In Defense of Not Giving it the Time of Day - Stopping Sekiro

Have you ever considered not doing the thing? Have you ever believed you’d be better off not following the demands and requests of others? For a while, I have been living by the decision not to see everything, not to be part of the group, and not to fear missing out on something. By ignoring FOMO as the stupid concept that it is, I’m free to enjoy whatever it is I wish to enjoy, without the social pressures of keeping up with fads and fashions—the only downside is that I don’t always have something to write on DagonDogs.com.

To give you an idea of what I mean, I have seen a grand total of 5 movies from the Disney MCU franchise and even fewer from the DC universe. Despite Spider-Man being one of my favorite superheroes as a kid, I still haven’t seen the last three live-action movies. I have seen two episodes of The Mandalorian, two episodes of Tiger King, and one season of Game of Thrones. Do these proclamations disturb you? If they do, perhaps you should consider following my path:

If you don’t really like something enough to continue engaging with it, don’t.

Why confess to my sins of not seeing these renowned and popular pieces of pop culture? What spurred this thought in my mind that I felt it necessary to write down here in a blog format? The answer is, I don’t like Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice.

Okay. There’s a little more to it, for the sake of keeping it short, I’m mostly talking about Sekiro in this post. I’m a fan of almost all the From Software games that I have played in the past, starting with Demon’s Souls in 2009. Many of their games had steep learning curves that, while harsh and intimidating at the start, ended up being extremely rewarding by the end. Bloodborne was the most notoriously difficult game for me to grasp. In fact, I was more irritated than pleased with it the first time through. However, there were enough reasons for me to keep coming back and it eventually clicked. Even though I was so irritated with my initial playthrough, I stuck it out, everything clicked, and now Bloodborne is my favorite of the From Software catalog as a result.

I wanted to give Sekiro the same benefit of the doubt, especially after all the praise it received. Perhaps it too would become an instant classic in my mind. I wanted to be as lenient and understanding of the game as I eventually was with Bloodborne, so I would not have to eat my words again. I thought that, if I lived by my motto, I’d miss out on another Bloodborne-like revelation and experience. Yet, I’ve found that Sekiro does not have the reasons necessary to justify giving it the time of day.

I was able to recognize, even in my most irritated moods with Bloodborne, that it was mostly a fault of my own abilities and that I didn’t enjoy myself simply because I wasn’t good enough and it hadn’t yet ‘clicked.’ In Sekiro, I’m not good enough either, however, I don’t think I’ll enjoy it if I do eventually get good enough. I don’t find the combat as engaging or interesting. I don’t find the world itself interesting enough to keep me engaged either. While I’m a sucker for traditional Japanese stories and myths, nothing about Sekiro stands out enough to justify my irritation with it. I have started and restarted this game multiple times over the past few months, and while my skills with the combat have improved and I’ve explored more of the world each time, I’m just not having much fun.

If it’s your favorite From Software game, fine. If you think it’s the best, you’re wrong, but that’s okay. I am willing to give enough leeway to a game or a show or a movie in the beginning. But if it’s clear to me that I have to invest more in it, there had better be something worth my while in the end. Bloodborne proved to me that it was worth my effort. But watching The Mandalorian is not going to make me a Star Wars fan again. Catching an episode of Wandavision is not going to motivate me to do all the homework and catch up on all the Marvel movies I haven’t yet seen. And banging my head against the wall of the Sekiro gameplay is not going to make me enjoy it any more than I do now. I know it doesn’t change much beyond what I’m already doing, so there’s no point.

If ever you feel peer pressured to try something, and the peers doing the pressuring tell you that it gets good later, really consider if it’s worth your time. If it doesn’t do enough from the start, maybe you’re better off moving on to something else.

…but I’ll probably be eating my words again soon enough…

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