Nioh 3 by developer Team Ninja and publisher Koei Tecmo America—Sony PlayStation 5 preview written by Pierre-Yves with limited time demos provided on the PSN.
Estimated Reading Time: 8 minutes.
Here we go again!
Is what I would like to say. Before that however, due to a wrong turn out of a traffic circle somewhere between here and there, you get both my Beta Demo impressions from this summer and my latest impressions of the much more recent, and currently available, pre-release demo!
Nioh 3 Beta Demo
Available from June 4 to June 18, Team Ninja and Koei Tecmo released a limited time demo to one of my favorite soulslikes series. Following in the steps of Nioh and Nioh 2, player feedback was collected, and if you keep your cleared save data, you get bonuses on launch.
Nioh 3 - Announcement Trailer | PS5 Games
Heading back to the Sengoku period, Nioh 3 is throwing us back into the mix of war, warriors, bandits and more yokai than you'll know what to do with. Actually, that's a lie, they are all worth Amrita which we can use to level up our brand new warrior who's poised to become the next Shogun.
Diving back into this chaotic world, there are several returning features making it an easy return. Returning are the mission like structures, the samurai like combat, guardian spirits and yokai abilities to give you an added edge.
For those new to the genre, or, new to Team Ninja's variant of soulslikes, the following is for you! In general, a soulslike is rather unforgiving, but, when crafted right, very rewarding. Nioh since the beginning has been in the very rewarding category as the development team is very receptive to feedback gathered in their limited time demos.
In general, Nioh plays like a mission based action adventure. Each mission has objectives, midbosses and stage bosses. In each mission, you’ll gather new gear and a substance called Amrita which will let you level up your character as you see fit. There are many stats from health to magic that you’ll be able to experiment with to play just the way you want to.
When you die, because it will happen, you lose all of the Amrita that you were carrying. Doubling down on this soulslike aspect, if you die a second time? It’s all gone. Both the Amrita that you were chasing after and the amount that you were now carrying. The reason for this is that in Nioh, your chosen guardian spirit animal holds this for you. If you don’t make it back to them, they’ll leave it behind and come back to you. So with no one to hold your current amount, it's all gone.
Where Team Ninja is spicing it up for Nioh 3 are in some of the systems that we’ve come to know and love. First and foremost, this adventure has gone vertical. Maybe that’s a stretch, but you now have the ability to jump, giving you more options when exploring and allowing the exploration to take new routes.
But PY, that’s nothing really new. You would be right, however, being able to jump in a soulslike can change a lot of small things. You test the limits a lot more. Ledges once thought out of reach are now “potentially” possible. Finally to top it all off, you may need to jump in combat in order to avoid certain attacks. It’s one more thing to try to kill you on your adventures!
Also changing completely how you play are the new Samurai and Ninja modes. In both Nioh and Nioh 2, you would level up and equip your character as you saw fit. What’s going to make the biggest impact on how you play? In my case? There was a whole lot of medium to heavy armor, swords, and onmyo magic so that I could coat my swords with whatever element suited the situation.
All of this is still possible in Nioh 3, but you’ll be doing these loadouts twice. Our protagonist can, on a moment’s notice, change from a heavier and more powerful Samurai loadout into a more nimble and fast hitting Ninja loadout. And it’s so freaking fun. Each side to your character’s equation has moments where they shine best and I look very forward to seeing more of this system on launch. Or in another demo for more freebies!
Where Nioh 3 makes the biggest changes are in its mission structure. Whether in Nioh, Nioh 2 or Wo Long, the structure was the same. Each main mission was followed by several smaller missions in specific areas of that original mission location. Where Nioh 3 makes a change is that all of these missions, main and side, seem to be available at the same time in much larger playable areas.
If I’m being perfectly honest, Team Ninja’s Rise of the Ronin feels like it was a tech demo for some of the new features in Nioh 3. Larger areas for players to explore, “forts” to be conquered, and side missions that can be done if you want to, but they aren’t vital to the main objective. All of these elements feel right at home in this style compared to the more open world format of Rise of the Ronin.
Will it work as well in the full version as it does in the Alpha Demo? Time will tell on that, but I think it will. There's greater flexibility offered in how you go about the mission and if going east doesn’t seem to be going your way? Head west for a bit, or north, south, anywhere else and then come back once you’ve leveled up slightly or picked up some better gear.
Nioh 3 Pre-Release Demo
Much more recently and available through the PSN for another limited amount of time, Nioh 3 is back for another look right before launch. Those that complete this latest demo by February 15 won't just get another fancy new item for the main game. They'll also be able to transfer their save data for when it fully releases on February 6, 2026 which is only a few days away from the time of this writing.
For those that played the original Nioh 3 Beta Demo, this will pretty much be a similar affair. You'll go through a traditional Nioh styled stage, fight a boss, and then move into the new open world format that begins to open up the game’s real features.
What I appreciated with this round is that not every possible encounter is incredibly tough from the get go. Sure, certain enemies are designed to obliterate you, but if you go and poke them with a stick, you know what you're getting into. There's more balance in how much damage they deal versus receive, and, certain enemies have been replaced or moved around making achieving certain milestones a little bit easier.
Where this demo may be a bit more interesting, is the inclusion of the story and a better idea of the overall plot. Thinking that Nioh 3 would simply return to the Sengoku period was exciting enough, but moving into a slightly different direction, it seems like we may be seeing more than just this time period. We may be a time traveling warrior. We'll all have to wait and see for the full release.
Realizing that I didn't talk about it this summer, also making a return is the grave system. While From Software lets you see another player's last movements before they died, Team Ninja went in a whole other direction that works brilliantly. Instead of seeing the last movements, Nioh instead allowed you to summon their angry malevolent spirit to face in combat. If you win, you get Amrita and a copy of a random piece of their gear.
Taking this a step further in Nioh 2, benevolent graves were added. Much friendlier in nature, these allow you to summon a copy of another player to fight against tougher enemies and take the heat off yourself a little bit. With the open world format, these make exploring new reaches a little less scary for a limited time as you have another warrior beside you. Plus, that player gets a bonus from their grave having been used. Everyone wins!
Finally, if you really wanted to, you could also summon an actual player from the Shrine system. This easily allows you to play with your friends or other random people online. I don't currently have many more details to the specifics for this feature, but most likely will post launch.
Final thoughts
If you couldn't already tell, I'm super excited for the latest entry into the world of Team Ninja and Koei Tecmo's Nioh. Keeping things somewhat familiar, but also adding in new and exciting elements is not an easy task, but I think Nioh 3 has the chance to be the best in the series so far.
And maybe sit near the top of the Soulslike pile. For me at any rate!
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