Summary
As one of the best games in terms of gameplay and graphics of all time,Ghost of Tsushimais bringing players that fully explored the island back with a huge, new, FREE update. Sucker Punch has added a substantial multiplayer aspect to their original product with the Legends mode. They’ve also doubled down on their initial installment, adding a New Game Plus mode that will entice the same audience that first fell in love with the game to give it a second whirl.
But what is this New Game Plus mode? The description states that the story will start over but upgrades, unlocks, and gear will stay. That’s not entirely true, the story begins after the first siege of Tsushima and a few unlocks sneakily do revert back to zero. Also, some magnificent new facets weren’t advertised at all. Here is a deep dive intoGhost of Tsushima’s New Game Plus that will help players understand exactly what to look forward to (and what to dread) when giving this new mode a shot.
Updated August 05, 2025, by Hamza Haq: Ghost of Tsushima’s Director’s Cut has proven once more that pursuing the PC market is in Sony’s best interest, and players are hungry for goodopen-world role-playing games. The single-player experience has not been outdone by the live-service model, and there is no need to convert every single upcoming game into a replica of two or three successful titles only to have them fail miserably. Nowhere is this clearer than in Ghost of Tsushima, where PlayStation players are rebuying the game on PC to experience it at 4K 120 FPS. And if the interest in New Game Plus is any indication, more than once.
How To Unlock New Game Plus & What It Is
Those who haven’t yet beatenGhost of Tsushimaneed not worry about New Game Plus yet. The mode can only be unlocked after defeating the entire campaign. Not all of the side missions need to be completed and not every collectible needs to be grabbed, but the entirety of the main quest does need to be knocked out as well as the brief battle in the epilogue.
This mode will give players the opportunity to play through the entire game again with the plot completely reset. The rest of this article will get into the exact details as far as what resets and what stays the same, but all gamers should be aware, at the very least, that the missions will start all over, starting right after the events of the initial invasion.
12Ammo & Currency Are Gone
The awesome tools and techniques in Jin Sakai’s arsenal stick around in New Game Plus, so there is nothing to worry about there. The stances and the grappling hook that are normally unlocked through missions are thankfully present right out of the gate. Players can grab their favorite sword and get right intowinning all of the game’s duels.
What has gone missing, however, is everything in the satchel: No wood, no cloth, no metal, and no goods. No supplies at all. Arrows are also missing, though the bows stick around. The lesson here is to spend everything on gear upgrades before starting a New Game Plus, since the gear stays but the components do not.
11Map Is Hidden
It’s hard to criticize a game at the top of its…uh.. game, but evenGhost of Tsushimahas a few very annoying issues that even die-hard fans will admit. One such annoyance is the task of clearing the fog of war.
In New Game Plus, the fog is back in all of its fury. To make matters worse, this includes the fast travel points, so don’t think there’s any way to zip around quickly and clear it back up. The journey ofgathering every weapon in the gamewill have to be completed either on foot or horseback.
10Exploration Collection Is Gone
Although there’s a lot of good news in store, it’s time to get the bad news out of the way. Vanity Gear, as stated in the description, does indeed stay in the player’s inventory, but the progress tracker is back to 0 out of 59. Hopefully someclassic memes about the gamecan help players laugh off some of this understandable anger.
Everything else in Exploration Collection has also been totally cleared. While all of those awesome sword kit skins and other cosmetics can still be equipped right off the bat (Ghost Flowers are the new reward for finding their original locations), getting back to 100% needs to start from scratch.
9Artifact Collection Is Intact
Having gotten rid of everything in the other two tabs, things were not looking good for the artifacts. This was the cause of a great deal of dread because some of these trophies are ridiculously hard to find, so recapturing them was not well anticipated. It’s much easier tolocate all of the archery challengesthan to find these rare pieces of history.
Thankfully, this tab did not suffer as the other two did. The Artifact Collection has been left alone, including the Sashimono Banners and their corresponding saddles. Don’t feel the need to scour every battlefield and graveyard, as Sucker Punch decided doing that once is enough.
8Charms Are Still There
After booting up the game, a few players took to the forums in a rage. Looking at their weapons, they found that all of their Charm slots were empty. The anger of finding out that some of the best charms in the game were removed is understandable.
However, it would have done them some good to take a deep breath and make one more click. While the Charms have been unequipped, they are all still in the inventory along with any other Charm that was collected prior to starting a New Game Plus. This includes the Charm of Inari, so clearing progress on the shrines did not, happily, clear the Charms that they give.All of the animal sanctuary locationsare still open for business in this mode, so visiting animal pals will still bring smiles to the faces of visitors.
7Extra Upgrades
Everyone has a favorite armor for Jin Sakai and the debates about which ones are the best and where to find them are fiery.Ghost of Tsushimadoes a good job of making sure that players of all styles and preferences have armor that fits just right.
Get ready to feel even more snuggly in that favorite armor set, an extra upgrade that doubles most of the previous values is available for most fan favorites. And it’s not just armor; katanas, bows, and half-bows also get a bonus upgrade spot!
6Skippable Cutscenes
One of the most requested features forGhost of Tsushimahas always been the ability to skip cutscenes to get back to the gameplay. In New Game, there is no way to toggle this seemingly basic quality-of-life feature on, and players have to sit through the entire length of all the cinematics with no skip button.
New Game Plus brings with it theability to skip cutscenesfrom the get-go. In fact, it immediately dumps players past the first lengthy cutscene that shows the start of the Mongol invasion of Tsushima Island, diving straight into the gameplay. In all subsequent instances, players will be able to hold a button (shown at the top of the screen during a scene) to skip.
5Increased Difficulty
To balance the fact that Jin starts his journey anew with all of his armor and skills intact, thegame’s difficulty ramps up drasticallyin terms of how much damage enemies do to the player. Even at Normal+, enemies hit harder than they do at simply Normal, and using defensive charms to increase durability starts to show its value.
At Lethal+, players are playing a different game entirely. One that doesn’t allow for a single mistake, lest heads roll. Broken builds like the Tadayori Turret or the Sarugami parry machine start showing their actual worth in the face of the relentless assault of the Mongol horde.
4New Horse & Saddle
Look carefully at the new promotional art forGhost of Tsushima’s New Game Plus mode. This game is already the most photogenic game around thanks tothe incredible photo mode. It’s easy to be drawn in by Jin Sakai’s flamboyant new cape and armor, but don’t overlook the fact that players have never seen this horse before
The black horse with a bright red mane and tail is granted at the beginning of New Game Plus, as is that very fresh red saddle. Better yet, Jin Sakai doesn’t have to stumble through the fog to find a stable or the saddle vendor; the very first scene depicts the horse and the saddle with Jin riding triumphantly on top.
3New Charms
Available for purchase from the new vendor (more on Baku the Voiceless in a bit) are some new and unique Charms. A useful one gives a chance to have lightning strike an enemy after using Heavenly Strike. A different one is purely cosmetic and increases the amount of gore in combat.
Don’t think that all of these new Charms will help out with builds that best tackle the Mongol hordes, though, a few of them actually make it harder. One makes any damage instant death, another eliminates all drops from bodies, and a third doubles resolve costs. Yikes.
