Rise of the Ronin includes a relatively new feature that I believe should become standard across all games going forward.
It wasn’t the combat that intimidated me most when starting Rise of the Ronin — it was the history.
Although I’ve played a couple of games set in late 19th-century Japan, I freely admit that my knowledge of the Edo period was surface-level at best. I vaguely knew of the Tokugawa shogunate and Sakamoto Ryōma, but would struggle to go into any depth on either topic if pressed. But from the opening moments of Rise of the Ronin, I recognized that this specific location and time period in which it was set would be an integral and influential force that permeated every aspect of the experience, and not just a backdrop for the story Team Ninja wanted to tell.
Getting by isn’t possible with just a passing understanding of the setting. Thankfully, Rise of the Ronin gives players the necessary tools to learn with a fantastic feature that every game could benefit from.Context-sensitive
In Rise of the Ronin, players are free to pause the game at any moment, including during cutscenes, and be shown a list of key terms related to what is happening at that moment. From there, they can access an encyclopedia with further details on each person, faction, and their interactions. The encyclopedia is extensive and a little intimidating if you just dive into it in the menu, but it works far better if you access it in real time. During a cutscene, you can hit the DualSense controller’s touchpad and bring up a list of terms relevant to that conversation. After choosing the topic that you want, you’re then directly brought to that encyclopedia entry, where you can learn more in a concisely written paragraph.
You can go a step further by hitting Triangle to see related entries.
