Soulslikes - Reviews and Recommendations

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Long time ago, when Dark Souls came first out, I thought this would be right up my alley: Innovative ARPG, well received, challenging.

I tried it a few hours, but I did not have fun - I did not know, where am I, where I am supposed to go, what to look for; what's even the point. Difficulty and (at that time) novel control scheme did not help either.

Sometime later I gave it another try, had some technical problems, but did not have fun either.

For a couple of years I gave up on the genre as a whole.

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A few years ago I got Surge in Humble Choice, and I gave it a try and liked it enough, to later try other soulsikes I got in bundles.

pro
- rather accessible and straight forward

your mileage may vary/not my cup of tea
- uneccessary labyrinthine, I ended up using a guide that only told me where to go, because it was frustrating


next one was Nioh 2

pro
- different weapons, good mixture/choice of blocking vs dodging, strength vs speed etc
- visitor system - you can fight "shadows" of other players for equipment and one of the many currencies, with which you can summon other players' avatars to help you. they can sometimes make the game really easy, but they are completely optional

your mileage may vary/not my cup of tea
- overly complex/complicated. there are several currencies, and don't get me started on the smithing materials. also a lot of abilites with poor descritptions ("makes some (!) attack stronger when your [other stat] is high (!)"), maybe you are supposed to min-max.
- way too long, overstays it's welcome - no reason the stretch the main campaign alone out to 40h. there are optional sidequest, an online mode, extra difficult missions.
- story is a yokai-version of the rise and fall of Oda Nobunaga and Hideyoshi (don't know if it would have been better or worse if I've known more about Japanese history).

con
- really grindy - you can grind about two dozens skill trees (eg. one for each weapon, one for magic, one for transforming, one for ninja skills), you collect expierence for each individual weapon, but you can grind the weapon themself by smithing, the individual yokai abilities and so on
- leveling up feels ineffective: due to the grindy nature, you are leveling up something most of the time, but rarely anything feels different or better through it.
- grinding does not make you stronger - I was level ~140 when the game recommended 95, but it still took a long time to take down any but the weakest enemies (again, maybe more min-maxing required, but I dislike min-maxing and would not have known which of the many things need to be min-maxed)

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Steelrising

An automat fights other automats an the behest of Marie Antoinette to start a very alternative French revolution

pro
- rather accessible
- compass, a completely optional equipment which shows you the direction to your goal (mainquest & sidequests)

your mileage may vary
- rather easy for a soulslike, especially most bosses
- sidequest are unnecessary drawn out, don't give much rewards and sometimes send you on unnecessary long treks, although there would have been shortcuts, which just never open
- very interesting ideas, but many are poorly executed or not finished
- setting is good, story has a few good ideas, jumps around (first a focus on Marie Antoinette, then Athenais, and the end is suddenly about Louis) but is disappointing
- it is not that long, but felt much longer

con
- janky
- requires high specs (it looked worse than all other soulslikes so far, still played on the same computer)

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Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order (2019, Respawn Entertainment, EA, released for PC, PS 4/5, Xbox1 and others)

The game tries to be several different things at the same time, and does a pretty decent job.
So let's review them seperately:

as a Soulslike:
Since you are a Jedi, and you fight a lot of comparably weak opponents, eg Stormtroopers. Therefore the game usually throws a bunch of them at you at the same time. This works.

The soulslike is very accessable (a necessity for a game with such a wide focus), that includes difficulty settings. Those do not only include damage taken and dealt, but also a slider for how strict your timing neds to be. (I have not played Another Crabs' Treasure yet but all future Soulslike should copy at least that).

There is barely any "RPG" in it - there are upgrade points, but they are mostly tied to learning a few single moves, or make a few of them a little stronger. New abiliets are mostly learned by progressing through the game. You can upgrade your health and Force points, and can find healing items.

Dodging did not really work for me - you have a "small dodge", which often was not enough, and a roll dodge, for which you have to press the button price. Then you are too far away for counter attack. Blocking/countering with the light sabre was more fun anyway.

as a Tombraider-like/3D-Metroidvania
You explore exotic planets, learn new moves and access new areas. Most locations have to be visited several times in course of the story, after you have learned new ways to access new areas.

There are a few puzzles included, but they are rather few and are either rather easy or can be solved by just trying the things the game allows you to do. There is also a hint system in form of your robot companion, which I did not need.

The backtracking has been critized often, so I expected much worse. Yes, you have to go back after finishing whatever you came to do. In soulslike-fashion the pathes somehow loop back, so it is usually not that far and sometimes the new shortcuts are fun themselves or you are chased while hurrying back. Sometimes it is unclear what is the best way. There is a map, which helps most of the time. (The sequel has quick travel.)

as a cineastic Star Wars spectacle
Lots of cameos, cross-references and what not to other Star Wars media, from Rebels to whatever the last trilogy was called.
Various types of stormtroopers, AT-STs and many more really fit well into the game.

There is a bunch of "videogamey" things, which do not mesh well with the setting. And I do not mean only that he finds in enemy bases a part he desperatly needs to upgrade his robot, could not get in any other way (they have a spaceship), recognizes in an instant and can built into his robot while stormtropers are around the corner, which should be looking for him. This bring me to my biggest - although still very mild - gripe: Most places include a lot - and I mean really a lot - of bottomless pits. Everywhere, even inside of villages and bases. And then you have a single storm trooper standing around on a floating island in the air, unclear how they could have gotten there without double jumping or jetpack. While 3 island further 5 more storm troopers are doing exactly the same.
But as I said, it also has to work as a video game, and that it does.

In regards of cineastic quality, it has in the beginning, the middle and the end very good scripted parts, and all the locations lookg very good, scenic and different.

The story is also good, the ending is coherent and makes sense, although it is without much fanfare. The inner conflicts of the characters are plausible and fitting, although lack on the narrative side.

Resume
As said, many differnt things, all at least decent.
So overall, it is a a clear recommendation. It does not really excel in anything, but it does not have any weaknesses either.

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Lies of P

I was baffled, how similar this game is to Steelrising:

After pre-electronics robots run amok, the MC is one of those machines, fighting others. MC finds out, how the robots are powered (spoiler: it's some sort of human energy), how thery themselves come to be and struggle with their own fate.
Enemy design, and the way they move, is very similar, because they are based on semi-broken robots, which where used for cleaing, directing traffic etc.
In both games coaches and dead horses block paths, dead humans lie around, and there are elemental powers like fire and electricity (not sure, if acid was also in Steelrising). Both take place in European-like cities.

Lies of P somehow forgoes this for more resident evil-type enemies in the last third or so.

Lies of P is the better looking game and it has much less jank.

Pro
- polished, decent soulslike

minor gripes/ your mileage may very
- leveling up becomes eventually pointless, because you gain so little strength. more relevant is upgrading your weapons and the "special ability" upgrades, but those have glass ceilings
- the whole alchemy thing is neither very new, original or fitting
- while the games has no (more?) bugs, in 2 boss fights the hardest obstacle was the camera
- most characters have names from Carlo Collodi's novel, however the games does not engage in any meaningful way with the story it claims to be based on and decends into generic plottwists, which are still forseeable.
- while there is a lot of talk about lying, it is unclear what it does or what even is considered lying and I am not sure if it has any bearing on the 3 different endings, which all 3 are not very good and rather short.
- eventually the game just throws stronger versions of earler enemies at you, instead of ending

Con
- no pause button. even in the menu the games goes on. It is a single player game!