The Lords of the Fallen Review (PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, & PC)

It’s interesting to see CI Games have another go at the Soulslike genre. In 2014, they worked on Lords of the Fallen alongside Deck 13. Mind you, FromSoftware’s Dark Souls was barely three years old at the time. Developers had only recently started to replicate the genre-inspiring difficulty, dark fantasy, and environmental storytelling of Soulslike games. 

When CI Games took a nose dive on their first try, we couldn’t hold it against them. Dark Souls is an evolutionary tale of the Castlevania genre that's hundreds of times more difficult to copy-paste. Above all, Lords of the Fallen was painfully sluggish, drastically beating the odds of ever achieving an immersive and challenging Soulslike system. Well, that’s until, aptly named The Lords of the Fallen, a sort of sequel, yet more like a reboot by Hexworks, recently came into the picture.

We’ve seen stories of developers getting back up and trying again. The question is, does the second time around work like a charm? Or will CI Games need to go back to the drawing board to please a tough crowd? Tag along on our The Lords of the Fallen review to find out.

Same Old

The Lords of the Fallen’s story is pretty much similar to its sequel. It’s set within the same universe and recaps the all-familiar Soulslike plotting. Granted, it's been a millennium since the events of the last game. We pick up on one of the endings of the original. While we defeated Adyr, the demon god, players may face him again. Gaming gods just never recede into eternal sleep, do they? 

Unless you can travel through the treacherous lands of Mournstead and light the six beacons of the sentinels, Adyr will awaken to unleash chaos and destruction. Why do you ask? Well, you’re one of the fabled Dark Crusaders. Additionally, you’re the only one who can wield a mystical, magical lantern. Saying “lantern” makes it sound lame, but trust me, it’s going to be one of the most satisfying tools to use.

This is very much a grimdark fantasy tale in a dark fantasy world. Moreover, The Lords of the Fallen’s open world, though majorly linearly progressive, is five times larger, according to Steam. And you can see and feel it, interconnected horizontally and vertically, and, get this, designed to harbor parallel worlds you can travel between any time you like.

The Land of the Living and the Dead

The land of the living, Axiom, and the dead, the Umbral plane, both exist in parallel to each other. What’s more? Obstacles infused in Axiom are mostly navigated by bringing forth the umbral plane. You’ll need your magical Umbral lantern to peer into the Umbral realm in real-time – just long enough to solve the puzzle. However temporary, you’re bound to spot shortcuts, new areas, secrets, powerful loot, alternate paths, and more.

However, once you’re on the Umbral plane, your health immediately gets slashed by half. You can regain it by fighting previously hidden wraiths. It makes it so that taking even one hit drains the remaining part of your health bar. On the other hand, staying alive is extremely tough because wraiths respawn limitlessly. They also grow stronger the longer you stay here. This is the land of the dead, after all.

It begs the question, Why risk coming to Umbral? Well, being a Soulslike game, you’ll inevitably meet a tragic end one too many times. The monsters in The Lords of the Fallen are vicious – the bosses even more so. But the trick is, every time you die, you get a second chance to redeem yourself by respawning at your death spot, but on the umbral plane. This serves as the perfect incentive to traverse both planes every now and then. So, no matter how tough Umbral gets, you’ll almost always find yourself there.

The Gifts of the Dead

It pays off, though. All the bloodshed and turmoil just to stay alive. Firstly, both worlds are strikingly beautiful. Axiom understands the Soulslike assignment perfectly well. It infuses diverse areas with so much depth. From gunky marshlands to ruined castles crawling with monsters, each environment calls on you to thoroughly comb through its end-to-end nook and cranny. If there's one thing The Lords of the Fallen does well, it’s its depiction of its gloriously deadly universe.

So, naturally, you’re drawn to explore Umbral, too. Yet Umbral feels unique to The Lords of the Fallen rather than an adaptation of Soulslike. Bloodthirsty wraiths lurk in every corner. Even a nearly unkillable reaper stalks your every move if you stay too long. The walls and ground quickly start to feel hungry and pulsating. But for the chance to explore new layers of a stunning world, or, run into the game’s incredibly fluid fights. Or even meet plentiful and significant NPCs, your risk-reward assessment starts to linger a bit more on the latter.

You do get a helping hand, thanks to the vestige seedling system Soulslike fans will be familiar with. Players plant vestige seedlings in a bed of flowers. Here, they can rest to replenish health and healing potions, although replenishing health respawns enemies (not bosses). On the other hand, fighting them can earn you vigor. Vestige seedlings become respawn checkpoints, too, which you can be strategic about.

Give and Take

The Umbral Plane and The Lords of the Fallen, are generally give-and-take systems. When you die in Axiom, there’s a chance to regain vigor (upgrade and gear currency gained by killing enemies). Simply make it out of Umbral alive and back to your death spot. But if you die in Umbral, you’ll respawn at your last checkpoint and lose Vigor for good. So, you now have to do the usual Soulslike grind work of retracing all you’d already done before.

It’s not necessarily a bad thing, especially since a thriving Soulslike community delights in these systems. Also note the withered health versus regular health system, where once withered health fills up, you won’t die. But filling it up will also heal regular health at the same time, making healing potions less effective. 

Soulslike a Boss

Fortunately, unlike the original, The Lords of the Fallen infuses a fast and fluid combat system. Pursuing and diving into a rhythmic dance with enemies feels incredibly satisfying. The lock-on system works splendidly well for one-on-one fights or a few enemies. You have access to nine classes and plentiful weapons, each packing a distinct punch of its own.

Enemies, too, have an immense variety of skills and appearances. Granted, some feel unoriginal. However, a steady stream of unique types comes in the early hours of the game, which doesn’t bode well for the latter hours. The bosses are somewhat disappointing, especially when coming from a ruthless enemy battle to relatively cruise-through wimpy bosses. They appear mindless, often getting stuck between narrow corridors and giving up too easily, I guess.

I have to quickly mention the frustratingly buggy launch. The game took a nose dive with drastic frame drops and stuttering. The performance is disappointing, especially on PC, where 20fps was the best the game could do. But the developing team stepped in with a day one patch, skyrocketing the performance to a rock-solid 60fps. The technical side isn’t all the way there yet, but it’s getting there.

Verdict

Aside from the technical difficulties, most of which have been fixed with a pronto day one patch, and rather wimpy bosses for Soulslike taste, The Lords of the Fallen delivers above par. Its open-world setting stands out the most, with rich, grimdark environs that infuse in-depth verticality in the most interconnected ways possible. Cruising around Mournstead feels enticing, which is only elevated by the freedom to commandeer the Umbral realm at will.

Gameplay is extremely difficult, as one would hope in a Soulslike game, yet you have leeway to take advantage of things like bonus vigor and strategically placed vestige seedlings. Or, you can enjoy the breathing room in the relatively easier-to-beat Axiom realm before returning to Umbral re-energized to take on more challenges. Given the painfully sluggish outcome of CI Games’ first try at Soulslike, the drastic improvements are highly commendable. Fantastic job, I must say, and a definite must-play.