You do have to progress to a certain point before you can get to the Dilapidated Temple. If the first handful of enemies are too difficult, just run. Sounds lame but yu can either spend the time to learn how to block and counterattack (which will be 100% necessary later on) or you can simply sprint past everyone to progress. This game is definitely trial by fire. It no kidding took me a good month of practice (intermittently) to get through the first few minibosses, and I played the Dark Souls games extensively. Just be patient and adapt to the speed of attacks, you'll pick it up.
I found a way to ’sneak up’ and get 1 free deathblow on the red-eyed restrained giant (or whatever they call him), and now I am exploring Hirata Estate. I’ve mined just about everything there is to find, and now I am trying to get to the next save point. (Bamboo: Thicket Slope Idol).
But....you have to travel a bit from the last idol to get to the Shinobi Hunter and you cannot go around him and ‘rest’ at the idol until he is dispatched. That’s fine, I’ve died so much I think my mom has Dragon Rot, but it SUCKS that you have to retrace so much distance just to fight him again. At least with the tied up giant, there was an Idol just a few feet away and only 2 dudes to easily dispatch to trigger that fight again.
I don’t mind the game being hard, but this is silly. The Internet says that the purists want it to remain hard, and I get that....but not all of us are 23 year olds living in our basement and having nothing to do all day but game. I’ve got a few hours a day, (maybe) and it sucks that I’ve been trying to kill the same boss for a week....sucks to the point of just not being fun anymore.
I bought the book (it’s over 500 pages and reminds me of a school textbook) and see that coming up soon is an area where there is some crazy snake that is going to take a significant amount of luck to dispatch....I don’t know.
Thinking maybe I might pause and reconsider buying a PS4 so that I can play Ghost of Tsushima instead.
My 17 year old is reading this over my shoulder and said, “dad you don’t sound like a very committed Shinobi!”
LOL, God I love that kid!
