Summary
Highlights
The 1.600 patch introduces a new raid for Legends mode, unlocking on Friday the 10th at 10 AM Pacific. Survival curses now display appropriate icons, and a new 'Watanabe Mode' with lounge music has been added to the display settings. The video also notes a reduction in the fox's volume in the Legends main menu and a change in the display order for Quickplay and Campaigns.
New sword VFX have been added, mostly imported from Ghost of Tsushima Legends, unlocking through weapon upgrades. The presenter highlights an inconsistent overlapping VFX icon for the Shinobi class. He also criticizes the new main menu navigation for Legends, requiring players to enter the campaign first, unlike the more direct access in Tsushima.
Specific survival maps have improved navigation with better-placed grapple hook points. However, the leaderboard display for survival has been altered, creating a counterintuitive 32-spot 'front page' that makes navigating to lower ranks awkward.
Nightmare missions are now part of Quickplay, counting towards achievements, and a 'vote to replay' option for failed survival missions has been added. The 'Weightless Spirit' bow, added from Tsushima, has a strange description that claims fast firing, which the presenter refutes, noting its primary feature is straight-shooting arrows that don't descend. He compares it to other bows, highlighting its original buff in Tsushima's Iki Island DLC that improved its speed and usefulness, which is not fully reflected in its current iteration.
New charms include 'Daimyo's Generosity' and 'Sensei's Teachings,' allowing players to sacrifice their currency or XP to teammates. The 'Samurai's Honor' charm now offers offensive stats on its top slot, whereas prior versions only offered defensive stats. The 'Shadow's Bite' charm has legendary-grade percentages on its top slot. A significant combat improvement is the ability for players to perform a double dodge, offering better evasion, address tracking issues from enemy AI.
Hallucinated enemies can now target each other, but the presenter criticizes the implementation, as players still cannot target or assassinate them effectively, making hallucination abilities a detriment to the team. He contrasts this with Tsushima's hysteria perk, which allowed players to take advantage of distracted enemies. The Odachi bullwark stance now correctly registers its counterattack as a counter for damage calculations.
Corruption zones now despawn when their summoners die, and their visibility has been improved. Several legendary items received buffs, including 'Lightning's Bite,' which saw a significant damage increase; the legendary Yari, with an enhanced weakening radius; and the 'Thunderous Katana,' which now reliably procs with every hit. The Jufu's health was decreased, though the presenter believes it still needs further reduction.
Assassins can now run during their ultimate ability, greatly improving mobility, a feature present in Tsushima. Attuned enemies now take significantly more damage, which the presenter notes is a welcome change for players frustrated by the previous difficulty of this mechanic.
Several archer abilities and items received nerfs, such as reduced ultimate gain from spirit shatter and decreased ammo return from resupply. The presenter finds these nerfs negligible for skilled archers. He expresses strong disappointment with the implementation of the 'Spirit Kunai,' a beloved legendary from Tsushima Legends, stating that its damage nerfs and lack of the 'Super Massive' perk make it a lukewarm and disappointing addition.
The video points out unmentioned nerfs, including reduced ammo capacity for bows (from 10 to 9 arrows) and lower drop rates for scorch bombs. The spirit brew legendary charm's sake refill mechanism has also been altered. The presenter critiques Sucker Punch's approach to game difficulty, arguing that starting with an unnecessarily difficult game and then incrementally balancing it is less effective than starting with a moderate difficulty and gradually increasing it, as players adapt to extreme challenges and may then complain about subsequent ease.