Ghost of Yōtei | PS5/PRO | October 2, 2025 | Now Available - Metacritic: 87 Opencritic: 89

[Gizmo_Duck]

Ghost of Yotei | Game Informer Interview - Balancing Freedom and Story

New Details

In 1603, peace has broken out in Japan, now many warriors are out of work, moved to Ezo (modern day Hokkaido)
It's sort of a powder keg as it is mostly lawless, packed with people, weapons, etc
Reiterates the game is very much its own story, not connected to Ghost of Tsushima or Jin Sakai
A lot of time went into researching the history and location, traveling all over Hokkaido, plus Japanese advisors to make sure everything fits
The wolf in the game is an Ezo wolf (now extinct)
The wolf 'shadows' you in the game, but it's not a pet dog that can be called upon, more of an ally through the representation of wilderness
"Great variety" of animals Atsu can interact with, like herds of horses you can ride with
The storyline is still linear with a structured arc, you don't kill the Yotei Six in any order, but there are some more open ended options to encourage exploration and more freedom
PS5 allowed Sucker Punch to implement the instant time travel feature from present to past to Atsu as a kid, both are on at the same time
PS5 tech also let the team render more distance detail like mountains, higher-fidelity distant terrain, volumetric fog, low lying clouds, improved skin and hair rendering, better sky boxes (new: aurora borealis effect) etc
Fast travel is still super quick, barely any load times
Wind navigation system returns with improvements, guides you around major obstacles instead of just a straight line through
The shamisen (stringed instrument) Atsu carries on her back can also guide her to certain places
The team doesn't mind comparisons to Assassin's Creed Shadows, welcome more studios creating games in this style and era

 

[$cam-U-Well_Jack$on]

I’ma have to have this.

 

[Gizmo_Duck]

this shyt so goofy. nikkas tryna beat off while they play or something?

cacs worrying about if the characters in games are lesbians like they tryna fukk 'em. Just play the game and stfu. or don't, just stop whining like bytches over dumb shyt.

It’s like complaining about batman being ugly, who gives a fukk. 90% of people will be playing with some type of mask on just like the first game.

 

[Don Homer]

It’s like complaining about batman being ugly, who gives a fukk. 90% of people will be playing with some type of mask on just like the first game.

crying about the "male gaze" for a fukking video game.

If u wanna see sexy women, go watch porn or some shyt. ur on the internet complaining about not being able to see hot women. If ur that pressed there are a lot of outlets

Cacs just love to complain

 

[Gizmo_Duck]

crying about the "male gaze" for a fukking video game.

If u wanna see sexy women, go watch porn or some shyt. ur on the internet complaining about not being able to see hot women. If ur that pressed there are a lot of outlets

Cacs just love to complain

I just played through death stranding 2 as Norman reedus, a guy that looks like he’s been sleeping outside for years and smokes and huffs whatever’s laying around.

I gotta play all these games as disgruntled and weathered cacs, they can play as an ‘average’ looking japanese woman

 

[zerorequiem]

Day 1 purchase for me. It's funny because if this ever goes to PC these cacs will foam at the mouth trying to mod the game.

 

[Don Homer]

Day 1 purchase for me. It's funny because if this ever goes to PC these cacs will foam at the mouth trying to mod the game.

people's brains are broken. and they will have some perverted fukking mods for this when it's released on PC

this has the GOTY potential, clearly. A damn shame people are complaining about not having an erection while playing the game

 

[Gizmo_Duck]

Confirmed you can main one weapon if you want, switching isn’t requireed

 

[Gizmo_Duck]

 

[Gizmo_Duck]

Ghost of Yotei’s map is about the same size as Ghost of Tsushima’s. The devs didn’t want to compromise on “density” for a larger map - AUTOMATON WEST

Ghost of Yotei co-directors Jason Connell and Nate Fox decided early on in development that they will not be expanding the game's map "for the sake of it."

automaton-media.com

Commenting on Ghost of Yotei's overall volume, Fox notes, "I'd say it's roughly on par with Ghost of Tsushima. The map is about the same size too, but Ghost of Yotei has more density."

Connel follows up by commenting, "When it comes to both map size and game volume, we don't believe that 'bigger' or 'more' is inherently better." The developers say they took the lessons they learned from developing Ghost of Tsushima and focused on improving the quality of individual experiences the game offers, rather than upscaling the open world. In order to keep Ghost of Yotei engaging from start to finish, they employed two strategies.

While Sucker Punch could have opted to "double the map size and use that as a selling point," they decided against doing so fairly early in development. "If we did that, we'd have to fill the map with twice the content, and that content would need to be meaningful so as to not tire the player. Ghost of Tsushima was already a big enough game, so rather than upscaling just for the sake of it, we chose to focus on delivering more variety and higher quality while maintaining a similar scale."

 

[Mister_DoItNice]

Copped that Collectors Edition.

 

[Gizmo_Duck]

Copped that Collectors Edition.

Yep, just put down for the collectors edition

 

[Dillah810]

Copped that Collectors Edition.

Yep, just put down for the collectors edition

I'm coping next paycheck. With the Collectors Edition, you still get to preload the game right?

 

[Ironman]

Confirmed you can main one weapon if you want, switching isn’t requireed

I really want to see more combat with the kusarigamaIf you can main with any that's very interesting. I'll probably lean the most to the dual blades for my first run.

 

[Don Homer]

I really want to see more combat with the kusarigamaIf you can main with any that's very interesting. I'll probably lean the most to the dual blades for my first run.

apparently switching weapons is like switching stances in GoT. So some enemies are weaker against certain weapons