Since its world premiere during PlayStation’s State Of Play last week, Ghost of Yōtei has become one of 2025’s biggest releases. A follow-up to 2020’s Ghost Of Tsushima, the sequel will tell the story of a new “Ghost” some 300 years after the first game. But in addition to the refresh in premise and setting, developer Sucker Punch Productions will also address one of the biggest criticisms of the first game.
Sucker Punch creative directors Nate Fox and Jason Connell said that removing overused elements of open-world game design will be a focus for the sequel, according to the New York Times.
“One challenge that comes with making an open-world game is the repetitive nature of doing the same thing over again,” Connell said. “We wanted to balance against that and find unique experiences.”
Those experiences remain to be seen, but Fox and Connell shared that two recent research trips the team took to northern Japan were a major point of the inspiration for this follow-up both in terms of location and how this sequel will depart from the critically acclaimed original. Fox said that a trip to Shiretoko National Park presented the simultaneous beauty and danger of Japan’s natural landscapes.
“Being in this incredibly beautiful park with jagged cliffs and water, yet all the time being aware there were dangerous bears, was electrifying,” Fox told the Times. “We strive to bring that into the video game — that feeling of danger.”
These key changes signaled by Ghost of Yōtei’s developers are a great sign of things to come. While the original game was a stunning recreation of feudal Japan, it did rely on many of the same tropes popularized by developers like Ubisoft. Sneaking through outposts, assassinating enemies, and finding collectibles and locations, are all elements players wouldn't have seen in other open-world games, even if Ghost of Tsushima found a refreshing way to present them. Increasing the variety of side missions on offer can correct one of the few faults the original had among fans.
The decision to up the sense of difficulty is also a sign of welcome change. Ghost of Tsushima eventually added harder difficulty modes via DLC, but the game was relatively easy to complete. Making the world more treacherous is a cool way to escalate the sequel and incentivize exploration in ways the original didn’t.
Ghost Of Yōtei will center around the new protagonist Atsu, played by Dragon Age: The Veilguard actor Erika Ishii. It will take place in the lands surrounding Mount Yōtei known as the time as Ezo. The area is where the present-day island of Hokkaido is today, according to the PlayStation Blog. The game will be Sucker Punch’s first game built directly for the PlayStation 5.
