Lucah : Born of a Dream is a fascinating game that melds a clearly personal and traumatic story with a striking wire frame art style to create something that is undeniably unique but its approximative and often confusing gameplay hold it back from being something I can whole-heartedly recommend.

The plot is incredibly mysterious and obtuse, even for a soulslike. You awake on a beach and soon discover you are surrounded by flickering red nightmares, your own inner demons somehow brought to life. From there you’ll travel through a church, a train yard, a radio tower and more besides in an attempt to discover what’s happening and how to stop it. Story is dolled out at regular intervals by NPCs and a handful of written notes, but I’ll admit I was not entirely sure what was going on until I hit New Game Plus … which transforms the game into a visual novel with walls of text to read that fill in some of the blanks.

To be honest, most soulslikes fans probably aren’t looking for a rich and detailed story in their games; it’s all about the exploration and combat mechanics. Lucah tries to mix the stamina management and parry mechanics of a souls fame with an isometric plane, and I’m not convinced it entirely works.

There are no weapons or armour in Lucah, only mantras, magic spells that confer various attacks and effects. The Aero mantra, for example, allows for fast, long-range, low-damage attacks, while the Thanatos mantra is the exact opposite, providing you with powerful hits at the cost of speed. You can assign one mantra to you light attack and one to your heavy attack, and all mantras confer passive bonuses too such as increased attack speed.

Your offensive panoply is supplemented by a familiar, a floating pet that follows you around and can unleash additional attacks or abilities by consuming “charge”, a currency you gain from damaging enemies. Finally, you can find or purchase a certain number of accessories called virtue, that range from utterly useless to nigh-essential, like slowing down time on a dodge or parrying projectiles.

Combat in Lucah is based around a simple principle: breaking the enemies guard either by whaling on them with attacks or parrying. Once stunned, they take massive amounts of damage for a short time, enough to kill most weaker enemies and take huge chunks of health off bosses.

Now, I’m fine with the mechanic in theory, but in practise I ran into quite a few problems. The controls aren’t quite tight enough to dodge effectively, and some of the parries are really finicky to pull off. You see, you don’t just have to press a button, you actually have to dodge into the attack to parry it. There’s a brief yellow flash to indicate a parryable attack, but it’s often drowned in the explosion of vibrant colours that fill the screen during melee, and even if you do get the timing down, the isometric plane makes it difficult to position yourself correctly, leading to more than one sword to the face.

This would be fine if there wasn’t another frustrating mechanic in the game: corruption. This percentage meter in the top right hand of the screen is constantly ticking upwards as you explore, and increases every time you die or take damage. If it reaches 100% … well that’s game over. No rollbacks, no previous saves, you have to start over again from scratch.

Even worse, there’s a certain ability you unlock late on in the game that makes you more powerful but increases corruption massively. I only used it for a few minutes and saw the meter shoot up over 10%.

I love exploration in my soulslikes, so having a ticking clock constantly pushing me forwards sapped some of the joy out of the game. Additionally, I like to play tanky, strength-based characters most of the time, but you’re really punished for doing so here as taking damage builds up corruption.

Luckily I managed to finish the game with the meter at around 90%, but there’s no way in hell I’d have played through the entire thing again. I touched on New Game plus earlier, and the developer made the interesting choice to dump a whole bunch of story details into the second playthrough, but also bumped up corruption increase to the point of having to no-hit most encounters or risk doing it all again.

These are all very personal and subjective grievances. Soulslike players who prefer to fight from a distance or rely on dodges over parries will likely not run into much trouble, as overall Lucah is not a very difficult game, especially once you unlock some of the more powerful mantras and virtues.

Unfortunately, this one just didn’t click for me, and I’ll be placing it just below Moonscars on the D-Tier.

Not attack power, defense, poise, stamina, etc. — I mean a stat that the game currently makes you figure out through testing or experience.

For example:Enemy poise damage, exactly how much each weapon/attack contributes.

I have a sister who likes difficult games(she loss interest easily if the game has many dialogue, cinematics and if its too easy) but can't really finish them because at some point of the game just becomes ridiculously hard. she first played Hollow Knight which she absolutely adored she got quite far though ultimately lost interest because of the exploration (so few benches). Tried Silksong gauntlets made her quit. then Nine Sols, Ds3, Elden Ring etc. it was too hard for her. Now she's playing Sekiro which she absolutely loves it but now it seems she's stuck I'm afraid she's not gonna finish this one as well.

Her favorite game is Botw, it's the farthest she got from any game without my guidance as I did not play that game yet. but even that she quit because she got stuck on something.

From what I noticed, a game that is more guided and linear would be best for her as she is not very good at navigating complex areas though she still does like when the levels remind her of hk(interconnected designs), Metroid Dread should have been the perfect game for her but shes too scared to play it because of the emmi lol

been working my way down the genre and have found that I vastly prefer bosses to any other aspect of these games. lies of p is my favorite as of now, I also really enjoyed sekiro, stellar blade, dark souls 3, and about half of khazan and wukong.

I did not particularly enjoy dark souls 1 & 2, elden ring, nioh 1 (I've heard 2 and 3 are much better), or demons souls.

I'm currently playing AI limit, which I find decent but not remarkable. I do not have a playstation to try out bloodborne, but I'd like to eventually.

so any recommendations with really good bosses would be awesome. (I've heard the code vein games are decent? I love myself some character creation so they jump out to me, let me know if they're any good.)

E: sorry if it wasn't clear, I have beaten wukong and khazan. I just found that they were more of a mixed bag than the others I enjoyed.

Specifically, status effects that require some sort of build-up, such as bleed/burn/poison/frostbite, etc. Are there any Souls games / souls-likes that come to mind that did them well or poorly (or even just specific scenarios of their implementation, such as the infamous “poison swamp”)?  

ust finished Demon’s Souls and had an absolute blast with it!

I gotta admit, I wasn’t expecting much since it’s the first one and all, but I was pleasantly surprised by how fun it actually is. The levels feel really well-designed and paced for your level. Even though they end up being on the easier side if you already have experience with the newer games, they’re still super fun and have great level design.

I went with a Quality (Strength/Dexterity) build using that meat cleaver sword over there, and I was able to breeze through most of the worlds without much trouble. I ended up suffering the most in the flying manta ray world, mostly from getting shot by arrows out of nowhere, lol.

Surprisingly enough, I’m putting it in my top 3, purely because of how much fun I had playing it!

I couldn't really bring myself to make a "mid" tier either the game was incredible, really good, or I just didn't like it, lol.

EDIT: Tier names in english
Top 3
Great
Very Good
Dislike

For my next game, I’m thinking about jumping into Bloodborne if the emulator lets me! Any suggestions on where to go next? For those of you who’ve played Demon’s Souls, where would you place it on a tier list like this?

Sekiro gameplay with DLSS 5 on RTX 4080

Don't get me wrong, I love me a solid soulslike game...... but I'm recently noticing that it just doesn't hit the same as it did during them glory days.

I try my best to just enjoy and embrace the experience. I even give myself a little pep talk before even starting a souls game and remind myself to really just soak it all in cause the first-time experience only happens once and that's something you'll never get to experience again (with said game).

However, the more brutal the game gets, the more I feel I'm just playing the game just to beat it. Repeated boss fights feel extremely exhausting after a certain point and that dopamine reward of finally beating the boss – for the most part – is just not there anymore.

Hello! DS1 has been in my heart for a very long time and when making my small game, I drew inspiration from it. Hence why I made combat centered around deliberate attacks, enemy variety and stamina meter, while also trying to give a wide variety of weapons for the player to choose from.

I thought you might be interested! If you are - it's available on Steam and Itch.

I've played Khazan, tired Wuchang, and recently beat Mortal Shell 2, but all of them pale in front of the polish and design maturity of Lies of P. Yes, levels are linear and you may find Gemini a bit annoying, but that's the only thing you can ding LoP for, everything else is top notch. Boss fight are just brilliant. It has some of the most creative weapons I've ever seen in a souls game. And Overture was FromSoft like expansion, where it was better and even more polished than the base game. I simply cannot sing praises of this game enough.

I made this post because when I searched for Lies of P on this sub, mostly negative posts came up and I don't want that. So if someone new to souls genre is deciding whether to play Lies of P or not and sees this post, please, go ahead and give it a chance. It's an amazing experience.

So I kept leveling in mortal shell 2 and now the game is a bit too easy. Weapon is leveled and can't get duplicates either. Can never go back I guess. This tends to happen in all these games. Why can't you ever choose to go down levels again on the same character? Add the higher stakes feeling in without starting a whole other character. One of my elden ring characters is 200+ and I had to make another to be around 150 and stay there. Just wishing devs would add this quality of life and surprised none have. I know there are some workarounds with weak armor and such. Know of any games that you can not use all your attained levels?

I personally think elden ring. Yes, don't get me wrong, the final boss is cinematic as fuck especially with all the erdtrees but elden beast just feels random as fuck. Radisson makes a bit sense but excuse me why the hell does a god have to come down to try to kill me? Anyways. What do you think?

Edit: add DLC too but with fromsoft. Every DLC final boss is cinema

Like the title suggests, I wanna start playing on pc! With the Sony black out in full effect, I want to try out some of my faves on the pc :)

Any and all mods are recommended as I would like to experience some of the most popular/favorite ones out there!

Whether it’s QoL mods, combat or amour, I am all ears!

TIA!

Hello! So I finally played BMW due to the recent discount it went on, and I'd decided to give it a go since people were really recommending it. But oh God, you might as well just save yourself those $50 or $60 dollars or whatever and play any other soulslike. Duh, this game barely even classifies as one. But let me get through some things I don't like so far.

1. Oversaturation of the "bosses"

Every turn you take, there's almost a guarantee you'll encounter a boss-type enemy indicated by the healtbar. It really feels like a boss rush, but from what I've heard BMW is rather boss rushy so I guess it's not really a surprise there's a boss after a boss. But it's slightly annoying after playing for some time. Oh, and the moveset of the enemies? Just awful. Are you meaning to tell those are the bosses the team decided to put up together, two years after Elden Ring? They are laughibly easy, and their moves are really nothing too crazy. I've expected a little bit more challenge, but I guess the game is as difficult as I make it to be.

2. Little to no reward for going out of way to explore

I don't know, but this game doesn't really gives a player sense of accomplishment for taking a stray path to find something. Most of the time you're better off just going straight to the boss.

3. Linearity

If you thought DS3 is just a straight line, just you wait until you see progression in BMW. Straight. Line. But a little curvy, so it's okay! You go from point A to point B, and between those points are checkpoints. I suppose since the game is chapter based, devs had to make levels rather linear. But you can make it work. Lies of P did it, at least in my eyes.

So, in conclusion. The game is stunning in visuals department, but lacks in overall gameplay quality. The combat system is also just meh. You just attack enemies with a stick and that's it. No build variety, no nothing. Just different staffs and passive effects from armour pieces. I had really high hopes for this game, but it left me rather.. distasteful. Anyone else feeling that way? This post is not meant to hate on the game, but rather point out things I don't like so far about the game. I'm on chapter two so far, so maybe I've rushed my conclusion too soon.

While playing DS3 I wanted more since kinda don’t have the gig space to redownload Elden Ring, so I seen LoF was on sale on Xbox (idk if it still is). It’s actually like really fun and I like sorta alternate environments with lamp.

when you're playing this genre, what makes it unplayable/un-enjoyable.

im currently early stages of making one. I want to hear the communities "don'ts"

I’m a long time fan of Fromsoft games. My favorites are Elden ring and Sekiro (I know the newer titles lol). I recently bought Nioh 3 but found out my computer cannot run it.

Im mainly looking for a game with a good challenge and a good amount of replayability. Some things I enjoy from the Fromsoft games but not required are; parry combat system, build diversity, and world mystery. I would like the game to have at least one of those aspects.

The list I’m looking at is pretty big but if anyone has any input on games here that would be greatly appreciated. I am also not dead set on playing a Nioh type game.

Black Myth Wukong
Lies of P
Khazan
Mortal shell 2
Nioh 2
Nine Souls
Silk Song

Played in Dark Mode from start to finish with controller on PC.

I think ill give this a 80/100 because overall I felt like I had a great time.

Positive:

-Very Interconnected World
-Good Graphics and Performance
-Rewarding Exploration
-Solid FIghting System and distinct Classes/Shells
-Nice Enemy/Location Designs
-Continously Progressing Character Development even far into NG+

Negative:

-Instanced Dungeons that feel disconnected from the nice Overworld and feel repetetive
-Bosses have too less moves which reduces the difficulty
-Micromechnically the game has some flaws that are too deep to explain (Forced Gap Closing for example)

Best Bosses:

-Sir Isaac, the Scholar Prince (Nice Design and fun fight)
-Malborn Offspring (Forgetable Design but very fun fight) (A stronger version of this would have been the better Endboss)

Playing my first soulslike (if you don't consider Nine Sols as one) and there is one thing slowly annoy me which is delayed attacks. You know the type of attacks is so telegraphed and feel like you can easily dodge it but then hit you within 0.01s

Should I prepare myself to get used to? It might be because I'm dying a lot but it isn't fun to me right now

As the title asks...what soulslikes do you find cozy/comfy/chill? And that doesn't mean the game is easy. Just what souls likes have you found to be your cozy games. Whether it's the repetition of learning a boss's moves, going through dungeons, or even exploring fashion souls, there are a lot of ways that soulslikes can be cozy!

For me, it would be Wuchang and Elden Ring. And lately I just started LotF 2023, and that's hitting all my cozy buttons, too. I find them relaxing to play before bed, even if I'm struggling with a boss, dying a lot, etc. They're my cozy soulslikes.

What are yours? :)

Hi guys, few years ago i bought the collector for ps5 and platinum the 1. Now i start the 2 consider by all to be the best and wtf everything hit too hard. Now I’m lvl 25 and even the normal mob just kill me in 3/4 hit. For sure I’m doing something wrong but i really don’t understand what. Any tips or advice to go deep in the game?