City Interactive is publishing this fantasy action game that brings some of the prettiest visuals seen on next generation hardware. While we didn’t get to actually have hands-on time with the demo, what we were shown was a definite work-in-progress in terms of gameplay, and that’s not a knock.
The main character is a burly bald man named Harkyn, who is hunting down supernatural demon-like creatures that seem to be cropping up everywhere in a broken and dissolute land. As the demo demonstrated, before you get into smashing/bashing up the baddies, you get to choose from a set of three different classes: Warrior, Rogue, and Cleric.
For this demo, we started off with Rogue, which was explained to us as being in the middle when it came to talents — kind of a jack of all trades, master of none. Anyway, once chosen, the story began and we found Harkyn in a monastery, which was ominous looking. Around us there were dreadful, darkened gray hallways and places for evil things to reside. Surrounding us was stained glass windows, which were the only visible color scheme in the place. The graphics really set the tone for the story, using good reflective textures, strong shading and shadows.
Upon the first bit of exploration, and discovery of dead bodies everywhere, we happened upon our first bit of trouble, which came in the form of a well armored, sword-swinging bad guy. As the action began, we were told that the wrap of the gameplay was built with strategy in mind — and not button mashing. So, all you God of War fans out there hoping for a badass medieval, demon smashing fest are going to have to put breaks on that notion. The fighting was slow and methodical during the demo. Granted, our gamer was trying to show us the strategy around the fighting and how insane it would be just to hack/slash through enemies, but still this was more of a thinking man’s action game. Harkyn would roll in, stab/slash and then back out of the attack zone again. Very slow-paced action, which could be a downfall of the game, but it just depends on the gamer playing (I have a feeling PC folks are going to like this one).
After dispatching the enemy, we’re also informed that you can find elements/treasures throughout the maps that would affect gameplay later in the game. For example, there was a small shard lying in front of what seemed like an unreachable stained glass window. While we didn’t go and get it due to time constraints, we were told that this bit would play into the first level’s boss and give Harkyn the opportunity to acquire a special weapon. The developers informed us that items like this would be scattered throughout the entire game. These were exciting little bits that help with the overall game.
Now, once we dispatched the bad guy, we moved on to the first level’s mini-boss, which was a nine-foot tall armored demon. His attacks came in three distinct waves, with each dictating where we were in the battle with him. The strategic fighting style was still intact, as the dev would take Harkyn in for one or two hits after a patterned attack from the bad guy, then retreat back. After a certain amount of time, the armor was destroyed and the fighting style from the bad guy switched to more of a dangerous sword-swinging twirl. It complicated things and you didn’t want to get close to the fight when the enemy was going through this motion. Again, the fight seemed to slow down a bit. Eventually, the bad guy was defeated and the game continued.
Let’s talk about gameplay a bit. I was concerned with two major elements of Lords of the Fallen. The first concern was that this touch-and-go sort of fighting might frustrate players enough to warrant not wanting to get into fights. To the devs’ credit, they showed off a level tree with the characters that added special moves to do more damage, which might switch the monotonous fighting tone up a bit. Prior to getting to these upgrades, the fighting still feels a bit stiff. I’m not sure what the solution is for that, as you don’t want to change the philosophy of the game mid-way through the development process to appease hack/slash fans. It might be a good idea to add some more moves right from the start to give gamers a variety of attacks. I know that most games start out in a more simplified manner, but for a game like this it really needs a bit more attack varieties from the get-go to keep the gamer interested.
The second issue I have is the pattern-istic ways the computer AI thinks. Though this was just a demo, it seemed like the devs were simply just waiting for attack patterns to begin rather than applying strong strategy to the attack, which is the theme they were wanting to push for this action game. The mini-boss fight was a prime example of this issue, as one move from the enemy was a two-handed downward sword attack that he recovered from slowly, which opened him up for an attack. His attacks seemed too shallow and not that exciting, but the devs were waiting for that attack to happen, so they could go in with Harkyn’s attacks.
These two things need some adjustments before the game’s 2014 release, or I can see some big issues with it from gamers.
Anyway, the game itself was beautiful to watch in motion and I became very fascinated with the environment and what it added to the overall story. The story itself was damn strong, as it surrounded the reemergence of a God that was defeated by the people of Lords of the Fallen’s land. I’m very interested to see the rest of how the story plays out when the game is finally released next year.
Until then, I have faith that things will get cleaned up and improved before that happens. There is certainly enough time for some strong adjustments to make this one memorable game from City Interactive.