Despite being less than a month away from release, Rise of the Ronin developer Team NINJA still had to clarify whether a few key features would be included in the upcoming game. They just did so by adding a FAQ section to the game's product page on the PlayStation Store website.
To begin with, Rise of the Ronin offers cooperative (PvE) multiplayer for up to four players. There is, however, no PvP combat. This is a change from previous Team Ninja games, such as the Nioh franchise and Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty, where multiplayer was supported for up to three players. Wo Long also featured Souls-like PvP invasions, and the first Nioh had an Arena system for PvP.
Yes. In Rise of the Ronin, players can join up to three others to experience the game’s main story missions in online co-op. Note that a PlayStation Plus membership is required to play online, and there is no PVP combat.
Like Nioh 2 and Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty, Rise of the Ronin supports character creation.
Yes. You can freely customize your character’s visual features, including elements like their face and body shape, hair, voice and more.
Perhaps the most interesting change is the addition of actual difficulty settings, which were always lacking in the studio's previous games.
Yes. Rise of the Ronin includes three difficulty modes: easy, normal, and hard (referred to in-game as Dawn, Dusk, and Twilight) that can be changed at any time. Selecting Dawn difficulty unlocks additional settings, including the option to increase Health recovery from Medicine and reduce Ki loss from attacks.
It is, however, an understandable feature considering that this is an open world title instead of a Soulslike game. By its very nature, it's supposed to be a lot more accessible.
Even so, the developers recently said they consider Rise of the Ronin to be a culmination of all their previous action games. They've integrated ranged combat with weapons like handguns, providing more variety during fights. There are also Fire Pipes, which blow powerful flames. Players can use this ranged weapon to set a group of enemies ablaze or ignite a gunpowder barrel to explode. The latter move can also be performed by grabbing the barrel with the grappling rope (which is also useful to pull enemies toward the player character) and throwing it at enemies.
Rise of the Ronin is a PlayStation 5 exclusive due to launch on March 22. It'll probably land on PC eventually, just like Nioh and its sequel did.
