To commemorate 100 days until its release on October 2, Sucker Punch Productions and SIE recently published a State of Play gameplay trailer for Ghost of Yotei, their upcoming open-world action-adventure succeeding 2020’s Ghost of Tsushima. Following the release of the trailer, Automaton Japan talked to Ghost of Yotei co-directors Nate Fox and Jason Connell about what they learned from developing Ghost of Tsushima, and how they utilized that knowledge to improve the gameplay in Yotei.
Fox explains that Ghost of Tsushima still hold a special place in their hearts, however, he admits that the game suffered from some problems with the pacing of the exploration and minigame segments of the game. The developers received feedback about some of the gameplay elements feeling too repetitive and monotonous. ‘Tsushima has various minigames, but sadly some of them – especially the one where you follow a fox to a hidden shrine – don’t have much variety and end up feeling like a chore. We felt this from the player feedback as well,” Fox detailed.
However, it seems like the development team has taken all the feedback into consideration in order to make Ghost of Yotei a more dynamic experience than its predecessor. Fox comments, “Ghost of Yotei improves [the minigame] segments in a sense that we won’t be making players go through the same thing all over again whenever their curiosity leads them to encountering new secrets during exploration. We’ve prepared different kinds of outcomes that could go beyond the player’s expectations. We believe that the beauty of open-world games is in the exploration, so we were determined to offer players a diverse experience .”
As revealed in the State of Play trailer, Ghost of Yotei introduces a “Clue Card” system to the series. While the full details haven’t been revealed yet, it seems like the new mechanic allows you to keep track of the possible branching adventures and is designed to lead the player through the story in a way that suits their playstyle the best. As Fox and Connell say that they wanted to create “an open-world game that lets you drive your own experiences,” it appears that the player will be playing a big role in how the adventure unfolds. While Yotei will inherit iconic side-activities like bamboo-strikes from Tsushima, the sequel will introduce new unique minigame options such as first-person Sumi-e painting or a coin-flicking game inspired by Ohajiki, a traditional children’s game. Overall, it sounds like Ghost of Yotei will be keeping many elements of its predecessor while allowing for more diverse (and less-repetitive) open-world exploration.
Ghost of Yotei releases on October 2, 2025 for PS5.
