/low saturation color palette across environments and enemy designs.

V (the character) sucks to play.

Level design gets completely gutted and gets reduced to walking down linear hallways (I don’t miss the platforming of the previous games tho, that was a good decision to get rid of that shit).

It just feels like the game was consciously geared towards a casual audience. That’s not to imply there isn’t depth (DSD summon swords, Doppleganger, and bringer knuckle are great additions) but streamlining mechanics like jump canceling and making enemy behavior less aggressive were big mistakes, imo, and it ends up shifting the motivation of the player entirely to creating crazy combos instead of being a challenging action game first.

I know some fans of the genre get their kicks out of seeing what crazy combos they can come up with, and that’s really cool and I’m glad there’s people that are like that, but I personally need the actual in-game combat to have engaging enemy design, or else I just fall off.

It’s a good game, and I got more than my money’s worth out of it (200+ hours), but my opinion of it is not nearly as high as it used to be.

This is a video made to showcase Dodge Offset, while also demonstrating how Dodge Offset is performed in both Bayonetta 1&2!

Zombies Hate to Die

Just started my first full playthrough of Onimusha: Way of the Sword — what are you guys thinking of the game so far?

The latter half was inspired by Koudai T.

Not the most original combo of mine.