In the past few years, we have seen so many action role-playing games inspired by From Software’s Souls series that it has become difficult to keep track of them all. While very few of these titles have managed to reach the level of quality of games like the first Dark Souls, Bloodborne, or Elden Ring, it is undeniable that seeing the different takes on the formula by a variety of developers, both big and small has been very interesting, to say the least.
Among the action role-playing games inspired by the Souls series’ formula that try to twist the experience in interesting ways is Stray Blade by Berlin-based studio Point Blank Games, which features an unusually bright and colorful fantasy setting. Appearances, however, can be deceiving, as the game is not exactly an idyllic romp through a peaceful land.
Stray Blade stars two different characters, the anthropologist Farren and the magically created half-wolf being Boji, that found themselves bound to Acrea the Lost Valley, a wild land where mysterious powers lay hidden, powers that grant immortality to all those that venture into it in exchange of their freedom. However, this doesn’t stop Farren from wanting to learn more about the land, a desire for knowledge that makes him eventually enter an uneasy alliance with Boji as they search for a way out of their predicament.
While Farren is the game’s only playable character, the dual main characters approach works incredibly well in a formula usually best suited for a solitary adventure. Farren is very talkative even when alone, and the banter between the two characters is often entertaining and somewhat informative, as the lore of Acrea seems much deeper than what may seem at first glance.
Having main characters that attempt to explain what’s going on during an adventure in a mysterious land is only one feature that makes Stray Blade a little more accessible than your usual Soulslike, where players are left to figure things out themselves. Not only the game offers different maps and a compass that guide players to the next story objective but also combat has some interesting mechanics that make it easy to understand but still rather challenging.
The combat system in Stray Blade is the same stamina-based combat we have seen in countless other games, but with a few twists. Before an enemy attack, a small icon will appear above them, and the color of said icon determines how to effectively counter the attack, either with a parry or with a dodge. Timing these actions correctly will result in recovered stamina and, in case of a well-timed parry, drastically reducing the opponent’s Poise Gauge, which will leave them open to a finishing move when fully depleted.
Parrying and dodging are obviously not the only combat options available in Stray Blade, as players can unleash light, heavy and special attacks with a variety of different weapons, ranging from short swords and great swords to clubs, spears, and so on. Two different weapons can be equipped at any time and switched on the fly, so players can come up with different loadouts that will allow them to take on all sorts of enemies. When it comes to enemy variety, Stray Blade also seems to be spot on, as in the first couple of hours, I fought a lot of different creatures, all coming with unique attack patterns that force players to stay on their toes at all times.
The weapon system in Stray Blade is also tied to character progression in a very interesting way. By using any weapon in combat, Farron’s mastery for that specific weapon will increase, and once it reaches 100%, it will unlock a new node on the Skill Tree. As not many nodes are available without mastering multiple weapons, it definitely feels like Stray Blade will incentivize switching weapons as often as possible to unlock Farren’s full potential. Exploration is also tied to character progression since players need to recover various items to obtain skill points that can be used to unlock more skills in Boji’s individual skill tree. With some Metroidvania elements thrown into the mix, exploring Acrea is promising to be quite fun, even when not engaging enemies in combat. However, the level design sometimes feels a little confusing.
The experience could also do with a bit more polish, especially when it comes to responsiveness in combat and overall performance, as my system (i7-10700 CPU, RTX 3070 GPU, 16GB RAM) couldn’t run a somewhat visually undemanding game at 4K resolution at anything higher than 40ish FPS.
That said, I enjoyed my time with Stray Blade more than I expected. Being developed by a smaller studio, Soulslike fans shouldn’t expect the same level of quality as From Software’s title, but I feel Stray Blade has enough going on for itself to stand out from similar games. To find out if the game can hold up until the very end, we won’t have to wait much longer, as Stray Blade launches on PC via Steam, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S next month, on April 20th.
