Depends on the game of course. I actually played Breath of the Wild while watching the Game Grumps videos. Learning to play well made it more enjoyable to me and I learned a lot from those videos and searching for info online.

That generally isn't how I would play a game.

Am I the only one who thinks Nioh 2 is extremely difficult? Like overly so. I'm getting my ass kicked ever ten feet I move. 

I thought this way, until I had to start looking for these Kodama collectibles ASAP to keep stocked up on health items. I mean, the game is the same and the guides have enemies cleared out so it doesn't really effect my experience only takes the frustration away and saves time. If I were to platinum this game, I'd end up going back through the levels anyway with a guide to get these. I wouldn't play like this for most games but I'm surprised by how little it impacts my experience and enjoyment and infact improves the experience I was havinng before I started with the guide. This game is so brutally difficult that making your way through a level is going to be stunned anyway as you get sent back to the last bonfire a lot so you loose little in the way of exploration. 

I avoid using guides. But this is primarily why I dropped both Signalis and Tears of the Kingdom lol. The frustration outweighed the fun of figuring things out on my own, and yet I stubbornly refused watching guides until the end!

Months later I found out that the reason I got stuck in Signalis was a glitch, but I didn't play the game again coz I forgot the controls, story, map, and everything. As for TotK, I finished all temples except the Water one, which I couldn't even find :(

Next time I play a puzzle/exploration heavy game, I'll be sure to use a guide before my enjoyment depletes!

Nioh 2 fits my style better than the souls series. Dodge vs roll.

Because I was so in tune with the game, it felt like nothing was difficult. Same thing happened to me with Bloodborne.

What kind of enemies are you struggling with?

Everything is causing me hassle. Every mob has onr or two combos that you can't cancel, doge out of or roll once it's set off and then it's a one shot and wipe. Sometimes it's easily indefinable and telegraphed, they light up red but mostly it's a 3 or 4 hit combo that comes out of no where. It's RNG based winning when you complete a level, it feels like they tuned it for co-operative multiplayer but there's no one online anymore. All the enemies are way to close together too, like every inch is multiple mobs ready to gang bang you at any point. I've never played a game more punishing, Elden Ring DLC and souls 2 aren't even this hard yet the fun here is outweighing the punishing difficulty. Leveling up means very little in this game, you can still get hit with the combos so my biggest fault of the game is it's these movesets that are so damaging that RNG comes into play. There's no way to out skill a combo that locks you in place and one shots you. I've made it to the third map area but it's been one hell of a struggle. The bosses have been easy to solo, it's the mobs that are causing the problems. Then you run out of elixirs and if you don't have the kodama in the map area you have to go farming. I'm all for punishing difficulty but this is one serious extreme, I'd have as much luck at progressing through super meat boy. 

It seems you've played Wolong recently, another Team Ninja game. It shouldn't be much harder than that. The red moves are easy to counter of course, and for normal moves you need to dodge or block. Blocking doesn't use much stamina like Souls. It shouldn't one shot you, so I would check your equipment and stat bonuses. Most important thing is to keep up to snuff with the equipment in terms of level for defense only, the minor stats don't matter that much in the early game. But better than defense is simply killing them with ki pulses and perfect dodges. Ki pulse is better than the parry in Wolong.

Remember you can use the demon skills as well, so if you find a ranged demon skill, it can be very helpful against troublesome enemies. Also for Humans it is very easy to just used ranged weapons to thin the herd. Ammunition is near infinite after awhile.

Pfft. Wolong, and I'm not being hyperbolic, is at the very least 10x easier than Nioh 2. I'm playing grand and get the systems albeit I don't get the burst counter, I use it but something won't click in my brain to get it right. The Human enemies are no problem, I just beat a mission where it was mainly humans and it was easy. It's the Yokai, they are brutal to take down and just... Well brutal. I see a lot of people saying this is easier than Nioh 2 cause of the abilities but I don't see it or something isn't clicking. I find it in the range of 5x harder plus you're always under leveled and there's nothing good to farm. I'm 7 levels under the recommended for missions but sure when I am leveled it feels like I'm not stronger. I cleared Wolong and barely died apart from a few bosses but I had online help for those. Maybe a death every other mission. I've in the hundreds of times so far and I'm barely half way through the game. What did you build as? I'm settled on a magic Switch glaive build, but a few points into other stuff for beefier armour and ecoumberance limit. Working on getting my health pool up at the moment. 

I suppose magic will take awhile to come online, but it is one of the stronger builds. When you get a few spells, it might become a cakewalk in contrast.

I was a 2h axe build, very easily breaking the posture of even the demons. I had a bit of trouble until the snake boss, but after that it became easier.

I can't imagine playing the original demon souls without the packed in guide way back on the PS3 when "souls-like" wasnt really a thing