As far as the “Soulslike” genre goes, Lords of the Fallen remains my favorite. Having played Code Vein, that remains the case, but Code Vein is still pretty cool, despite some snags. Much of these issues can be patched and worked out post-launch, too, so, if you’re looking for a Soulslike that is also heavy on anime and vampires, Code Vein could very well be for you.
I’ll admit that I’m not actually a fan of anime or vampires, but I went into Code Vein looking for just a good third person action title, and I came away with that — good, but not great; compelling, but not enthralling. The game begins with character creation, just in terms of your appearance and voice, and it’s super deep. There are more customization options than I cared to count, but suffice it to say you’ll find something you’re pleased with. From here, you’re brought into a strange area to learn some of the game’s mechanics. Light and heavy attacks, using Gifts, the Mistles, and Blood Codes are all learned here. Balancing your attacks is obviously key, but it turns out the difficultly in Code Vein is not as exacting as something like a Souls or Sekiro, for example. So, if you’re timing and general skill level isn’t super good (mine is not), you’ll be alright. This is in part because of the game’s forgiving difficulty, and also in large part to the tepid AI of the bad guys, which is one of the lesser aspects of the experience. Additionally, you can have a very capable AI partner team-up with you as you embark on your journey to rid the world of the fallen Revenants, known as the Lost, and to disperse this visible mist.
Mistles are like the Bonfires of Souls, allowing fast-travel, healing, and so forth. They’re always a welcome site, and they’re thankfully placed fairly generously. Blood Codes and Gifts, which are upgraded with the currency known as Haze (that you lose all of if you die and do not make it back to where you previously died at). Blood Codes replace character-specific classes, and I liked this because it takes a lot of pressure off of the player in choosing the right build as they play. You can change your Blood Code (melee-focused, mage-like, etc), at anytime. Within each Code, there are stats, but you don’t actually have to upgrade these individually. Gifts are like your special abilities, and these can be used on various Codes, ultimately giving you a lot of customization flexibility to tune your character to your liking. Combined with a variety of AI partners with their own Code, this gives you a lot of power going into battles.
Not too unlike other games in this genre that I have played, these are a slow burn to start — it takes a few hours to really get into them to decide if they’re worth the grind or not. With Code Vein, there is less of what I call a grind, but, there is also less to invest in, at least for me. I was never all that interested in my character or the AI, or the plight of the world — serviceable, sure, but not so interesting that I just “had to” know it all (by contrast, Control is a recent game that I played where I did really want to know everything I could find in the game). It’s worth pointing out, though, that many of Code Vein’s areas were interesting enough to want to “find the edges” of, so kudos to the devs for that.
Code Vein is a pretty strong entry into the genre and it’s always refreshing to see new IP. While it has a few (mostly patchable) drawbacks, Code Vein is one I would recommend with just a little bit of hesitation.
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