It is Finished

As I sat down thinking about what I was going to say for this review, it dawned on me that this will make the 3rd time that I have written up a review for Sifu (4th if you consider the preview I did for the game before release) Well If you’ve seen either of the Miles Morales/Spider-Verse films (and if you haven’t stop reading this review and go watch them… don’t worry, I’ll wait) you’ll be familiar with how I am gonna do this intro:

So here we go again for the 3rd time… Sifu is a roguelike martial arts action game. Throughout its campaign players will go on a quest to avenge their fallen father but to accomplish this goal they will have to take down each of the gang leaders before facing the final boss. Of course, being a roguelike means you will die, die, and die some more; the wrinkle in Sifu though is as you die you age and as you age you become more of a master in martial arts. How this works in game is when you die you increase in age which makes your attacks stronger because you have gotten better with age, but the drawback is your defense and health is lower so it’s a clever risk vs reward system. There are also weapons and other game modes in the base game… there you are all caught up.

MSRP: Base game $39.99 (update is free)
Platforms: PC (reviewed), Xbox, PlayStation, Switch
Price I’d Pay: It’s a ‘free update’ sooooo…

This review is going to focus on the new (and final) expansion for the Sifu game from the developers at Sloclap. Even though this is the final update for the game a motion picture was announced from the director of the John Wick series so Sifu will return. In this final update the developers have expanded upon the already great Arena’s mode that was dropped in the game last year. Arenas allows players to set up all kinds of martial arts goodies; you want to remake the Matrix fight when Neo goes up against a billion Agent Smith’s? Arena’s lets you do that and so much more, and with this update the developers have expanded on enemy types, challenges, levels and even gives players a few new costumes.

Arena’s is a separate mode from the main campaign and as such can get away with some otherwise wild mechanics. In this new update players will have multiple modes to choose from such as Capture, which will place points on a map that needs to be captured and held while defeating thugs in mortal combat. There of course is the tried-and-true Survival which will see players try and hold out against wave upon wave of goons, and last but certainly not least my favorite of the new modes: Manhunt. Manhunt is exactly as it sounds, there will be a marked target to take down, but players will have to fight through their security/bodyguards in order to get to them. The targets will disengage from combat and send goons so players will have to be proficient with their blocks and counters. And sad to say, even though I have now played this game on every system except for the Switch; I am not proficient and got my ass whipped a lot.

But you know what, I still had a great time with Sifu’s ‘swan song’ of an update. Finishing off this utterly fantastic martial arts gem with a veritable smorgasbord of items with 9 new maps, 45 new challenges per arena and the 5 game modes. Oh, did I mention that this was a FREE update? And let’s be honest that’s just stuff you don’t see game developers doing a lot of nowadays for this level of content. And that’s in addition to the main story, the editor which allows players to choregraph the martial-arts fight sequence of their dreams and that includes all the costumes some of which are from movies like Bruce Lee’s yellow suit from Game of Death among others.

Whew… I mean if you are a martial arts fan this game is – as cliché as this sounds it’s really made for you. A special shoutout to developer Sloclap who has certainly honed own their skills to the level of ‘Sifu’ since the already amazing Absolver. With this final update you all have sent this off into the world like Caine from ‘Kung Fu’ for all to experience and as we all hone our martial arts skills; I think I speak for all the fans when I say we can’t wait for the next fight.

Review copy of game provided by publisher.