Apparently I need to make it abundantly clear that I do indeed like this game. I played it for 27 hours at the time of writing this and plan to play more. This is just a review of the things that upset me about the game and in my opinion would be a major turn off to fans of the genre.

I coped my way to the second to last boss because I really liked everything this game did, but man it just continued to absolutely grind my gears. There is no such thing as punishing enemies in this game, you are getting lucky when you actually punish enemies. Most of the bosses will do a long combo string and then without enough time to even get 1 hit in begin another combo and you most likely get hit for 2/3 of your health. Even if you just block you will still take 1/3 of your health and there's no guarantee you will get it back because most likely you got hit by another attack in the combo so there goes your recovery. The mechanics themselves are fine and I liked them for a long time but some enemies are just too damn fast and there is nothing you can do to slow them down. Attack windows are TINY and you tend to only get 1 hit in either way. On top of that if you want to do any amount of damage you need to parry to either break their weapon or allow for a visceral but parrying is so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ hard. I practiced parrying on the archbishop boss for 3 hours until I could parry every single one of his attacks and it barely sped up his first phase. You are barely rewarded for putting in the effort to actually use the parry mechanic because it is so absurdly punishing. You miss time a parry, you get hit hit for almost all your health or get a status effect applied to you that makes some part of your character dwindle down at light speed. Decay for example is on a ton of enemies and bosses and this degrades your weapon nonstop and damages you until the status effect is removed but enemies can apply this in 2 hits if you're not blocking or parrying. But what are you trying to do? Oh you're trying to parry well good luck with that because now you have a status effect constantly ticking away at your source of damage. Then you try to run away from enemies to use your grindstone but oh no, every boss has ice skates that they use to glide over to you and instantly hit you without you having any time to react because you were forced into using your grindstone. With the ice skates thing I mean they are in the middle of holding up their weapon to do an attack and they will glide across the floor just to get closer to you even though you ran a good distance away.

I've had enough man, I got on today to try and beat the game after playing through the early access period and the more I play it the more it upsets me. I'm gonna come back to it and revise this review if they update the game. In all honesty I do think this game is awesome but ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ is it frustrating and not in a fair feeling way. Not gonna recommend it now to anyone that doesn't love these types of games.

Final Edit: I have finished the game and every point still stands. I do really enjoy this game and is definitely one of the best soulslikes out there but as I said in my review, a lot of the things it does tend to be annoying.

Apparently I need to make it abundantly clear that I do indeed like this game. I played it for 27 hours at the time of writing this and plan to play more. This is just a review of the things that upset me about the game and in my opinion would be a major turn off to fans of the genre. I coped my way to the second to last boss because I really liked everything this game did, but man it just continued to absolutely grind my gears. There is no such thing as punishing enemies in this game, you are getting lucky when you actually punish enemies. Most of the bosses will do a long combo string and then without enough time to even get 1 hit in begin another combo and you most likely get hit for 2/3 of your health. Even if you just block you will still take 1/3 of your health and there's no guarantee you will get it back because most likely you got hit by another attack in the combo so there goes your recovery. The mechanics themselves are fine and I liked them for a long time but some enemies are just too damn fast and there is nothing you can do to slow them down. Attack windows are TINY and you tend to only get 1 hit in either way. On top of that if you want to do any amount of damage you need to parry to either break their weapon or allow for a visceral but parrying is so fucking hard. I practiced parrying on the archbishop boss for 3 hours until I could parry every single one of his attacks and it barely sped up his first phase. You are barely rewarded for putting in the effort to actually use the parry mechanic because it is so absurdly punishing. You miss time a parry, you get hit hit for almost all your health or get a status effect applied to you that makes some part of your character dwindle down at light speed. Decay for example is on a ton of enemies and bosses and this degrades your weapon nonstop and damages you until the status effect is removed but enemies can apply this in 2 hits if you're not blocking or parrying. But what are you trying to do? Oh you're trying to parry well good luck with that because now you have a status effect constantly ticking away at your source of damage. Then you try to run away from enemies to use your grindstone but oh no, every boss has ice skates that they use to glide over to you and instantly hit you without you having any time to react because you were forced into using your grindstone. With the ice skates thing I mean they are in the middle of holding up their weapon to do an attack and they will glide across the floor just to get closer to you even though you ran a good distance away. I've had enough man, I got on today to try and beat the game after playing through the early access period and the more I play it the more it upsets me. I'm gonna come back to it and revise this review if they update the game. In all honesty I do think this game is awesome but holy shit is it frustrating and not in a fair feeling way. Not gonna recommend it now to anyone that doesn't love these types of games. Final Edit: I have finished the game and every point still stands. I do really enjoy this game and is definitely one of the best soulslikes out there but as I said in my review, a lot of the things it does tend to be annoying.