The upcoming PS5 action RPG Phantom Blade Zero will buck Soulslike conventions, and developer S-GAME has affirmed the "kungfupunk" title is looking to stand out from the crowded sub-genre. The added info comes via a Q&A answer reveal on Twitter following the game's playable showing at Summer Game Fest.
Top of the list, the developer stresses the goal for the game was always "combo-driven, heart-pumping combat that is hectic, rewarding, and exhilarating". While inspiration for things like multi-layered maps offering multiple approaches, full of secret nooks and crannies, the studio freely admits pulls from FromSoftware's Dark Souls series, Phantom Blade Zero offers multiple difficulty options, and enemies won't respawn on death, or after interacting with checkpoints.
S-GAME stresses that, despite what some press outlets are reporting, Phantom Blade Zero is not exclusive to PS5 and is coming to PC as well. Further, it reveals that the long-awaited demo of the game is not ready to be released to the masses, and when it does, will be offline only. The developer candidly admits that it's noted framerate issues and occasional crashes in the playable build at SGF.
What do you think of Phantom Blade Zero? Does it sound like a breath of fresh air after so many Soulslike games have been released in the last few years, or like this self-flagellating scribe, do you wish there were even more? Let us know in the comments section below.
[source x.com]
Comments 19
Lol Twitter was very funny with people saying "we are glad you've not taken the PS bribe" when Playstation is actively helping in development and marketing of the game.
Kudos to the developers. It seems they have no need to hide average combat by forcing a difficulty level.
This is my most anticipated known game after Metaphor Refantazio drops. Hope they don't Cyberpunk this
@Sequel Soulbornes and Soulslikes are the boring form of action game I've ever played. I've optted to avoid the genre like the plague.
@Sequel I am not a fan of souls like game difficulty at all. I love what I have seen with wukong and that game would be a first day buy or even a preorder. If it is a souls like difficulty though I might skip it all together. I hope for the best
I'm not really a fan of soulslike but I'll give it a go.
I am a big fan of dark souls, elden ring, sekiro and bloodborne. But day by day i despite more and more others so called "soulslike".
I prefer a million times other games with some inspirations but with their own identity, like Stellar blade for example
I can understand why people are getting fed up of the souls formula but I'm a total souls game junkie..I can't get enough of them but that's my choice. This game looks awesome but with the elden ring expansion and my plan to start that game from scratch i just don't know if I'll have the time to play this. Let's see how things go 🤣
So it's more of a DMC-like instead then.
Finally.... someone used one brain cell and stepped out of the nonsense box "must be soulslike" that eradicated classic action RPGs.
I love Demon's Souls, Dark Souls 1, Bloodborne, Mortal Shell, and Sekiro. But i really burnout from Soulsborne / Soulslike games.
So yeah, i'm glad this game is more DMC or Ninja Gaiden than Souls games, especially since those two games are still absent.
Souls like... followed by souls like... followed by souls like...
Please stop!!! this genre of game is way to saturated now and I personally are NOT a fan of souls like games.
With this one and Wukong, I’m hoping that they aren’t strict Soulslikes, you know? I never really liked Souls games til Elden Ring changed my mind on the genre, but even so, I want different styles of combat.
Cool phantom blade zero does look amazing word up son
I love a good souls like, but I also love other fighting systems, we've had a bit too much souls of late. But hopefully it isn't a mindless hack and slash and there is some sort of higher skill ceiling to keep combos interesting. With a difficulty system to allow all to play.
Glad to hear this, as I truly dislike souls-like games with no difficulty options. (Elden Ring excepted because there are ways in the game to somewhat compensate for the lack of difficult options. And even so, I played it on PC with difficulty mods enabled.)
Music to my ears honestly. As someone whose favorite game of all time is probably the original Dark Souls (and Bloodborne being in my top 10) I am so thoroughly sick of souls games and soulslikes. Last year, For the life of me, I couldn't understand the hype around Lies of P and I think it has less to do with the game's overall quality and more so to do with the fact that this genre has become so oversaturated.
When a game comes out and has strict manual checkpoints, respawning enemies, corpse running, and combat that relies on either precise dodge rolling or strict parry timings it just doesn't do it for me anymore. I don't understand how people continuously stay excited every time another one of these types of games comes out but I'm just over them. The less "souls" Phantom Blade Zero is, the better I say
@NathanKang I love them I played them a lot Demon Souls is my favorite I bought my PS5 because of the remake. 😅
Excellent! I never enjoyed the Soulsborne games. Too boring for me.
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