Tokyo Game Show 2025

Nioh 3 Hands-On: Getting Stomped into the Ground for 10 Minutes Straight

I am no stranger to Souls-like games. Beyond the Fromsoft titles, I've played a ton, including those quite similar to Nioh 3—namely the original Nioh and The First Berserker: Khazan. Because of this, Nioh 3 was instantly familiar.

In the Tokyo Game Show 2025 demo, the focus is on the combat and nothing but the combat. You fight a grand total of six enemies and then a boss. Two of these are normal samurai. One is a mounted warrior (who never respawns after the first kill) and two are oni—one that is feasting on a corpse and another which comes out of the fog. Lastly, there is also a player ghost you can summon to fight. It's basically a quick showcase of the different types of enemies in the game and how to fight them—and with the demo's default gear, they are hardly a challenge.

However, these enemies do allow you to play around a bit with the new big mechanic of the game, switching characters. On the fly you can switch between a sword-wielding samurai character and a dual dagger-wielding ninja. In practice, I preferred the samurai's familiar power to the ninja's speed but appreciated the option to change between the two—especially mid-combo. Of course, when it comes down to it, the normal enemies are little more than a sideshow to the main focus of the demo: the boss.

The boss of this demo is a hulking oni haunting an old temple. And while I had about 10 minutes to fight him after messing about with the ninja and the normal enemies, I wasn't able to get the clear—though I feel that with another 10 minutes I would have been able to easily.

Basically, this boss is one of those enemies that, while not particularly tough in a vaccuum, requires time to defeat. The roadblock you face is that the majority of his combos contain at least one roll-catch—an attack where the enemy pauses just long enough that, if you dodge in anticipation, you'll still be hit by the attack (and most likely subsequent ones) after your dodge. The only thing you can do is simply memorize the attack patterns. However, as there are only around five of them—and since the save point shrine is right next to the boss room—it doesn't feel too unfair.

All in all, this little slice of Nioh 3 feels like Nioh. So while it may be stating the obvious, if you liked the other games in the series, you'll probably like this one too.

Nioh 3 is set to be released on PlayStation 5 and PC on February 6, 2026.