Throughout the story of Onimusha: Way of the Sword, you'll face a good number of bosses that must be defeated in order to progress. In this section of our guide, we'll give you some tips for taking on Sasaki Ganryu. You'll face him for the third time during In the Light of an Icy Moon.
At first, the fight plays out just like your second battle against Ganryu. The same combos, the same grab attempts... Remember to keep your distance to bait either his thrust or jumping attack. If you Parry the tentacles instead of using Deflect, you'll be able to cut them off and deal additional Stamina damage.
Once he has attacked you several times or you deplete his first health bar, the tentacles can no longer be severed, although he won't gain any completely new attacks yet. He will, however, start using a fast combo more frequently, and he'll continue attacking even if you successfully Parry it. Don't immediately counterattack just because you've blocked one of his strikes.
After you've dealt enough damage to his second health bar — or reached the second bar after his tentacles have already been strengthened — he'll go full Skull Knight and draw a sword infused with Malice. At this point he gains two new attacks. The first sees him drive the sword into the ground and send out waves of energy that you can Deflect back at him. The second is an extremely fast Unavoidable Attack that, most of the time, you'll barely see coming... although after getting hit by it a few times, you'll eventually learn the timing. Remember that you still have your Onimusha transformation available for emergencies if things get out of hand.
