Team Ninja, Japanese developer behind Ninja Gaiden and Dead or Alive series, just revealed some scarce details about their upcoming action role-playing game Nioh 2. A closed alpha test and a new trailer were also announced. This is quite good news for the franchise's lovers as we haven't heard much about this sequel since its announcement at E3 last year.

Watch the full gameplay trailer below:

The new trailer pretty much resembles what we have seen in the original Nioh game, with familiar graphics and visual effects. Yet, the most significant changes are in the characters. This time, alongside an existing male samurai that is playable, we have another onna-bugeisha (female warrior) fighting against the yokai.

Later on, the developer also hints that you can "unleash your darkness" to turn into some kind of powerful, devastating yokai to fight against bosses. This might be some transformation features to give the playable enhanced strength, abilities, and skills that we hope to learn more in future updates. Personally, the transformation seems quite badass.

Unleash your darkness!
Unleash your darkness!

And, of course, we can't ignore the fatal strikes that bring horrible bloodsheds to the enemies, impressive blows that seem powerful enough to take down a towering-huge yokai, or many new cool weapons including nodaichi-styled swords, two-handed battle axes, a naginata-like weapon (naginata is a kind of Japanese glaive). When transforming to yokai, the characters can use some kind of powerful dark magic also, which is very impressive.

Nioh 2
Nioh 2 will continue the franchise with impressive fighting system and fluid combat.

Alongside the trailer, the developer also announced in a Tweet their closed alpha plan, which stretches from 25/5 to 2/6, about a week. However, the Tweet doesn't specifically explain how to join the closed alpha as it only says some PS4 players will be invited, and they won't expand the alpha, which means it is very restricted to experience the game soon.

As part of Team Ninja's plan for the Nioh franchise, Nioh 2 is anticipated to give out more and more details. Yet, with an E3 2019 that will never come, it's hard to know when we will see more interesting updates about the hack-n-slash game.