You won’t regret putting in the hours
★★★★
IF you’re anything like me, you’ll enjoy a good kung fu flick – whether it’s classic Bruce Lee fare or more modern twists ranging from Kung Fu Hustle to the Ip Man series.
Enter Sifu, a brawler with some accurately mo-capped action that’s here to punch you out with style.
From the developers of Absolver, an inventive multi-player brawler, Sifu is a wonderfully focused singleplayer take on third-person action.
Played out as a classic revenge story, it has you battle through a range of environments in search of the masters who killed your father.
Sifu’s twist is that a magic pendant can keep you alive when you would normally die. The cost is that you age, with each “death” causing greater leaps in time.
Starting at 20, by the time your luck runs out you’ll be over 70. With each age increase, your character can hit harder but take less damage, all the while getting more grey and wizened.
Thankfully the simple act of punching and kicking in Sifu is a joy.
Based on a simple system of light and strong attacks, blocks, throws and parries, it’s easy enough to get stuck in, with more complex moves becoming unlocked as you progress.
Make no mistake, though, Sifu is hard.
It’s hard to the point that the developer added an easy mode after launch but, like games such as Dark
Souls, that difficulty is rewarding once you slowly become a kung fu master, with each run becoming faster and more lethal for your opponents.
It also runs impressively well on the Switch, for some highly recommended kung fu action on the go.