When you are called back at the Kennin-ji Temple in Onimusha Way of the Sword; and if you had been paying attention to the dialog during your battle with Ifuu at the same place, you know what’s coming – a battle with his brother, Burai – and if Ifuu was all about wind attacks, this one is going to be all lightning. The boss makes an appearance with some great music and animation, so enjoy that. When it comes to combat, the first phase is somewhat manageable, however, the boss gets out all the big movesets in the second phase.
This, like the one with Benkei, is one of the more enjoyable fights in the game where you can be aggressive and punish specific movesets for the boss. Here is how to fight and win in this battle against Burai in Onimusha Way of the Sword.
Strategy against Burai in Onimusha Way of the Sword
The cadence of this fight will generally flow like this – the boss will perform his thrust or overhead slash, you will counter that with a parry or deflect, the boss will keel over and be staggered, and you will get some time to get in a good number of melee hits. He will then do a kick before getting some distance between you and him.
The Kick can be Reflex Dodged to further punish him. After this is done, he will then get some distance, throw in a couple of his lightning attacks, and once you avoid or take damage from those, this cycle will repeat once again.
Lightning Attack 1 – This will have two rows of lightning orbs. The first row will fire, and then the second row, which has these orbs placed in between the gaps on the first row, will fire. You will have enough time to strafe each attack.
Lightning Attack 2 – The orbs will criss-cross over a small area around you, dodge a couple of times to evade these. The window here is not as liberal as in the previous lightning attack moveset, so get those dodges executed quickly.
The pattern of the above moves will remain the same right through Phase 2, even when he is Empowered, except for a couple of new attacks that he now introduces into the mix.
Key Phase 2 Moves To Watch Out For
He will always begin Phase 2 with his disappearing act. He will do this move a lot of times in Phase 2, and it is a great move to take advantage of. What you need to do, is watch for a purple shadow to appear below you. The moment that does, get ready for your L1 + X deflect. It is immensely satisfying to pull this off, even if you miss the timing a bit, you will take stamina damage at worst, but if you get it right, he will bounce off and land staggered, giving you time to get in your attacks.
The other move that you need to watch out for is actually a feint move. He will raise his leg as if to kick you, but then just hold that pose. If you keep attacking, he will disappear, land behind you and deliver a thrust that takes out a good chunk of your health. If you also just hold your attack, then so will he. The difficulty here, is that you are highly likely to be in that zone of delivering sword hits, and may not be able to hold back.
The difference between his normal Kick and the feint kick is that while feinting, he will hold his Switchglaive over his shoulder, while in the normal Kick, it will remain at his side.
The final move to watch out for in Phase 2 is when he charges up the Switchglaive, then does an overhead smash that significantly extends the reach of the Switchglaive down a straight line at you. It is best to dodge this attack. If you miss, this will take out some 40% of your health.
An upgraded Earth Shakers Oni Armament is perfect for this fight, though the one thing to keep in mind here is the timing – you don’t want to execute it the moment the boss decides to build distance and do his lightning attacks. The best time to land these is when you have just staggered the boss a bit from a parry or a deflect.
Once the fight ends, the map opens up a couple of side quests for you to work on. Do those and get the necessary upgrades to be able to take out the next boss in the game, which happens to be a major difficulty spike and one of the more challenging bosses in Onimusha: Way of the Sword.
