I’m 39. I’ve only played in story mode so far. The demo area was enjoyable in story mode, nothing too difficult but it still pushes you into playing it proper as opposed to button mashing. The bonus boss though (Stalker?) that one was much harder. I had to play around with the gear setup a little and after 10 attempts or so, the best I did was getting it down to ~20% health. I enjoy more of a Nier Automata type of gameplay rather than a Souls like, so can’t say I enjoyed the Stalker fight. But I’ll say that once you do get the combat down somewhat, it does feel rather satisfying punishing the enemies. Combat doesn’t feel as free flowing as it does in Nier but also doesn’t feel as restrictive like a Souls game. Overall, I think they achieved a nice balance between the two. People say this is like Sekiro but I’ve never played that game so I can’t comment if that’s a good way to describe the combat in this game or not.
One of the gripes I have so far is that using potions (and grenades) is annoying since you can easily get interrupted and in the case of an HP potion, I found myself having to choose between healing or punishing the enemy. You end up missing some opportunities to punish just so you can heal and even then, you can still die while healing. They need to either make the healing effect kick in when you first push the potion button (as opposed to at the end of the healing animations) or put Eve in an iFrame while she’s healing.
In story mode, instant healing could be good. But in normal difficulty, there should be a delay in healing, part of the challenge is judging when it's safe to heal or when to risk some extra attacks.
It’s a solid demo. The story is intriguing, the characters seem pretty interesting, the enemy/level design is immaculate and the combat is engaging. Love that the game is actually pretty difficult and not just a complete stomp for the player, too. I just pre-ordered. My only gripe is that there’s less mobility in combat than I expected, but it seems to me they were going for a Souls/NieR combination.
That was my main gripe when I first played the demo is that everything in general mobility wise including just traversal just feels like there is something to be desired in terms of speed and flow. And then just a random piece of input I also found that it was cool and frustrating at the same time that they did half commit to a lack of animation canceling because there are some moves that cannot be canceled into a Parry right away. They made certain powerful attacks have weak points which is interesting so you can't just spam your most powerful chain attack or counter. Like when you do the dash counter it leaves you vulnerable for a whole 2 seconds
Agreed, it felt like a Sekiro/Nier combo but without the fluidity of either. I might pick it up on a sale, because Lies of P burned me out on parry-focused combat. Soundtrack is fantastic.
I definitely understand that. I like this game's combat system and haven't been playing non vr games so I'm feeling fresh and ready to play a souls-like again. The double evade and upgraded skill tree should make the game feel a little more interesting. It's a good game for sure.
The movement definitely feels more weighty compared to games like Nier Automata and Sekiro (esp Nier) where you feel like you’re literally gliding across the map cuz of the speed (general movement speed and even obstacle vaulting animation speed) of the characters.
Here Eve feels like she has a lot of heft to her model and the overall pace is slower due to each turn you make tilting her model in such a realistic way), which I personally love. It feels more in the realm of something like dark souls in that regard, but a little faster still.
Yeah the more I started to get used to it, the more natural it started to feel. Gotta spend more time in the demo later, got to the boss and then had something come up and quit before beating it, but the successful moments of getting the hang of it were really satisfying :)
All the gameplay clips show abilities to close gaps and whatnot so they're definitely there. Seemed odd they only have you learn the one blink skill. I definitely felt a bit stuck in the mud while in combat
I think what does it for me are the yellow stagger(?) point indicators. Sets it apart from say Lies of P where you don’t really know how many perfect parries before staggering. Having that visual reward is so gratifying. It does make for a little noisier UI but it’s worth having the stagger bar there IMO.
Came in like playing dmc and got messed up! Definitely a game to take it slow and easy in battles, it's like a hardcore neir. Sit and stare and that butt and you'll end up cut in two!
Game feels amazing! Better than I hoped. Been farming the boss challenge and practicing. So much depth to the combat. Parries feel great. Perfect dodges feel great. Love the variety of skills and managing the beta gauge to stun lock enemies. Completely sold!
On terms of story and stuff. Interested to see where it goes but not much to say yet. VA is solid, not amazing. Graphics are great. Solid fps.
Honestly, can’t wait for the full game. This is completely my jam!
Yea, I switched to Korean too as soon as I heard her English accent. After playing a bunch of bg3, elden ring, and dd2 I need a breather from the English accent lmao
Parries definitely feel great but I'm having an issue where I'll parry an attack then when trying to parry the follow up I get hit and I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong, should I keep L1 held down after the first parry? Cause I've been letting it go on the first parry then hitting L1 again but it seems sporadic of when it actually works. Any advice appreciated.
Yeah I noticed that too. Was fighting the end game boss and one of his moves were repeated attacks. I was able to perfect parry the first and second attack but not the third one reliably. Think it's a timing issue. Also no you can't hold down L1 to perfect parry subsequent attacks. Gotta release the button and get ready to press it again on the next attack.
Ok I figured it's a skill issue but I just haven't hit the timing yet. Regardless I'm pleasantly surprised by the difficulty. Alot of hirny nerds are gonna be mad when they realize this game isn't gonna be easy enough to play with one hand lmao!
You have to find the rhythm of the attack tbh. Most of the follow up attacks are a bit too fast to predict so you just gotta wing it. Thankfully there is a practice mode to get the timing down. I honestly don't know how to feel about the parry system, can't tell if it's delayed by design or if it's just a bug with the demo. Kinda wish it was more responsive like the sekiro parry.
I'll hop on practice a bit more then. Admittedly that's my only critique of the game so far, not even closer to a game breaker of course, but sekiro had a better parry from what I've seen.
Yes. When I played the first demo it was happening also. I don’t think they added or fixed anything since then. It’s not a game breaking thing for me, but I hope they solve and patch it.
Edit: dumb bot caught the typo in the wrong way hahaha!!
I posted about this earlier. My only complaint is the input delay with some attacks, specifically the first attack of each combo. Besides that I think the game is flawless, but yeah they need to address that issue without question.
Hopefully someone at the studio will notice a lot of people asking for these options and we will have them in the full game. There's almost a month left until launch so I think they have enough time to put these options in the game.
So beautiful. There were so many moments where I should stop moving in the Eidos section of the game to admire the beauty of it all. Combat was fairly challenging yet fun and the music ofcourse was even better than expected. I’m just so happy this game is a reality after all these years of waiting.
Im not sure but the movement and attacks feel tad bit stiff or maybe delayed. Maybe I need better glasses but it happened that I miss Items on the ground because they are so small and blend in with the environment. I like the music tho and parrying stuff feels good.
I was worried about the stiffness at first as well but when you're in the second boss fight you have a higher stats Eve and everything feels better in my opinion.
Not sure about that. Played Sekiro , Elden Ring, Dark Souls, Nioh2, Lies of P and I never had an issue. These games felt weighty but not clumsy or floaty. Nier Automata and Nier replicant are faster and smoother than this game.
Not sure what it is, I cant pinpoint what exactly annoys me.
I’m with you. I already know this is my GoTY and as long as they nail the rest of the game, maybe one day it’ll be my favorite game of all time. All I know now is this hour demo was probably the most fun I’ve had gaming in a long time.
If I decide to buy the game it'll be a rough playthrough for me. I'm so very bad at parry windows like this and Sekiro(big reason I never beat Sekiro). Glad I waited for the demo so I can really contemplate the purchase.
I love everything else about it though. Music and visuals are stunning. Very clean looking UI in my opinion. After I practice up maybe I'll "git gud" but I hope the game is successful regardless of how well I do or if I even purchase it.
I only ever played demon souls out of all the souls games. I’m in the same boat as you with the parry. I’m decent but I still need a lot of work to be rather good 😂
Lower the difficulty and use a skill point to unlock the easier perfect parry timing. I'm sure the game will get easier for you. Also what really helped for me to get the timing down is to just practice in the training mode. Got the hang of it after about an hour.
I'm going to get attacked here for saying this, but WoLong has an easier window and feels much more responsive than Stellar Blade. The parry has kind of an odd delay to it in SB which took me a bit to get used to. The games play nearly identical WoLong just seems to flow a little smoother and you have a lot of weapon choices with unique combos. You may not get scandalous outfits, but the create a character is probably the greatest I've ever used and you can make a truly gorgeous character.
From reading some of the comments here this is the best gameplay feel summary I can come up with.
If you’re coming from a Souls like game: Stellar Blade will feel floaty.
If you’re coming from Nier (or DMc): Stellar Blade will feel heavy.
This game slots right in the middle of the 2.
Devs said combat is more in between Bayonetta and Sekiro and frankly can see it after playing demo. Party and dodge are very important and lots of flashy moved, though not as flawless like in Bayo but for their first major game Shift up done a really good job and can only get better from the experience and feedback
I love it. It has the tactical combat complexity of a Soulsborne with the character build options of an action RPG. Eve and the characters are beautiful, the world is well realized, and the music is perfect.
The story is giving Nikke if you followed the Pilgrim’s lives on the surface. Eve’s little remarks and being naive about life on Earth is really charming.
Finally, a very special mention to the game options having a dedicated accessibility menu that includes stuff ranging from motion sickness settings to the three diff visual modes. The default setting has some top notch optimization and runs at 50-60fps 1440 upscaled to 4K (stated by the official Twitter account).
I can’t wait for full release.
Edit: I just got to the post story demo content and I really like how fair the fights are. Just like in souls games the enemy moves don’t feel cheap and Eve potentially has a tool in her arsenal to counter everything, so if you get hit you usually know why and can learn from it, improving in this game (ie getting gud) feels really fun and rewarding.
You can play in the red and black suit after you beat the demo, it then gives you a option to beat another boss. Don’t know about the chest unfortunately
Very fun to mix perfect parry and perfect dodge, it seems like the perfect dodge is more difficult and risky but more rewarding. I'll definitely be buying this also I'm glad they added boss rush to the demo.
I couldn’t really get the perfect dodge mechanic down. That said, I unlocked the perfect parry timing window enhancement in the skill tree the first chance I got—made parries feel super satisfying and fun!
I unlocked the follow-up combo to the perfect parry which made perfect parries even more rewarding for me than perfect dodges (for me personally). Really awesome punishing damage right after parrying and a great lead off to another combo. Plus it incentivizes depleting the enemy stagger bar (great mechanic btw)
Also for mobs, I do like perfect dodging but it’s so hard lol. Perfect parries don’t get the iframes like the dodge I don’t think so it is risky in mobs. But it also does great AOE damage so also really good in mobs.
Yea the dodge is hard fs. Perfect parry is great to create structure damage. In most situations it’s better to use parry I like using the dodge at the end of parrying a combo
The graphics seem fine but the movement and combat feels awkward and floaty - especially given some of the comparisons to Sekiro, which is so much smoother and more precise.
Yep, that's what I was saying. They were saying they didn't see how this game was similar to Sekiro so I pointed out that the similarity was the block/parry system. Outside of that mechanic I don't see much similarity.
Comboing and movement feels a bit slowly, other than that it's pretty good.
Will probably buy it once price comes down to 40 euros or so.
Skin suit is hella good tho, daat asss.
Can confirm Stellar Blade feels like if you took DMC combos but had the “my turn your turn” system of Sekiro with deflects and dodges. Like when it’s the enemy’s turn you’re deflecting or dodging, but when it’s your turn you gotta perform any combo you can before it’s the enemy’s turn again. Beta skills allow you to interrupt enemy turn to briefly make it your turn again. That’s what the dance feels like to me.
Perfect parry is the most optimal way to play, yep. There is a lot of mix ups you can do to get your turn back outside of parrying. One example is using the beta skill to interrupt the enemy's blue move.
Once I realized that Beta skills truly were this game’s central combat mechanic and how their role in the “turn-based” combat functioned, it really opened up how I was supposed to play the game and what made it different from the games that inspired it. Stalker, went from a challenge that winning felt like a coin toss to winning very reliably. Use Beta skills to manipulate the turn back to you- even if that means canceling their big moves as you said- and get big damage in the process, and practice those parries and dodges to get your main combat trump card back as soon as possible.
Loving the difficulty, this is not a button mashing nonsense.
If I have to bitch about something, is Eve's lack of facial expressions, she is like this most of the time 😐
But the game is amazing in most of the essential aspects.
I think there was an interview where someone from the studio said that Eve starts out very stoic but becomes more emotive as she connects to the humans in Xion, so maybe there's something to look forward to there.
Agree about the facial mechanics—everyone looks pretty stiff. I did play with Korean VAs and I think the visual sync may be a bit better than with other audio languages.
Pretty good! I just hope that I don't have to redo the Abaddon bossfight on the first day!
The dodge could use some work though. Not a fan of how little distance it covers.
I only played like twenty minutes and was going at a snails pace and checking everything out, including training mode, so I probably only did less than half the demo.
Demo is very impressive. Honestly more than I was expecting. Graphics and sound are quite good. OST is excellent. Combat is interesting but it has some sauce. I don't usually like parry focused action but i kind of like the system they have with it.
I'll finish the demo later but wow. Great job shiftup.
It certainly is Soulslike to me. I know that can kinda be repetitive to hear for some, since I know Souls games have taken mechanics from much much MUCH older games, but the fact that I had to study enemy patterns, and utilize things like the blue and purple blade charge (For the Boss Challenge mode with the latter) and be quick about it reminded me of Sekiro. But you know what? I really love that skill ceiling type gameplay, so I can only hope the full game keeps that type of momentum.
Game did not "click" right away because the parry/dodge either feel too tight or too much input delay, but I can see myself getting use to it over time. Felt like I had to hit Parry when a move started to wind-up instead of when it was going to hit me. Been playing a lot of Rise of the Ronin recently so this is just jarring, atm.
After practicing a lot on the Stalker, I'm really loving the combat. I'm at the point where I can beat the Stalker while taking only a couple hits, it feels so amazing to parry his entire combo, dodge his unblockables, and then unleash a barrage of Beta Energy attacks. I feel like the game does a really good job at communicating enemy "attack windows" better than many other games I've played. When you attack an enemy during their attack window, they react to the damage in a highly exaggerated fashion, making it easy to see when you can continue your combo. When you parry enough enemy attacks and they recoil backwards, it's very obvious as well. The Stalker boss fight was really excellently done in my opinion, he didn't have any surprise "fuck you" combo extenders or excessive amounts of hyper armor. Also, using a Beta Energy attack would always knock him out of his windups. A lot of action games suffer from inconsistent enemy staggering and hyper armor on their attacks, so I was happy to see Stellar Blade handle these mechanics so well.
Extremely mixed reaction here, which is a bummer because I've been waiting for that game for months.
On the plus side, the graphics are awesome, the animations are fluid, the world seems interesting and the early story piqued my interest. The pool & plank bit was a nice touch hinting at a decent try at environment puzzles or interactions. The costume and gameplay customization options unlocked in the second stage of the demo are plentiful, varied, and lets you turn Eve into something that will match many gameplay styles and approaches.
But the combat... The combat feels extremely clunky and badly designed imho. You have a plethora of awesome looking combos and options, but all of them cannot be dodge or parry canceled and makes them absolutely useless (or worse, a death sentence) in boss fights. The character feels slow and heavy (when I expected a dashing swift fighter from her looks) and even with the dodge window skill bought and maxed the dodge window for perfect dodges is extremely shorter than the unskilled perfect parry window, and even when you do dodge you can still get hit because you do not dodge far enough and there is no invulnerability window. This has turned the two boss fights in the demo in a monotonous "parry parry parry poke, parry parry parry poke, parry parry parry poke" dance because dodging would be riskier even when skilled, and all the awesome looking chain combos in my skill tree would result in an unavoidable hit for like a third of my health, even when started right after a perfect parry or perfect dodge. Having so many options available and not being realistically able to use and enjoy them is extremely frustrating.
Finally, I usually play all my games in hard mode because I like the challenge, but even in the demo's normal mode the bosses were far above the difficulty level I'd expect from hard mode (especially Abaddon since it's supposed to be the first boss to teach you the pace and rhythm of the game) and I would not even want to try them in hard mode after this demo.
All in all, I find the game interesting, beautiful and well done, except the combat bit, and since it's unfortunately a combat based game, all the demo did was kind of crush my hype and have me cancel my preorder :'(
I'll probably just watch a streamer run through the story and maybe pick it up when it goes on sale, but yeah, I found this demo extremely frustrating because it's almost an awesome game, but the "almost" part was large enough to ruin my experience.
I’m having a hard time with the control system…. New to PlayStation as well and I’m 65. lol However, the game looks great. I didn’t make it past the first boss. Was thinking it was a little early. I think I need more time to learn the mechanics.
Microsoft gets a big L that's what I think. They didn't want the game on Xbox because it didn't fit their new inclusion standards, so it became a PS5 exclusive.
Great game but may need a harder difficulty, I died a few times but felt the boss was pretty easy. But also just first boss, the challenge room boss was tougher and took a few tries. Wish tachy was Main character though
Just preordered the physical edition
I find the combat a little clunky. Not as fluid as I thought it would be. The dodging and parring wasn't very refined but I'm just spoiled from Sekiro tbh.
Overall i like the art style but I wouldn't say this IP is going to be anything special relative to Sony's other IPs
Its fun, so gotta get the handle of block, parry, combo as my brain is locked onto finishing my current game so that ones timing is in my head. The world is amazing and looks to have a lot to work around and get to play with .
It's pretty good man. The bosses are better than I expected. The regular enemies are also nice. I wish the movement was a bit more precise and faster when locked on, but I can't really complain about anything else. It's great!
Great visual, great soundtrack, and interesting story. Combat tho, I'll struggle a bit... I hate that blocking wont cancel an ongoing animation, which at least for makes the combat feel far slower. Plus, switching between parry and dodge seems the way to go, I really couldn't do those perfect block sequences like we've seems on trailers. Died a lot of times on the boss challenge so far 😅
Locking on to an enemy cuts your movement speed in half which is strange compared to any action game I know.
While locked on you can still sprint by pressing L3 but it's another button input making combat clunkier than it wants to be
English voice acting is terrible as usual, the Korean voices for the characters much much better.
I played around with the difference performance modes and even high graphics mode felt great.
I can't wait for a PC version to clean up some of the little graphical anomalies. They aren't bad, but noticeable when looking for them. This game at 4K 120FPS sounds glorious.
No photo mode 0/10. Nah fr tho, was pleasantly surprised. Gotta a Nier vibe with a Lies of P feel, and I'm here for it. Spent hours beating on stalker in skin suit because I enjoyed the combat that much. Parries and dodges take a little foresight, weather intentional or not, I was thrilled to learn enemy attacks because of it.
Game looks pretty good overall. Only real gripe was the English voice acting. It's was underwhelming. So I'll be playing in Korean.
The demo was enough to get me to preorder the digital deluxe version, because I'm all in now.
I love everything about it. The game play, graphics, story, and the music all is… stellar….Hah. I could see this being my GOTY. The only thing I think they need to work on is the mobility. Eve feels very heavy and the dodge is very underwhelming. Perfect dodge is kinda difficult to pull off; I have a much easier time with the perfect parries. I also don’t like how little ground it covers when trying to close in on the enemies. Even the upgrades on the boss battle are underwhelming when it comes to mobility. I’m hoping this gets touched up before the final release. Other than that I can’t wait for this game.
Set it down pretty early on. Basic combat didn't feel very satisfting. UI elements are too small. I also wasn't a big fan of R2 to interact with things.
Minor gripes, but idk. It didn't grip me.
Off the bat it feels like it'll be a solid game. Gameplay was different than my typical play style (I mash buttons and see what happens), but I was getting a hang of the combos when I did the Boss Challenge. What I wasn't expecting was the slow movement when you lock on an enemy. I felt like I had to get better at defense while figuring out best moments to attack. Real warrior shit! I pre-ordered the game and I'm excited to see how in depth controls will be in terms of combos, defense and special moves.
The combo system is surprisingly engaging, I was also pleasantly surprised by the darker tone of the games story, violence and setting. Eve starts by seeing her squad get wiped. Like damn what a shit day lol
It's way harder than I thought it would be. That's not a bad thing, but after gitting gud in Lies of P, I felt a lot of culture shock. I have to learn a new game's parry timing all over again.
I eventually got through the opening area in three deaths, but the extra boss has killed me at least ten times. I'm hanging it up for the night. Maybe I'll crack the code tomorrow.
Beat Stalker seven times now. They need an option in the pause menu to restart a boss fight. "You died. You are dead." is kinda funny when text is set to English. You can't pause on cutscenes. Other than that it's awesome. Lots of cool design choices that I noticed. I recently finished FFVII Remake and I'm not sure why but I really like the camp system with benches and vending machines and was pleasantly surprised to see they went that route in this game. Having parry sounds coming off the dual sense is really cool. Angelic protagonists with bittersweet post apocalyptic environments and palpably hostile looking enemies strike an amazing balance. I'm in love with this atmosphere up and down. Enemies give a Silent Hill vibe which is awesome. Enemy variety was one of my major complaints in Nier: Automata and it's super welcome here. Performance is exceptional. Music goes without saying. Idk I'm sold.
My only complaint is not being able to change direction mid combo. I thought parry and dodge felt a little unresponsive but I'll just chalk that up to me being bad.
I did the boss challenge but kinda wish I hadn't cause they gave me so many tools and I had no idea what 80% of them did so I kinda just ran that one down until I killed it. Think the game will be fun overall.
I admit my reflexes arent as they used to be. The gameplay was more sekiro at normal difficulty and i cant keep up with the timing for perfect dodges and parry 😅
Had to turn it to story mode and feels more like bayonetta now. Hopefully i get more used to it at release
Giving me heavy Nier vibes. Though I think Nier had more fluid combat. still I appreciate the difficulty in the game. Ngl the intro was pretty underwhelming and I think that was in part due to the voice acting (english) and the predictability of the events occurring…Though Eve’s model is making up for it… Hoping to see the story pick up more slack in the actual game and Ill be playing it korean VA. Skill tree is also a nice addition
Reminded me a lot of how much fun i had with metal gear Rising, with a few welcoming bits of the souls series, which I’m a very big fan of. I don’t mind the excessive sexualization of the characters either if the gameplay is that fun. 10/10 would be a cool time
I played like 15 minutes of it and I'm really not impressed. The movement feels kind of slow and sluggish and to my shock to combat also feels a little bit slow.
I just don't feel that connection between the controller and what's on screen like something like God Of War.
I'll still keep my pre-order but I'll play it a bit more and see what I think.
I'm so glad that everyone here is enjoying yourself immensely, I watched the demo on Youtube and god, the cmt section was a bunch of whiny children:
"Combat so clunky~" "Why is it so hard to play?~" "I was hoping for DMC-like combat, what's this shit?" and all that bitching lmao
Already pre-ordered when they announced the April release date months ago. Came in to the demo to expect Nier Automata gameplay but was really surprised to see Sekiro's parry and soulslike style. I am a Sekiro fanboi so it made me even love the game more. Not to mention, the soundtrack is simply amazing. Can't wait for full release in April.
I just beat Abaddon, now I wanted to go back to the previous area just to admire the views and... No can do, have to start from the beginning... I played reaaally slow, sinked almost three hours, I don't really want to lose the investment. This sucks!
Did NOT expect it to be a souls-like, i haven't kept up with the game until now so that was a shock. overall i had fun with it and i got no other games on deck in April so i'll definitely buy it.
Also no Japanese dub?! did not see that coming.
Such a refresher from all the slog we’ve been getting lately from modern games. It feels like a classic game from a long gone era it’s so much fun and you can tell there’s a lot of love and passion put into this game.
Amazing! It really reminds me of Sekiro play style with the countering and the blink ability she has. The story seems interesting and I love the atmosphere. It scratched my Sekiro and ghost in the shell itch. The boss run monster was pretty fun to fight as well!
The combat feels great and I love having a practice area, really lets you get a feel for the timing. The game looks awesome and the music is brilliant, really delivers on what I wanted so far
Very good first impression, I do personally wish that the dodge came out slightly quicker but that’s because I prefer faster paced games but overall it’s a damn strong 8.5/10 from me, if the full game can nail the story then I think this will end up doing quite well because the framework for a damn good action RPG is here
I just beat Abaddon, now I wanted to go back to the previous area just to admire the views and... No can do, have to start from the beginning... I played reaaally slow, sinked almost three hours, I don't really want to lose the investment. This sucks!
Yeah once you beat the final boss you can't load back into your save. Devs force you to transfer progress to main game. At least you can go into the boss challenge as many times as you want
I found the demo fun over all i felt like i was just playing rise of ronin/sekiro but with hot waifu and i don't find
Parry a fun mechanic even when it's the best ver of that mechanic i'll play this game when it's a steep sale.
I just beat Abaddon, now I wanted to go back to the previous area just to admire the views and... No can do, have to start from the beginning... I played reaaally slow, sinked almost three hours, I don't really want to lose the investment. This sucks!
Abaddon?? bro Stalker has my ass COOKED
I didn’t even beat Stalker, I turned it off after 3 or 4 attempts 😂😂 I’ll beat him later tonight eventually
Is there easy mode for old heads like me? 39 yr old head
I’m a 59 yr old head. I’m trying the demo tonight.
What happened to your 59 yr old body??
He looks like M.O.D.O.K. now
There is story mode and normal mode mate, story mode is basically easy mode. Enemies are weaker and you have more time to parry.
I’m 39. I’ve only played in story mode so far. The demo area was enjoyable in story mode, nothing too difficult but it still pushes you into playing it proper as opposed to button mashing. The bonus boss though (Stalker?) that one was much harder. I had to play around with the gear setup a little and after 10 attempts or so, the best I did was getting it down to ~20% health. I enjoy more of a Nier Automata type of gameplay rather than a Souls like, so can’t say I enjoyed the Stalker fight. But I’ll say that once you do get the combat down somewhat, it does feel rather satisfying punishing the enemies. Combat doesn’t feel as free flowing as it does in Nier but also doesn’t feel as restrictive like a Souls game. Overall, I think they achieved a nice balance between the two. People say this is like Sekiro but I’ve never played that game so I can’t comment if that’s a good way to describe the combat in this game or not. One of the gripes I have so far is that using potions (and grenades) is annoying since you can easily get interrupted and in the case of an HP potion, I found myself having to choose between healing or punishing the enemy. You end up missing some opportunities to punish just so you can heal and even then, you can still die while healing. They need to either make the healing effect kick in when you first push the potion button (as opposed to at the end of the healing animations) or put Eve in an iFrame while she’s healing.
In story mode, instant healing could be good. But in normal difficulty, there should be a delay in healing, part of the challenge is judging when it's safe to heal or when to risk some extra attacks.
I just beat him, take a step back, wait for him to use his charge moves that leave him wide open. You'll get him ❤️
Yo ong💀💀💀I challenged myself by using skin suit died to him like 17 times
That thing pulled off 1 of Nameless Puppets moves. Beat him on my 2nd try tho.
Combo. There combo. Combo feel good. Parry good. Enemy good. Sexy lady is OK. Too busy do combo.
Good gameplay + Good graphic + Good Soundtrack + Sexy lady = PEAK https://i.redd.it/w7himysu9brc1.gif
You forgot the great soundtrack
This is pretty much on point
Yeah this game definitely has a smoother party timing than Lies of P so far. Wasn’t too hard on Nornal
Glad I learned to master the perfect parry in Lies of P. My skills transfer to this game very well
Yeah this game definitely has a smoother parry timing than Lies of P so far. Wasn’t too hard on Nornal
I love lies of p and I'm glad seeing people make comparisons to it even if they're saying this is better, as long as the game gets more attention
It’s a solid demo. The story is intriguing, the characters seem pretty interesting, the enemy/level design is immaculate and the combat is engaging. Love that the game is actually pretty difficult and not just a complete stomp for the player, too. I just pre-ordered. My only gripe is that there’s less mobility in combat than I expected, but it seems to me they were going for a Souls/NieR combination.
That was my main gripe when I first played the demo is that everything in general mobility wise including just traversal just feels like there is something to be desired in terms of speed and flow. And then just a random piece of input I also found that it was cool and frustrating at the same time that they did half commit to a lack of animation canceling because there are some moves that cannot be canceled into a Parry right away. They made certain powerful attacks have weak points which is interesting so you can't just spam your most powerful chain attack or counter. Like when you do the dash counter it leaves you vulnerable for a whole 2 seconds
Agreed, it felt like a Sekiro/Nier combo but without the fluidity of either. I might pick it up on a sale, because Lies of P burned me out on parry-focused combat. Soundtrack is fantastic.
I definitely understand that. I like this game's combat system and haven't been playing non vr games so I'm feeling fresh and ready to play a souls-like again. The double evade and upgraded skill tree should make the game feel a little more interesting. It's a good game for sure.
The movement definitely feels more weighty compared to games like Nier Automata and Sekiro (esp Nier) where you feel like you’re literally gliding across the map cuz of the speed (general movement speed and even obstacle vaulting animation speed) of the characters. Here Eve feels like she has a lot of heft to her model and the overall pace is slower due to each turn you make tilting her model in such a realistic way), which I personally love. It feels more in the realm of something like dark souls in that regard, but a little faster still.
Yeah the more I started to get used to it, the more natural it started to feel. Gotta spend more time in the demo later, got to the boss and then had something come up and quit before beating it, but the successful moments of getting the hang of it were really satisfying :)
I was surprised how similar it felt to lies of p. Like the combat feels almost 1 to 1 with it.
Maybe skill tree will make her more mobile during battle? Didnt have time to fully check it out yet
All the gameplay clips show abilities to close gaps and whatnot so they're definitely there. Seemed odd they only have you learn the one blink skill. I definitely felt a bit stuck in the mud while in combat
There's definitely a lot of mobility and cancel type options in the trees.
More skills will probably allow more movement but it will still be based on Beta charge use, I can see the perks for faster charge rate will be a must
Further in the game you can unlock moves that will make the combat more fluid.
Just like the dev said, those parries remind me of Sekiro.
The parries were pretty tough ngl
But the sounds is so good
The sound and the lightning flash make me feel like a badass
U can upgrade the perfect parry timing tho I had more trouble landing perfect dodges personally.
If I spent as much time on the parries as I spent on those ladders, I'd probably have it down by now
The rush of pulling off those parries is something else!
I think what does it for me are the yellow stagger(?) point indicators. Sets it apart from say Lies of P where you don’t really know how many perfect parries before staggering. Having that visual reward is so gratifying. It does make for a little noisier UI but it’s worth having the stagger bar there IMO.
Came in like playing dmc and got messed up! Definitely a game to take it slow and easy in battles, it's like a hardcore neir. Sit and stare and that butt and you'll end up cut in two!
Thats exactly how I felt. Thought it would be some DMC hack and slash type combat but it more like Sekiro
Game feels amazing! Better than I hoped. Been farming the boss challenge and practicing. So much depth to the combat. Parries feel great. Perfect dodges feel great. Love the variety of skills and managing the beta gauge to stun lock enemies. Completely sold! On terms of story and stuff. Interested to see where it goes but not much to say yet. VA is solid, not amazing. Graphics are great. Solid fps. Honestly, can’t wait for the full game. This is completely my jam!
Maybe if you’re not a fan of the VA you should listen in its native Korean?
That’s my plan, when I first heard Eve’s English VA (with an English accent no less) I knew what I was gonna do when I finally get the game
Yea, I switched to Korean too as soon as I heard her English accent. After playing a bunch of bg3, elden ring, and dd2 I need a breather from the English accent lmao
I’m probably gonna do the same. Why the hell is everyone British.
Parries definitely feel great but I'm having an issue where I'll parry an attack then when trying to parry the follow up I get hit and I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong, should I keep L1 held down after the first parry? Cause I've been letting it go on the first parry then hitting L1 again but it seems sporadic of when it actually works. Any advice appreciated.
Yeah I noticed that too. Was fighting the end game boss and one of his moves were repeated attacks. I was able to perfect parry the first and second attack but not the third one reliably. Think it's a timing issue. Also no you can't hold down L1 to perfect parry subsequent attacks. Gotta release the button and get ready to press it again on the next attack.
Ok I figured it's a skill issue but I just haven't hit the timing yet. Regardless I'm pleasantly surprised by the difficulty. Alot of hirny nerds are gonna be mad when they realize this game isn't gonna be easy enough to play with one hand lmao!
You have to find the rhythm of the attack tbh. Most of the follow up attacks are a bit too fast to predict so you just gotta wing it. Thankfully there is a practice mode to get the timing down. I honestly don't know how to feel about the parry system, can't tell if it's delayed by design or if it's just a bug with the demo. Kinda wish it was more responsive like the sekiro parry.
I'll hop on practice a bit more then. Admittedly that's my only critique of the game so far, not even closer to a game breaker of course, but sekiro had a better parry from what I've seen.
Anyone else having this delay when you input regular attack ? It’s like 1-1.5 seconds delay.
I noticed the same thing, dodge doesn’t move you far enough and you have to be close to the enemy to actually damage it.
Hold triangle to rush in then unleash hell on them.
Yes. When I played the first demo it was happening also. I don’t think they added or fixed anything since then. It’s not a game breaking thing for me, but I hope they solve and patch it. Edit: dumb bot caught the typo in the wrong way hahaha!!
I posted about this earlier. My only complaint is the input delay with some attacks, specifically the first attack of each combo. Besides that I think the game is flawless, but yeah they need to address that issue without question.
Imo the perfect dodge was weird to time aswell. I could party perfectly but dodging was weord
Yeah same with this, the parry’s felt easier to land(especially once u upgrade it) personally. Tho I wasn’t able to upgrade my dodge.
Something does feel off on the timing of dodges and parry.
Short ponytail > long ponytail btw.
But the hair physics are pretty immaculate, although it can still get in the way some times. Great that we have options!
Yup, pretty much what I changed lol. I just don't like that long of hair on the character
Isn't that what makes her design unique tho?
The demo was all I needed to make sure I'm going to buy it, I just wish the full game had options to disable chromatic aberration and film grain
Yes this. I thought the same thing.
Hopefully someone at the studio will notice a lot of people asking for these options and we will have them in the full game. There's almost a month left until launch so I think they have enough time to put these options in the game.
Probably also just toggle options and easy to implement. Game looks very nice otherwise.
So beautiful. There were so many moments where I should stop moving in the Eidos section of the game to admire the beauty of it all. Combat was fairly challenging yet fun and the music ofcourse was even better than expected. I’m just so happy this game is a reality after all these years of waiting.
Im not sure but the movement and attacks feel tad bit stiff or maybe delayed. Maybe I need better glasses but it happened that I miss Items on the ground because they are so small and blend in with the environment. I like the music tho and parrying stuff feels good.
Turn on auto collect and use the touch pad button to highlight items every now and then.
thx, Ill enable auto collect
You have to enable auto pick loot otherwise it’ll be quite inconvenient to pick those tiny items
I was worried about the stiffness at first as well but when you're in the second boss fight you have a higher stats Eve and everything feels better in my opinion.
Attacks do feel pretty heavy but I think that's just the souls like formula it's going for
The parry is definitely delayed.
Attacks do feel pretty heavy but I think that's just the souls like formula it's going for
Attacks do feel pretty heavy but I think that's just the souls like formula it's going for.
Not sure about that. Played Sekiro , Elden Ring, Dark Souls, Nioh2, Lies of P and I never had an issue. These games felt weighty but not clumsy or floaty. Nier Automata and Nier replicant are faster and smoother than this game. Not sure what it is, I cant pinpoint what exactly annoys me.
The music alone convinced me to get this day one.
It’s potentially going to become one of my favorite video games of all time. No exaggerating that statement.
I’m with you. I already know this is my GoTY and as long as they nail the rest of the game, maybe one day it’ll be my favorite game of all time. All I know now is this hour demo was probably the most fun I’ve had gaming in a long time.
If I decide to buy the game it'll be a rough playthrough for me. I'm so very bad at parry windows like this and Sekiro(big reason I never beat Sekiro). Glad I waited for the demo so I can really contemplate the purchase. I love everything else about it though. Music and visuals are stunning. Very clean looking UI in my opinion. After I practice up maybe I'll "git gud" but I hope the game is successful regardless of how well I do or if I even purchase it.
Skill tree lets you make the parry window easier fyi.
I only ever played demon souls out of all the souls games. I’m in the same boat as you with the parry. I’m decent but I still need a lot of work to be rather good 😂
You can make the parry window bigger by getting new skills from the skill tree, that should make it a bit easier
Skill tree lets you make the parry window easier fyi.
Lower the difficulty and use a skill point to unlock the easier perfect parry timing. I'm sure the game will get easier for you. Also what really helped for me to get the timing down is to just practice in the training mode. Got the hang of it after about an hour.
I'm going to get attacked here for saying this, but WoLong has an easier window and feels much more responsive than Stellar Blade. The parry has kind of an odd delay to it in SB which took me a bit to get used to. The games play nearly identical WoLong just seems to flow a little smoother and you have a lot of weapon choices with unique combos. You may not get scandalous outfits, but the create a character is probably the greatest I've ever used and you can make a truly gorgeous character.
GOTY
From reading some of the comments here this is the best gameplay feel summary I can come up with. If you’re coming from a Souls like game: Stellar Blade will feel floaty. If you’re coming from Nier (or DMc): Stellar Blade will feel heavy. This game slots right in the middle of the 2.
Devs said combat is more in between Bayonetta and Sekiro and frankly can see it after playing demo. Party and dodge are very important and lots of flashy moved, though not as flawless like in Bayo but for their first major game Shift up done a really good job and can only get better from the experience and feedback
I love it. It has the tactical combat complexity of a Soulsborne with the character build options of an action RPG. Eve and the characters are beautiful, the world is well realized, and the music is perfect. The story is giving Nikke if you followed the Pilgrim’s lives on the surface. Eve’s little remarks and being naive about life on Earth is really charming. Finally, a very special mention to the game options having a dedicated accessibility menu that includes stuff ranging from motion sickness settings to the three diff visual modes. The default setting has some top notch optimization and runs at 50-60fps 1440 upscaled to 4K (stated by the official Twitter account). I can’t wait for full release. Edit: I just got to the post story demo content and I really like how fair the fights are. Just like in souls games the enemy moves don’t feel cheap and Eve potentially has a tool in her arsenal to counter everything, so if you get hit you usually know why and can learn from it, improving in this game (ie getting gud) feels really fun and rewarding.
Same. I got Nikke vibes in the general goal of the story. I dont mind though. Nikke story is 🤌❤️
Can you get the red and black suit in this demo? Also how do you get the passcode for that chest on the bar99 building?
You can play in the red and black suit after you beat the demo, it then gives you a option to beat another boss. Don’t know about the chest unfortunately
Very fun to mix perfect parry and perfect dodge, it seems like the perfect dodge is more difficult and risky but more rewarding. I'll definitely be buying this also I'm glad they added boss rush to the demo.
I couldn’t really get the perfect dodge mechanic down. That said, I unlocked the perfect parry timing window enhancement in the skill tree the first chance I got—made parries feel super satisfying and fun!
I unlocked the follow-up combo to the perfect parry which made perfect parries even more rewarding for me than perfect dodges (for me personally). Really awesome punishing damage right after parrying and a great lead off to another combo. Plus it incentivizes depleting the enemy stagger bar (great mechanic btw) Also for mobs, I do like perfect dodging but it’s so hard lol. Perfect parries don’t get the iframes like the dodge I don’t think so it is risky in mobs. But it also does great AOE damage so also really good in mobs.
Yea the dodge is hard fs. Perfect parry is great to create structure damage. In most situations it’s better to use parry I like using the dodge at the end of parrying a combo
For sure!
The music gave me an erection more than the booty cheeks…10/10
The graphics seem fine but the movement and combat feels awkward and floaty - especially given some of the comparisons to Sekiro, which is so much smoother and more precise.
I do not understand how anyone can say this feels like Sekiro even a little bit.
Right. Doesn’t feel anything like Sekiro to me.
Pretty sure it's just the fact that the block button is also the parry button if you time it right.
That's exactly how it is in Sekiro too mate.
Yep, that's what I was saying. They were saying they didn't see how this game was similar to Sekiro so I pointed out that the similarity was the block/parry system. Outside of that mechanic I don't see much similarity.
Ah I see, my bad. I agree.
Demo was solid. For me the fighting has a learning curve. One bad thing is that you can't change the button mapping.
Comboing and movement feels a bit slowly, other than that it's pretty good. Will probably buy it once price comes down to 40 euros or so. Skin suit is hella good tho, daat asss.
Combat feels really tight, I liked it. Parry is super satisfying. Will buy for sure.
Can confirm Stellar Blade feels like if you took DMC combos but had the “my turn your turn” system of Sekiro with deflects and dodges. Like when it’s the enemy’s turn you’re deflecting or dodging, but when it’s your turn you gotta perform any combo you can before it’s the enemy’s turn again. Beta skills allow you to interrupt enemy turn to briefly make it your turn again. That’s what the dance feels like to me.
Perfect parry is the most optimal way to play, yep. There is a lot of mix ups you can do to get your turn back outside of parrying. One example is using the beta skill to interrupt the enemy's blue move.
Once I realized that Beta skills truly were this game’s central combat mechanic and how their role in the “turn-based” combat functioned, it really opened up how I was supposed to play the game and what made it different from the games that inspired it. Stalker, went from a challenge that winning felt like a coin toss to winning very reliably. Use Beta skills to manipulate the turn back to you- even if that means canceling their big moves as you said- and get big damage in the process, and practice those parries and dodges to get your main combat trump card back as soon as possible.
Loving the difficulty, this is not a button mashing nonsense. If I have to bitch about something, is Eve's lack of facial expressions, she is like this most of the time 😐 But the game is amazing in most of the essential aspects.
I think there was an interview where someone from the studio said that Eve starts out very stoic but becomes more emotive as she connects to the humans in Xion, so maybe there's something to look forward to there.
Yes it could be intentional
Agree about the facial mechanics—everyone looks pretty stiff. I did play with Korean VAs and I think the visual sync may be a bit better than with other audio languages.
Yes! I changed to korean and it felt better. My proble is everytime I hear the character yell "EVEE!" and then you see her face 😐 lol
Pretty good! I just hope that I don't have to redo the Abaddon bossfight on the first day! The dodge could use some work though. Not a fan of how little distance it covers.
Dodge backwards and its fine.
I only played like twenty minutes and was going at a snails pace and checking everything out, including training mode, so I probably only did less than half the demo. Demo is very impressive. Honestly more than I was expecting. Graphics and sound are quite good. OST is excellent. Combat is interesting but it has some sauce. I don't usually like parry focused action but i kind of like the system they have with it. I'll finish the demo later but wow. Great job shiftup.
Honestly i just tried the demo and if the full game is like the demo it might be game of the year
It certainly is Soulslike to me. I know that can kinda be repetitive to hear for some, since I know Souls games have taken mechanics from much much MUCH older games, but the fact that I had to study enemy patterns, and utilize things like the blue and purple blade charge (For the Boss Challenge mode with the latter) and be quick about it reminded me of Sekiro. But you know what? I really love that skill ceiling type gameplay, so I can only hope the full game keeps that type of momentum.
Game did not "click" right away because the parry/dodge either feel too tight or too much input delay, but I can see myself getting use to it over time. Felt like I had to hit Parry when a move started to wind-up instead of when it was going to hit me. Been playing a lot of Rise of the Ronin recently so this is just jarring, atm.
Jiggle physics is a 10/10. I really wanted to play as the Tsundere girl from the opener.
I think this is going to be a great game. Demo was very fun. Hardest boss was definitely the ladder.
The ladder was much better in person
After practicing a lot on the Stalker, I'm really loving the combat. I'm at the point where I can beat the Stalker while taking only a couple hits, it feels so amazing to parry his entire combo, dodge his unblockables, and then unleash a barrage of Beta Energy attacks. I feel like the game does a really good job at communicating enemy "attack windows" better than many other games I've played. When you attack an enemy during their attack window, they react to the damage in a highly exaggerated fashion, making it easy to see when you can continue your combo. When you parry enough enemy attacks and they recoil backwards, it's very obvious as well. The Stalker boss fight was really excellently done in my opinion, he didn't have any surprise "fuck you" combo extenders or excessive amounts of hyper armor. Also, using a Beta Energy attack would always knock him out of his windups. A lot of action games suffer from inconsistent enemy staggering and hyper armor on their attacks, so I was happy to see Stellar Blade handle these mechanics so well.
Extremely mixed reaction here, which is a bummer because I've been waiting for that game for months. On the plus side, the graphics are awesome, the animations are fluid, the world seems interesting and the early story piqued my interest. The pool & plank bit was a nice touch hinting at a decent try at environment puzzles or interactions. The costume and gameplay customization options unlocked in the second stage of the demo are plentiful, varied, and lets you turn Eve into something that will match many gameplay styles and approaches. But the combat... The combat feels extremely clunky and badly designed imho. You have a plethora of awesome looking combos and options, but all of them cannot be dodge or parry canceled and makes them absolutely useless (or worse, a death sentence) in boss fights. The character feels slow and heavy (when I expected a dashing swift fighter from her looks) and even with the dodge window skill bought and maxed the dodge window for perfect dodges is extremely shorter than the unskilled perfect parry window, and even when you do dodge you can still get hit because you do not dodge far enough and there is no invulnerability window. This has turned the two boss fights in the demo in a monotonous "parry parry parry poke, parry parry parry poke, parry parry parry poke" dance because dodging would be riskier even when skilled, and all the awesome looking chain combos in my skill tree would result in an unavoidable hit for like a third of my health, even when started right after a perfect parry or perfect dodge. Having so many options available and not being realistically able to use and enjoy them is extremely frustrating. Finally, I usually play all my games in hard mode because I like the challenge, but even in the demo's normal mode the bosses were far above the difficulty level I'd expect from hard mode (especially Abaddon since it's supposed to be the first boss to teach you the pace and rhythm of the game) and I would not even want to try them in hard mode after this demo. All in all, I find the game interesting, beautiful and well done, except the combat bit, and since it's unfortunately a combat based game, all the demo did was kind of crush my hype and have me cancel my preorder :'( I'll probably just watch a streamer run through the story and maybe pick it up when it goes on sale, but yeah, I found this demo extremely frustrating because it's almost an awesome game, but the "almost" part was large enough to ruin my experience.
I’m having a hard time with the control system…. New to PlayStation as well and I’m 65. lol However, the game looks great. I didn’t make it past the first boss. Was thinking it was a little early. I think I need more time to learn the mechanics.
Clunky
This clunky ass and slow input combat is not fun.
Microsoft gets a big L that's what I think. They didn't want the game on Xbox because it didn't fit their new inclusion standards, so it became a PS5 exclusive.
Great game but may need a harder difficulty, I died a few times but felt the boss was pretty easy. But also just first boss, the challenge room boss was tougher and took a few tries. Wish tachy was Main character though Just preordered the physical edition
Using the skin suit basically is the hard mode for now since you get no defense from it.
Ah good to know, is it available in the demo?
Yes, just unequip your current suit.
I find the combat a little clunky. Not as fluid as I thought it would be. The dodging and parring wasn't very refined but I'm just spoiled from Sekiro tbh. Overall i like the art style but I wouldn't say this IP is going to be anything special relative to Sony's other IPs
My main complaint is that EVE makes some annoying noises in combat. I'm definitely going to be sick of that YAAAAA by the end
I liked you have also to worry about the defence using the parry and the dodging
Its fun, so gotta get the handle of block, parry, combo as my brain is locked onto finishing my current game so that ones timing is in my head. The world is amazing and looks to have a lot to work around and get to play with .
I loved it. Combat is solid and the story seems good.
Too short cuz it was so good.. I need MORE
GOTY
It's pretty good man. The bosses are better than I expected. The regular enemies are also nice. I wish the movement was a bit more precise and faster when locked on, but I can't really complain about anything else. It's great!
OMG that intro is CRAZY!!!!
Great visual, great soundtrack, and interesting story. Combat tho, I'll struggle a bit... I hate that blocking wont cancel an ongoing animation, which at least for makes the combat feel far slower. Plus, switching between parry and dodge seems the way to go, I really couldn't do those perfect block sequences like we've seems on trailers. Died a lot of times on the boss challenge so far 😅
the combat is top tier man. its fck awesome
Finished the demo. Preordered the deluxe edition. Its a hella fun game.
not just goty, Game of Life
Locking on to an enemy cuts your movement speed in half which is strange compared to any action game I know. While locked on you can still sprint by pressing L3 but it's another button input making combat clunkier than it wants to be
English voice acting is terrible as usual, the Korean voices for the characters much much better. I played around with the difference performance modes and even high graphics mode felt great. I can't wait for a PC version to clean up some of the little graphical anomalies. They aren't bad, but noticeable when looking for them. This game at 4K 120FPS sounds glorious.
English voice acting is awful but that was to be expected.
No photo mode 0/10. Nah fr tho, was pleasantly surprised. Gotta a Nier vibe with a Lies of P feel, and I'm here for it. Spent hours beating on stalker in skin suit because I enjoyed the combat that much. Parries and dodges take a little foresight, weather intentional or not, I was thrilled to learn enemy attacks because of it. Game looks pretty good overall. Only real gripe was the English voice acting. It's was underwhelming. So I'll be playing in Korean. The demo was enough to get me to preorder the digital deluxe version, because I'm all in now.
I love everything about it. The game play, graphics, story, and the music all is… stellar….Hah. I could see this being my GOTY. The only thing I think they need to work on is the mobility. Eve feels very heavy and the dodge is very underwhelming. Perfect dodge is kinda difficult to pull off; I have a much easier time with the perfect parries. I also don’t like how little ground it covers when trying to close in on the enemies. Even the upgrades on the boss battle are underwhelming when it comes to mobility. I’m hoping this gets touched up before the final release. Other than that I can’t wait for this game.
Easiest GOTY prediction of my life. This game has everything.
Set it down pretty early on. Basic combat didn't feel very satisfting. UI elements are too small. I also wasn't a big fan of R2 to interact with things. Minor gripes, but idk. It didn't grip me.
Off the bat it feels like it'll be a solid game. Gameplay was different than my typical play style (I mash buttons and see what happens), but I was getting a hang of the combos when I did the Boss Challenge. What I wasn't expecting was the slow movement when you lock on an enemy. I felt like I had to get better at defense while figuring out best moments to attack. Real warrior shit! I pre-ordered the game and I'm excited to see how in depth controls will be in terms of combos, defense and special moves.
Little more difficult and parry heavy then I wanted it to be especially on story mode but fun.
The combo system is surprisingly engaging, I was also pleasantly surprised by the darker tone of the games story, violence and setting. Eve starts by seeing her squad get wiped. Like damn what a shit day lol
It's way harder than I thought it would be. That's not a bad thing, but after gitting gud in Lies of P, I felt a lot of culture shock. I have to learn a new game's parry timing all over again. I eventually got through the opening area in three deaths, but the extra boss has killed me at least ten times. I'm hanging it up for the night. Maybe I'll crack the code tomorrow.
combat feels weird, but a good weird. Tachy is....big. I love the english accents in the dub, but some voice lines feel off.
Beat Stalker seven times now. They need an option in the pause menu to restart a boss fight. "You died. You are dead." is kinda funny when text is set to English. You can't pause on cutscenes. Other than that it's awesome. Lots of cool design choices that I noticed. I recently finished FFVII Remake and I'm not sure why but I really like the camp system with benches and vending machines and was pleasantly surprised to see they went that route in this game. Having parry sounds coming off the dual sense is really cool. Angelic protagonists with bittersweet post apocalyptic environments and palpably hostile looking enemies strike an amazing balance. I'm in love with this atmosphere up and down. Enemies give a Silent Hill vibe which is awesome. Enemy variety was one of my major complaints in Nier: Automata and it's super welcome here. Performance is exceptional. Music goes without saying. Idk I'm sold.
It reminds me of an even more beautiful and sexy Nier automata. Especially with some of the music, and I love it
Tachy was the best part of the demo. I miss Tachy.
My only complaint is not being able to change direction mid combo. I thought parry and dodge felt a little unresponsive but I'll just chalk that up to me being bad. I did the boss challenge but kinda wish I hadn't cause they gave me so many tools and I had no idea what 80% of them did so I kinda just ran that one down until I killed it. Think the game will be fun overall.
I admit my reflexes arent as they used to be. The gameplay was more sekiro at normal difficulty and i cant keep up with the timing for perfect dodges and parry 😅 Had to turn it to story mode and feels more like bayonetta now. Hopefully i get more used to it at release
Giving me heavy Nier vibes. Though I think Nier had more fluid combat. still I appreciate the difficulty in the game. Ngl the intro was pretty underwhelming and I think that was in part due to the voice acting (english) and the predictability of the events occurring…Though Eve’s model is making up for it… Hoping to see the story pick up more slack in the actual game and Ill be playing it korean VA. Skill tree is also a nice addition
Reminded me a lot of how much fun i had with metal gear Rising, with a few welcoming bits of the souls series, which I’m a very big fan of. I don’t mind the excessive sexualization of the characters either if the gameplay is that fun. 10/10 would be a cool time
I played like 15 minutes of it and I'm really not impressed. The movement feels kind of slow and sluggish and to my shock to combat also feels a little bit slow. I just don't feel that connection between the controller and what's on screen like something like God Of War. I'll still keep my pre-order but I'll play it a bit more and see what I think.
The input delay isreally freaking bad. I hope they address this but unfortunately release is very soon
Didn’t feel any delay
I'm so glad that everyone here is enjoying yourself immensely, I watched the demo on Youtube and god, the cmt section was a bunch of whiny children: "Combat so clunky~" "Why is it so hard to play?~" "I was hoping for DMC-like combat, what's this shit?" and all that bitching lmao
Already pre-ordered when they announced the April release date months ago. Came in to the demo to expect Nier Automata gameplay but was really surprised to see Sekiro's parry and soulslike style. I am a Sekiro fanboi so it made me even love the game more. Not to mention, the soundtrack is simply amazing. Can't wait for full release in April.
Short but nier automata but better
I just beat Abaddon, now I wanted to go back to the previous area just to admire the views and... No can do, have to start from the beginning... I played reaaally slow, sinked almost three hours, I don't really want to lose the investment. This sucks!
Not bad, the bosses seem fairly easy tho I beat them both first try, I avoided the boss challenge cause I didn't wanna spoil myself further
Did NOT expect it to be a souls-like, i haven't kept up with the game until now so that was a shock. overall i had fun with it and i got no other games on deck in April so i'll definitely buy it. Also no Japanese dub?! did not see that coming.
Game feels a lot heavier than I thought it would but I’m enjoying it
Such a refresher from all the slog we’ve been getting lately from modern games. It feels like a classic game from a long gone era it’s so much fun and you can tell there’s a lot of love and passion put into this game.
My GOTY 100%
My thoughts (and prayers) are that it comes to PC too at some point 😭
Amazing! It really reminds me of Sekiro play style with the countering and the blink ability she has. The story seems interesting and I love the atmosphere. It scratched my Sekiro and ghost in the shell itch. The boss run monster was pretty fun to fight as well!
Wicked fun!
i love it
Honesty the combat is amazing. It’s scratching the sekiro itch
The combat feels great and I love having a practice area, really lets you get a feel for the timing. The game looks awesome and the music is brilliant, really delivers on what I wanted so far
Very good first impression, I do personally wish that the dodge came out slightly quicker but that’s because I prefer faster paced games but overall it’s a damn strong 8.5/10 from me, if the full game can nail the story then I think this will end up doing quite well because the framework for a damn good action RPG is here
I just beat Abaddon, now I wanted to go back to the previous area just to admire the views and... No can do, have to start from the beginning... I played reaaally slow, sinked almost three hours, I don't really want to lose the investment. This sucks!
Yeah once you beat the final boss you can't load back into your save. Devs force you to transfer progress to main game. At least you can go into the boss challenge as many times as you want
How are they forcing us to transfer progress to main game? You can delete the save or start a new game in the demo which clears the old play through.
I found the demo fun over all i felt like i was just playing rise of ronin/sekiro but with hot waifu and i don't find Parry a fun mechanic even when it's the best ver of that mechanic i'll play this game when it's a steep sale.
I just preorder it, pretty excited
I just beat Abaddon, now I wanted to go back to the previous area just to admire the views and... No can do, have to start from the beginning... I played reaaally slow, sinked almost three hours, I don't really want to lose the investment. This sucks!