Souls-like, a once-niche segment, like its most popular character Solaire (Praise the sun!) is having it’s moment (year? decade?) under the sun. The change was first seen when PS5, out of all possible games and genres chose a remake of an 11 year old, and the first entry in the Souls -universe by FromSoft – Demon Souls as it’s tentpole launch showcase for what a PS5 can do. This was around the same time when Sekiro won several Game of the Year awards for 2019 – and while a different beast from the Souls-like genre, it brought previous works of the studio to the fore for a bigger audience. And, then, of course, there was Elden Ring. This led to almost a Gold Rush equivalent by a lot of other studios to mine this genre, and you had a slew of pretty serviceable and decent attempts – Remnant From The Ashes was a Dark Souls but with guns, The Surge was set in the cybernetic – dystopian future kind of a world, Code Vein brought this to vampire-hunting and all were received quite well. However, there has never been a year as good as 2023 for the souls-like genre (and perhaps for the overall gaming scene as well – but that is for a different article). I present 5 games that do the truly difficult task of taking genuine, almost fan-level inspiration from the Soulsborne series and then add their own unique mechanic or element to put up something truly unique.
Star Wars Jedi – Survivor
Bringing the gameplay mechanics of a Soulsborne to the Star Wars universe was something that the Fallen Order did quite well when it was released back in 2019 . The sequel did what all good sequels do – make it bigger and better. The world had a more open-world feel with more planets to explore, more companions with their own story arc, and a well realised story that had all the right beats through the 25-30 hour it takes to finish the game. It stuck to it’s Soulsborne inspirations – boss fights which required one to memorize attack patterns, either parry or dodges with tight windows, and different stances for the lightsaber (which again harkened back to classic Soulsborne builds – either the slow moving but hard-hitting Greatsword- Strength equivalent stance or dual-wielding quick attack Dexterity equivalent stance or even a blaster that could be equipped for ranged attacks); and at the same time also focused on exhilirating but tough traversal challenges in between. The game launch on PC was unfortunately marred by bugs and performance issues – but at an overall level managed to end up as one of the more active games on Steam, and also received good reviews across all platforms – setting the stage for a trilogy that hopefully will end more like The Witcher 3 than Mass Effect 3.
Wo Long : Fallen Dynasty
The game, by Team Ninja, the makers of Nioh and Nioh 2 added a dash ( ok, maybe more than a dash) of Sekiro to the weapon variety and overall gameplay feel of Nioh 2 and put out Wo Long : Fallen Dynasty (along with a steady stream of DLCs) in 2023. So you had posture damage, deflection focused gameplay of a Sekiro – but also a build variety ranging from a sneak, dual-sword, Water spells damage based one to a ranged, Metal spell based caster focusing on debuffing enemies and wiping them out from a distance. And some punishing boss fights to boot, of course. It also bought a different mechanic of ‘Flags’ hoisted at different places within the area – that boosted ‘Morale’ upto a maximum of 20 per level – which had a big role to play in how easy or punishing the final boss fight of that level turned out to be – thus encouraging exploration. While this mechanic did not work for some (taking the Morale to 20 almost became a basic requirement to stand a chance against some bosses especially in NG+ rather than something that would make the player feel strong and over-powered); it was a neat attempt to bring something new and different to the table. The studio is currently focused on bringing home Rise Of The Ronin in March this year – it’s most ambitious open world offering yet
Remnant 2
Gunfire Games, the makers behind the original Remnant : From The Ashes listened to community feedback and came out with Remnant 2 this year – the result being a much improved game on all aspects : No stamina consumed when running outside of combat: check. Removing mobs that overwhelmed you during boss fights : check. A more living, breathing world with better realised NPCs : check. Significantly improved gunplay with a great variety and tighter, rewarding combat : check,check and check! Not only this, the developers brought in better build possibilities by introducing more archetypes, and brought in procedurally generated worlds – which meant that 2 players could have a completely different experience in terms of the worlds (and the bosses) they encounter – thus bringing a great deal of replayability. The fact that they were still able to fit a fairly engaging and coherent story inspite of this mechanism of procedural generation of worlds is a great credit to the developers and great news for Soulsborne fans
Lords Of The Fallen
Lords Of The Fallen, by Hexworks is a follow up to their 2014 game – and a sequel / reboot long time in the making. The time that got spent was fully worth it however when the game was released. A world that looked every bit as gorgeous, lifelike and intimidating thanks to Unreal Engine 5 on which the game was developed, a large set of weapons (200+) , armor pieces, rings, amulets, runes, three schools of magic with their own array of spells – all meant several build possibilities and opportunity to customize and finetune a build for NG+ and more cycles. Add your typical esoteric lore that is drip fed through notes, NPC dialog, item descriptions; NPCs questlines that are even more vague, multiple endings that need to get several steps absolutely right, super-complicated level design which interlinks through shortcuts – all the standard Soulsborne trappings are found here. The game also introduced a unique dual world mechanic – the living world of Axiom and the undead world of Umbral. So when you died, you got transported to Umbral with some health still left, and you had to find a place in the Umbral world where you could port back to the living. However, the enemies are more dangerous and likely to swarm you, and the more time you spend there, tougher enemies spawn. However, you also get higher XP for your kills as you spend more time in Umbral – this was a great risk return mechanic. Sure, there are a couple of things that the developers could have ironed out – the final enemy that spawns within a few minutes is almost unkillable unless you are levelled up to end-game levels, thus in effect acting as a timer rather than encouraging players to explore the world in Umbral. And the boss fights could have been grander on the lines that the next game in the list did. But all in all, this was a great addition to the Souls-like genre.
Lies Of P
Back when the game was first announced, and right through the pre-game release period, Lies Of P from South Korean developer Neowiz Studios was ticking all the right boxes, and people were cautiously optimistic that they would have something good on their hands come game release. What landed, instead, was the closest we are possibly going to get to a Bloodborne 2 (or a port of Bloodborne on PC) for some time. A game that wears its inspiration on its sleeve – think the rally mechanic from Bloodborne to the importance of parrying (in probably the tightest window I have experienced so far – and hence most rewarding!) from Sekiro – think of awe inspiring bosses with sweeping orchestral notes dialled right upto 11 mimicking a greatest hits collection of Dark Souls bosses; and you start getting a picture of why this game has raked up a million units within a month of launch and why the developers are going full steam ahead with a DLC and a sequel.
And the above does not even include games that in any other year would have made the list in a canter – games like Blasphemous 2 and FromSofts’ very own Armored Core 6 : Fires Of Rubicon! Yes, it has been one of those years. And with the kind of games already lined up for 2024 – there is no time better to be a Soulsborne and a Souls-like fan than now!
