Recent reviews by Deuce | PK

Frankly incredible game

The way the game handles its narrative is excellent, especially in the DLC. Without spoiling the story, you feel the impacts of choices you make in game.

All in game mechanics for the most part feel pretty good. The only one I did not totally like was the climbing mechanics, but only to the extent it was slightly janky sometimes whether or not you actually grabbed the ledge. This is the most minor of nit picks though. The game controls perfectly and combat itself feels amazing.

On a technical level, the game also runs pretty good. I played my entire playthrough on integrated graphics (Intels ARC 140v graphics from the Core Ultra 258V APU) with mostly high settings, 1920x1200 resolution (16:10 is fully supported) with XESS set to either quality or ultra quality. These settings gave me a very stable 30fps through most gameplay, with select cutscenes and large encounters causing some frame drop. Given the very new graphics architecture (Xe2) and playing on a laptop, the performance was very nice.

This has been one of my favorite games ive ever played, hands down.

Fantastic game, just know that there are some painful stuttering issues in the game that definitely hurt the experience a little bit. It does not ruin the game and I enjoyed my time with it so far, but go in with the understanding that as of the current patch (as of writing this), the performance is not optimal.

EDIT(3/2/2022): Got 32 hours compared to 5 or so wrote this so ill give some more thoughts. The performance stuttering sucks but it is not game breaking in the slightest. Annoying in traversing the world though. I can say with absolute certainty though the game is fantastic and one of the best games I probably have ever played. (Minus a few hours of Sekiro) I have never played a soulslike game before this. You definitely need to be a glutton for punishment to play a game like this but if you want a "fun" challenge, you'll love this game. The combat feel nice and the hitboxes for everything feel fair and honest. The target camera to lock on to a foe is underwhelming, especially when up close to larger enemies. It can make certain things harder to see for the player but is probably fine in a balance aspect since a lot of enemies are more vulnerable up close. It is perfectly fine for the most part though. The exploration is incredibly fun and the game world is simply beautiful to look at. I wont spoil anything but your eyes will enjoy this game. Have not beaten the game yet but will update this with more thoughts as I progress.

EDIT(3/22/2022). Up to 66 hours now. Review as now remains unchanged but performance has gotten markedly better. Way less stuttering (though it very much still exists) has made the experience more enjoyable. Everything feels good to play and I still got a ways to go so imma keep enjoying this masterpiece.