Soulslikes are one of my favorite gaming genres and one game I've been keeping an eye on for a long time is Lies of P. It was very well received upon its release both from critiques and players. It's special in that it takes on the story of Pinocchio set in a dark and grim world. Many have compared the world design and combat to Bloodborne which is intriguing ot me. It's 40% off on Steam right now so I decided to get it for myself as a summer gift.
Definitely a soulslike
From my first 2-3 hours of playing Lies of P I can safely say that it is a soulslike through and through. It's following everything from the classic souls formula by having the bonfire-like mechanic that heals you and respawns enemies, clever level design with secrets and shortcuts and bosses with on screen health bars. It's also got a few things of its own going on to make in unique. Especially when it comes to building your character there seems to be room for a lot of variety.
The bosses and level design has been a little disappointing so far. The levels are very linear which doesn't leave a lot of room for exploration. Every now and then you'll find a small side area with an item or a branching path but that's mostly it. This is probably bias on my end since I'm coming straight from Elden Ring which is the polar opposite.
The bosses haven't been an issue so far. I've fought three of them and each one I was able to defeat on my first try. The attacks are slow and easy to dodge or block and they don't have long attack combos which leaves a lot of time to attack them. Any kind of souls veteran shouldn't have a problem with these bosses. Bosses is usually a weak point in soulslikes and I think it's a shame that developers don't dare to up the difficulty on them in fear of backlash from the crowd.
Satisfying combat
The combat has been quite satisfying so far. It's simple but it works but that's also what I enjoy in soulslikes. I dodge an attack, I swing my sword and the enemies die. I was able to choose between three weapons at the start and I of course went with the biggest sword and a strength build like I always do. I'm glad I did because after testing the other weapons this one definitely had the attack pattern that suits me the most.
One cool feature is that each weapon consists of a blade and a handle. These can be mixed and matched to create new weapons of your own by mixing their abilities and skills. It's also a way to change which stat a weapon scales with which is pretty cool. I can apply a new handle to my greatsword but make it attack in a slashing pattern instead of a swinging pattern. I can also make it able to parry attacks instead of just blocking them. I haven't experimented to much with this yet but I definitely need to get into that.
We also have a special arm that can be modified to enhance our combat. I've mostly forgotten that this exists so I can't really say much about it yet. Combat is easy enough as it is with only my sword.
Great world design
The thing I'm enjoying the most about Lies of P so far is the world design and the story. It's set in a steampunky belle epoque era in a city called Krat. Here we play as (I think) Pinocchio who is trying to save the city from the uprising of the puppets. It's dark, it's brutal and it's right up my alley. It's so cool seeing classic stories like Pinocchio put into such a dark and brutalized world and story. I hope we get to see more stories like this in the future now that more and more Disney classics are starting to fall into the public domain.
Before stopping to write this I made it to a factory like area so I'm gonna start exploring that now. Hopefully it has some cool stuff for me and maybe even a challenging boss for once.
All images in this post are screenshots taken by me.