The PlayStation has a lot of high-profile games coming up, from Horizon Forbidden West to God of War: Ragnarok, but it's important not to forget smaller PlayStation titles when contemplating the future of Sony's console. For instance, Sloclap's new action-adventure beat 'em up game Sifu has been making the rounds lately, steadily gaining more and more attention as it draws closer to release. In Sifu, players take control of a young martial artist seeking vengeance on the five assassins who killed their family. The protagonist's magical medallion causes them to age rapidly and resurrects them whenever they die, shortening their life span while guiding them on the path to martial arts mastery.
Sifu's life-giving medallion isn't just a means to explain respawning; it's emblematic of a core concept in Sifu. The player is meant to constantly learn from mistakes and get better at the game with every sitting, mastering Sifu's network of offensive and defensive techniques alongside the game's protagonist. This means Sifu discourages spamming attacks unlike many other beat 'em ups; players who do so are bound to fall prey to Sifu's enemies and lose out on certain abilities. The result is that players are bound to invest themselves strongly into the game and its world, rather than mindlessly defeating enemies wave by wave.
Sifu's Emphasis on Difficulty
In a lot of beat 'em ups, players are at liberty to constantly use their strongest attacks to clear out oncoming enemies, or at least to simply play as aggressively as possible to win. Button mashing in this way is definitely fun now and again, giving players a satisfying sense of unstoppability, but that's not the kind of experience Sloclap wants in Sifu. Because learning martial arts is such an important theme in the game, Sloclap wants players to learn alongside the Sifu protagonist, meaning it has to mitigate the potential to button mash through Sifu's combat.
Sifu certainly has good ways of doing that. For instance, Sifu directly rewards skillful play through the use of the player's score. Shrines in Sifu allow players to unlock new perks and techniques to use in battle, many of which are locked behind one of three requirements: the Sifu protagonist's age, the player's XP total, and the player's score on their current level. The latter is the most interesting since it means some Sifu perks can only be obtained if fans play skillfully enough. Racking up an impressive score in Sifu is much harder if players constantly take damage, which resets the score multiplier. That means fans can't charge into every battle with guns blazing, or else enemies will find lots of openings to deal damage and keep the player's score low.
In general, the way Sifu enemies are designed discourages spamming attacks as well. The player might be able to parry and dodge blows, but enemies can block attacks and withstand knockback too. If an enemy blocks a player's rapid burst of attacks, that enemy gets an opportunity to deal serious damage, punishing the player's recklessness. Sifu players have to watch their surroundings and pay attention to each enemy's behavior, constantly changing up tactics to get through each opponent's defenses. The result is that Sifu is very hard to beat by simply mashing the attack buttons.
Getting Invested in Sifu
Sifu's ways of mitigating button-mashing not only make combat more challenging, but they get players more invested in the game too. Playing close attention to enemies and learning to perform combo inputs consistently encourages Sifu players to build a relationship with the game, meaning they'll care more about Sifu's story and each objective they complete too. Beat 'em ups where players freely mow down enemies can be a delight, but Sifu introduces some valuable variety to the genre through its emphasis on learning. It's great to see this martial arts title dedicate itself to the pursuit of mastery.
Sifu releases February 8, 2022 for PC, PS4, and PS5.