Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice - Ranking Every Boss From Easiest To Hardest

1. Emma and Isshin Ashina

Now, I know that a lot of people might separate these two just because their fights are rewarded by different achievements, but as soon as you beat Emma the battle with Isshin begins so I’m counting them together.

Emma might look meek and mild but trust me, she’s been studying and borrows attack stylings from across Ashina and even a sub boss called O'Rin of the water. What makes this fight challenging is that while you can get in close to deflect her attacks, she mixes her strategies up far more than other bosses at this point in the game.

If you’re far away she’ll close the gap with a cross style strike that will destroy posture and health, and if you’re up close she will attempt to grab you, which has possibly the best tracking in the game. And it makes you look like an idiot when it lands.

The worst thing about this fight is the pressure she puts on you to get through unharmed because the boss that follows immediately after, Isshin Ashina, is quite easily the toughest boss in the game. The first phase plays out almost in counter to Emma, with slower attacks but ones that you can only really dodge at the last second. You can exploit him at mid-to-long range by forcing a lunge attack, but with errors costing huge amounts of life, it’s almost better to stay close, block what you can and parry his lunges.

The second phase, though, is something else entirely. Drawing on the power of fire, Isshin becomes an almost unstoppable force. There’s even an attack where he moves so fast that you can be hit from all angles, and all of this is just after he’s set fire to the entire floor. There are ways to get around these attacks, but he moves so quickly you’ll need cat-like reflexes in order to exploit them.

I died countless, countless times against this boss and beating Emma and Isshin is cause for celebration. It’s a shame then that it technically nets you the bad ending...