Sifu: Overview & Critic Reception

Combat

Fights are close-quarters and defensive. You chain light and heavy strikes, grabs and thrown or picked-up objects, but the main skill is parrying and dodging to break an enemy's Structure meter, which opens them to a finishing attack. Taking hits fills your own Structure, so a room of enemies is a negotiation between offence and defence rather than a button-mashing exercise.

Each level ends with a boss. Fajar, "The Botanist", leads The Squats and is the first. Sean, "The Fighter", fights with a long staff in The Club. Kuroki, "The Artist", leads The Museum: she starts with a bladed chain staff and switches to dual kunai in the second phase, and she throws knives, so the Weapon Catch skill is useful. Jinfeng, "The CEO", uses a chained flail from The Tower, and Yang, "The Leader", waits in The Sanctuary.

The aging system

When you die, your death counter goes up by one and, when you rise, your age goes up by the counter's total. A fresh run starts at 20: the first death costs one year, the next two, then three, and so on. The counter is lowered by beating tougher enemies and bosses or by choosing the shrine upgrade that resets it. Finishing a level resets the counter but not your age, and there is no way to get younger within a run. Older age means less health and more damage, and some skills and shrine upgrades cannot be unlocked past certain ages.

Story and endings

The story is a straight revenge line across five levels. If you kill a target you are sent back in time to re-do the fights until you learn Wude; sparing all five targets leads to the enlightenment ending, with a post-credits scene.

Platforms and updates

Sifu launched on PS4, PS5 and Windows in February 2022 and later came to Switch (November 2022) and Xbox (March 2023). A content update in spring 2022 added the Student, Disciple and Master difficulty modes, an August 2022 free update added outfits, a scoring system and modifiers, and the free Arenas update (28 March 2023) added 45 challenges across nine locations.

Summary

Sifu rewards repetition: the main story is short (around 7.5 hours on HowLongToBeat averages, as reported by Deku Deals), but lowering your age by replaying levels is where most of the time goes.

Pros & Cons