The promised duel of taking on the brothers together finally comes through in the end-game in Onimusha Way of the Sword. You would have taken on Ifuu, and later on Burai – both tough battles in their own right, but in Storm Chaser mission, you are made to return to Kennin-ji Temple, from where you are taken through a portal into a massive arena – with both brothers ready to dish out everything that you have seen in their individual fights and some new combos.
But, you are also now sharper, well-equipped with a set of skills, and battle-hardened enough to face them off and defeat them. Here is how to go about defeating Ifuu & Burai in Onimusha Way of the Sword
Strategies to defeat Ifuu & Burai in Onimusha Way of the Sword
The good thing here is that they take damage quite a lot – especially Ifuu, and bringing down their health and stamina is not very difficult at all. Ensure that you have done a majority, if not all of the side quests available till this point, so that you have enough material to upgrade your gear and get Skills in Onimusha WotS.
You would have entered this fight just after clearing 2 rifts, so if you are low on potions, go back to the Spirit Mirror, save, and then come back to the fight.
Both brothers will, most of the times, only come at you one on one. If you are engaged in battling one, and the other, who is out of vision at the moment is launching an attack, you will get the red semi-circle with the direction pointing where the attack is coming from.
This brings me to the next important tip – try and keep both in your line of sight. This may not always be possible since the boss fight arena is huge, but you will still be able to do that if for most of the time if you keep this as an objective.
This is one fight where it pays to be aggressive – you will be able to counter most moves, and muscle memory will quickly kick in. After a parry / deflect / dodge, go in and attack as much as you can.
You can also damage both if they are in proximity to each other. Your Oni Armaments like Earth Shakers will damage both if they get caught near to each other. This also applies if you manage to Break Issen one, and the other is nearby. It is great to pull these off, and immensely satisfying.
Each has 2 health bars – if you get done with both health bars of one of the two brothers, it will then be a one on one encounter with the remaining brother.
With these general tips out of the way, let me put below specific moves that are new, or need to be watched out for.
Opening the Fight
The fight will be opened by Ifuu, with his 2 slashes, that will end in a blade barrage if you deflect both correctly and in time. He will continue with these, and by the time you are done deflecting his attacks, his stamina should be down to 30-40%. If you have your Oni Armament active, pull out the Earth Shakers, and get in a good hit. With this, you will get your Break Issen in, and Ifuu’s health would be down to ~60% with Burai having not even started his attacks.
Burai will almost always begin with his thrust, which also, is easy to parry. Ifuu will likely keep doing his swipe attacks, and the wind attack. Parry it back to him. Burai will slip in his Lightning Attacks, which should be as easy to avoid as before.
New Tag Team Movesets
There are three tag team movesets that are new, which you need to watch out for
Red Swipe Attack
Burai will disappear like he used to in his fight, but this time with Ifuu, and both will then attack you with a Red Hit Swipe from their Switchglaives. This move is almost similar to how Burai used to do a swipe from distance, only thing different being that this is a Red Attack. Deflect this, to deal stamina damage to both.
Lightning Whip From Burai + Ifuu Pulling You In
Burai will ready his Lightning Whip, and Ifuu will inflate the bags on his back simultaneously. Shoot the bags on Ifuu’s back, and he will fall down on Burai, disrupting his attack as well. Both will be staggered for a while, and you can get in your own attacks
The Flying Attack + Lightning & Wind AoE
This is the one attack to watch out for. Both will get onto a … flying aircraft. First, Burai will launch 3 lightning strikes at various points in the arena, and then Ifuu will do a wind AoE attack. The places where lightning will strike will have a purple glow a moment before the lightning, so move away from those. The wind attacks will all go in a straight line, so stand near the edge of the arena, and there will be plenty of open spaces in between the two straight lines that the attack goes on.
Next, both will swing down with a Red Attack. This one also is telegraphed, and you will be able to see them approach from a distance. Time the deflect and both will get thrown on the ground, with a good window available to you to go in and punish them with hits.
With the brothers now taken care of, you have the big three left as you enter end-game in Onimusha Way of the Sword – tough fights against Sasaki Ganryu (once again, yes – this time with 2 phases), Dokyo, & Yoshitsune.
