u/Mekelaxo

For context, I'm the guy who made these posts in the past:

Stuck in Lone Shadow: https://www.reddit.com/r/Sekiro/s/wfClA1HbTv

Stuck in Genichiro: https://www.reddit.com/r/Sekiro/s/BrQsf7pBfd

Stuck in Guardian Ape: https://www.reddit.com/r/Sekiro/s/lYV7Y5Pi6V

This game at first just felt like it kept throwing bullshit after bullshit for the sake of just making almost impossible to get through, but at some point I somehow just wasn't struggling with the combat anymore and I couldn't stop enjoying this game. It took me 90 hours, but I got to the final boss, and after about 4 hours of attempting, I just beat him, and it felt amazing, 10/10 fight, and great game.

I'm 85 hours into the game, and it took me like 50 hours to finally start to fully enjoy this game. I was liking it, but the combat learning curve was very steep and every boss fight I encountered was a major wall – Genichiro by himself took me 6 hours to beat – But somewhere between then and now something changed and I couldn't stop progressing, bosses no longer took me hours to beat, and I was no longer dying to every single enemy.

I made a few posts here asking for advice and I think the main thing that helped me get better was learning when to trigger my inputs as to avoid queueing up actions. Action queueing was probably the main thing killing me in this game because I'm used to playing games with fast animations and responsive controls. I feel like the moment I learned to time my inputs, this game got like 3 times easier.

I'm a bit sad now because I feel like I'm nearing the end of the game, and I've been going around the map trying to complete as much of the game as possible before I inevitably reach the end, and this is how I found this demon boss, which has been probably the most challenging boss for me after Genichiro, and it only took me 2 hours to beat, compared to the 6 on Genichiro, but it never felt frustrating or annoying, it was a very fun fight to learn. At this point in the game I have encountered, but not really attempted, what I assume is probably the final boss >!(the one at the other side of the secret passage where I lost my arm)!<, and I am very excited to give it a proper attempt, but also sad to finish the game.

I really wanna like this game, but every boss fight is just bullshit after bullshit.

Why does this fucking monkey need to have a second phase?

I am mostly enjoying the game, but it's very discouraging to spend hours on a boss and then when you think you've beat them they just get up like nothing and you have to fight them again with a completely new set of moves. I can't be spending 6 hours in every boss fight, I don't have that much free time.

At this point I just feel like finishing this fucking game out of spite, because I've already spent 40 hours on it, and it feels like I haven't made any progress

This fight is super fun, but damn this game is hard. I don't think I've struggled this much with an early game boss in any game. It feels super punishing, any minor mistake is met with death. I wanna beat this game, but this boss as already taken me 100 attempts and more than 3 hours and I still haven't beaten him, I can't imagine what stronger bosses are gonna be like, so it's probably gonna take me months to finish this game.

Did other people struggle this bad with this game too? Or I'm I just extra bad at it?

It's my first run, so try to avoid spoilers.

Update: Finally beat him https://www.reddit.com/r/Sekiro/s/8ZyRdadQhx

I picked up this game because I heard it had very satisfying and challenging combat, but this almost feels impossible. You've just witnessed what must be my 50th attempt at this fight in a span of about 3 hours, and I feel no closer to beating it than I was on my first few attempts.

The game lead me to believe that deflect was the main combat movement, and that I'm supposed to deal enough posture damage to then deal a deathblow, but this is the second boss where it seems like posture damage recovers way faster than I can inflict it, and I can't really do any significant amounts of regular damage because I can't find any significant windows. Is there a way to deal permanent posture damage? It's also annoying how small the area is, because a lot of the time the camera gets caught on the wall and I can't see anything, as if the attacks themselves weren't hard to read.

I really wanna like this game, but I've played for like 20 hours and it feels like I haven't even made it out of the early game and it's starting to feel overwhelming. I've played difficult games before, but this is either on another level, or there's something that I'm missing, and people play this game and like it, so It can't be this hard for all of you, right? I'm I just the least skilled person who has ever touched a controller?

I thought I understood the combat after the previous boss, but this enemy is making me feel like there's something I'm supposed to do here that I'm not doing. Parrying doesn't work because it damages me anyway and he recovers too fast, there seem to be no attack windows because every time I attack I get animation locked for too long, and get it. I've tried like 15 times and I feel no closer to killing it than I was on my first attempt.

Can I get any spoiler free tips? Try to avoid spoilers as much as possible, I just wanna know if I'm on the right track, or if I there something else I should be doing here, because where I'm at right now it just feels like an impossible fight.

Update: Managed to kill it by running in circles until he hits a wall, and then attacking his ass while he recovers from hitting the wall. Took about 2 hours.