Onimusha: Way of the Sword preview: The flow of the fight

If you’ve not played the previous games, it’s easy to get the wrong impression of Onimusha: Way of the Sword at a glance. The way it presents itself, you might think you’re in for a tough-as-nails game that’s all about fighting punishing foes by nailing precise timings, but once you get your hands on it, as I did for a short preview session, you’ll realize that’s not what it’s going for.

Instead, Onimusha is much more about fast-paced action that makes you feel cool, giving you a whole host of tools to do so. There’s the standard block and parry system, but this game takes it one step further, also offering a deflect. You can parry by blocking at the perfect time to avoid all damage, or you can hold block and press A/Cross at the perfect moment to deflect, essentially countering the attack to take a huge chunk of your foe’s stamina bar, at the cost of your own stamina.

You can dodge too, though it’s not some invincible dodge-roll that will get you out of trouble, it’s just a quick step back that’s only really effective if you time it well enough for a perfect dodge. This means that when you’re in a tough fight, you’re heavily encouraged to stand your ground and attempt parries or deflections instead of stepping out of the way.

This shines best in boss fights. The one I got to try pitted me against another samurai, and it did a fantastic job of presenting a fight between two people with near-identical fighting styles. We’d come together for a quick flurry of clashed blades, maybe one or two strikes land either way, before we’d back off and prepare for our next attack. Occasionally, when our attacks were timed perfectly together, our swords would bounce off each other, giving an opening to whoever was quick enough to react. It felt almost like two choreographed performers putting on a tense show, with motion so fluid and strikes so satisfying.

That’s why I’m thankful it doesn’t go for an oppressive difficulty level. It’s still a challenge – it took me several attempts to learn the patterns and find the right strategy to defeat the boss – but it’s not going to demand perfection as you die over and over for upwards of an hour. Instead, it strikes a perfect balance where I don’t feel overwhelmed by the challenge, yet still have to put in enough work that I come away satisfied and get to appreciate my cool samurai moves when I nail a deflection and unleash hell on my foe.

The fact that the health bars are yellow and the stamina bars are red is a simply unforgivable sin, but aside from that, Onimusha: Way of the Sword was a lot of fun to play, and once I was done with this 20-minute preview, I immediately wanted to play more. It has fun, fast-paced combat like any action game, but keeps it grounded with a nice bit of weight and challenge that stops it from turning into some mindless hack-and-slash. It’s a perfect balance that I can’t wait to see more of.

Onimusha: Way of the Sword is set to release in 2026 for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S

More features on DBLTAP: