Rise of the Ronin Receives Its Most Extensive Update Yet

Ali Haider April 18, 2024

Team Ninja and Koei Tecmo have released a new update for Rise of the Ronin that patches the game to version 1.04 bringing several changes.

In terms of weapon adjustments for Rise of the Ronin 1.04 patch, several tweaks have been made across different weapon types to balance gameplay. This includes adjustments to martial skill damage and ki consumption for sabers, polearms, bayonets, greatswords, oxtail blades, and unarmed combat. Additionally, improvements have been made to shooting attacks and charge attacks for certain weapon styles.

Character control has also been refined, with adjustments to input buffering for martial skills and normal attacks, as well as the ability to cancel certain actions to perform martial skills more efficiently. Animations for various combat maneuvers have been sped up, enhancing the overall fluidity of gameplay.

Enemy behaviors have been fine-tuned across different difficulty levels, with adjustments to boss actions and enemy accuracy. Mission-specific adjustments have been implemented to ensure a more balanced and challenging experience for players.

Several quality-of-life improvements have been introduced in update 1.04 for Rise of the Ronin, including adjustments to camera angles, auto-run mechanics, and equipment management. Bug fixes address various issues related to combat mechanics, character interactions, enemy behaviors, and graphical glitches.

Rise of the Ronin Update Version 1.04 (Released April 18, 2024)

Adjustments to Weapons

Saber: Adjusted Martial Skill damage to be fair with Ki consumption.
Mumyo-ryu
- Martial Skill “Kubira Whirl” and “Kubira Vortex”: Now easier to hit enemies afar.
Polearm: Lowered Ki consumption across the board for all styles.
Mumyo-ryu
- Martial Skill “Will-o-the-wisp Purge”: Now easier to hit enemies afar.
Bayonet: Reduced Ki consumption of Martial Skills, and adjusted damage.
Mumyo-ryu
- Increased max. Ki damage of shooting attacks.
Greatsword: Adjusted each style with a focus on charge attacks.
Mumyo-ryu
- Martial Skill “Rock Crusher”: Changed so that attack will slam enemy when hit, when activated by holding button.
Oxtail Blade: Adjusted and lowered Ki consumption of Martial Skills and non-weapon attacks.
Mumyo Kaishin-ryu
- Martial Skill “Beast Thrasher”: Reduced the time needed for charging the charge attack.
Unarmed: Reduced Ki consumption and adjusted Martial Skill damage.
- Martial Skill “Raven’s Claw”: Added invisibility briefly right after activating the skill.

Character Control Adjustments

Adjusted input buffering of Martial Skills during normal attacks.
Adjusted to make Flash Attack and Violent Gale trigger faster during normal attacks.
Adjusted so that grappling hook triggers faster during normal attacks.
You can now cancel Flash Attack and Violent Gale, to perform an Martial Skill.
Adjusted input buffering of normal attacks during Flash Attack and Violent Gale.
Flash Attack and Violent Gale animations are now faster.
Adjusted so that actions after staggering an enemy with counterspark responds better.
Mid-air counterspark is now triggered earlier.
Increased Ki recovery on successful mid-air countersparks.
Adjusted so that transitions to another action upon a successful mid-air counterspark is faster.
Adjusted input buffering of normal attacks during Blade Flash.
Heavy Weapon (Odachi, Polearm, Greatsword) and Normal Weapons (Katana, Spear, Bayonet):
- Reduced Blood Gauge loss when blocking enemy attacks.
During combat and locked on to enemy, Combat Style window is now displayed faster.
Can now guard during pick up motion.
Grapple motion adjusted slightly.
Other adjustments to animations of actions.

Enemy Adjustments

On “Midnight” difficulty, some bosses now use items.
Adjusted action selection of bosses on “Dusk” and “Twilight” difficulty.
- Mission “The Way of the Warrior”
- Mission “The Seed of Doubt”
- Mission “Chopped Liver”
- Mission “The Battle of Toba-Fushimi”
- Mission “The Physician’s Request” “A Vow of Steel”
  - Adjusted so that there is now sufficient time to guard/counterspark/dodge in between 1 boss’s attack and the other boss’s follow up attack.
- Mission “The Last Shogun”
  - Adjusted so that it is less likely that both bosses will use their Martial Skill at the same time.
- Adjusted to not place flames near the boss when they move, and shortened duration.
- Adjusted general accuracy of Boar enemies when targeting player, as well as adjusting movement in places where there are height differences.

Other Adjustments

Adjusted camera work when nearby walls to now better angles where you can see the character and your opponent better.
Adjusted Auto-run mechanic when the destination is set to an Unruly Area. Player will now stop running as soon as they reach the unruly Area instead of the exact marker location.
Can now dismount horse while in Auto-run.
Adjusted enemy placement of Unruly Area in “Midnight” difficulty.
Removed some flags that show up during Horseback Archery at the Military Academy in Edo.
Can now change/swap Veiled Arts at Equipment Screen and equipment presets.
Can now join the same room, even when each player has different difficulty settings during Cooperate.
Adjusted so that certain Black Marketers will sell “Firefighter’s Cowl”.
Post ending, Pilgrim Dogs will now bring back higher rarity items.
Adjusted the amount of Silver obtained when petting other player’s pilgrim dogs.
Adjusted motion blur of graphics mode “Graphics” and “Raytracing”.
Now able to play music on PS5 while playing.

Bug Fixes

Fixed an issue where Veiled Arts set to different combat styles had different specs when compared to its original style.
Fixed an issue where switching styles during specific action will result in an unintended action being triggered.
Fixed an issue where you could receive damage during Handgun Critical Hit or praying at shrines.
Fixed an issue where the horse would stop moving when circling around on stairs or slopes.
Fixed an issue where horses would have strange angles.
Fixed issue in Combat Training where Kogoro Katsura, Yukichi Fukuzawa, Eiichi Shibusawa would recover Ki during attack sequences.
Fixed issues where enemy and NPC will loop in unintended action/behavior.
Fixed issue where you will be stuck in crouch when entering storehouse, after clearing a Unruly Area in a specific way.
Fixed rare instances where enemies will get buried underground.
Fixed issue where once in a while, Combined Critical Hit would fail.
Fixed unnatural transitions of specific movements.
Fixed issue where in “Midnight” difficulty, an already restored Unruly Area would return to being unsolved.
Fixed issues where an unintended score was obtainable during Grinding Training.
Rankings will now be based on scores obtained from this version and onwards.
“High-scores obtained on previous versions will be re-calculated to its correct value after the update.
Fixed bug where the same user’s character and pilgrim dog would appear excessively.
Fixed bug where the fourth accessory would not save properly in presets.
Fixed bug where in origin “Unsharpened”, if Charm is over 101, luck would decrease.
Fixed bug where Blade Repairing after selecting “Unsharpened” would keep the luck status even after resetting.
Fixed bug during Bond Mission “The Seed of Doubt”, where after selecting a specific dialogue choice, Kogoro Katsura’s stats would not increase.
Fixed some background texture that looked rough.
Fixed issue where in graphics mode “Prioritize Graphics”, some shadow shapes would change suddenly.
Fixed performance issues in certain stages.
Fixed issues where in certain stages or circumstances, models would suddenly pop or switch appearance.
Fixed issue where when equipping certain equipment would cause the model to extend.
Other minor fixes.

The patch notes are taken from the official support page of Team Ninja on Twitter.

Rise of the Ronin is out now for PS5. In a recent fiscal year update, Koei Tecmo had to revise their forecast because of the lackluster sales of the games released during their latest fiscal year.