Disco Samurai is a brutally difficult and brilliant Sekiro-like rhythm slasher

rockpapershotgun.com:

Disco Samurai is a game that’s so difficult I’d have given up playing sooner if it didn’t contain so many of my absolute favourite action game things. Tense, decisive duels. Violence that’s both brutal and a little silly. Scalpel-sharp parry n' strike back-and-forths. Short stages that dole out chunky progression hits of dopamine, as quickly as they wrest those hits away from you with another humbling beatdown. Perhaps most importantly, it aims to do one thing - rhythm combat - and does it brilliantly. It's got teeth, but it's also got groove.

In the time it takes you to read this, you could grab the Steam demo, and become about 4% better at the game. You’ll need that 4%.

Unlike other rhythm combat games I’ve played, slashing off-beat doesn’t reduce your score here. Instead, you just won’t attack. The music itself is crunchy 4/4 techno, so nothing too hard to wrap your head around. (Why not disco? you ask. It takes place in a town called Disco, I respond, just as perplexed.) Parrying works the same way. Only on-beat deflections are successful, though you’ll know when one is coming due to an indicator. Each foe has a stamina meter, and they’ll enter a cartoony star-headed stun state once you whittle it down with parries, slashes, and some other moves I’ll get to in a sec.

If you don’t want to dent your lovely katana though, you can just dash. Again, only on the beat. We chop off left feet ‘round these parts. I’m not entirely sure why you would dodge, since it doesn’t affect your foe’s stamina meter, but maybe it comes into play more later. As you perform hits, dodges, and parries, you’ll gradually build up a flow meter. What happens when you build enough? A gun. A gun happens. You get about four shots per full meter with the default pistol, so this is less of a super move and more something you can weave in to your repertoire. If you want to spend a bigger chunk of flow, you can kick. Vases and other environmental objects make lovely smashing sounds, and also do big