During GeoffCon, there were several new IPs being showcased. One of them was Lies of P by Round8 Studio. I had never heard of them before. They are a Korean studio. The publisher is Neowiz Games (apparently, also in on development), which is also Korean. I have another game (based on Korean folktales) published by them in my library, but I have not played it. My pile of shame is so huge! It had been announced at last year’s GeoffCon, so there was buzz aplenty. This year, there was a gameplay trailer and the announcement that there was a demo available RIGHT NOW.
The shorthand way of talking about it is Timothee Chalamet times Pinocchio times Bloodborne. Oh, did I not mention that it was a soulslike? Well, it is. That’s the reason I aws interested in it in the first place. Puppet Bloodborne, it’s been called. It looked stylish and was dripping with vibe. I really dug the atmosphere and was eager to try it out. Oh, the Timothee Chalomet part is that the main character looks like Timothee Chalamet with very puffy hair.
I downloaded the demo on Steam and fired it up. I have to say I love, love, love the look of the game. It looks Victorian, but feels more like France than England to me. That’s just my impression, though. It’s just so gorgeous and makes it feel proper old-timey.
The basic gist is that you are Pinocchio, which means you are not all puppet or all human. In this world, the puppets serve at the pleasure of the humans and are second-class citizens. They can’t lie, but Pinocchio can because he’s part human. In fact, he looks very human. he can pass, in other words. That’s part of the demo–him lying to get into a hotel that only admits humans.
You have to answer the question whether you are a human or puppet, and ifg you say human, you get in. I don’t know what happens if you say puppet. I’m getting ahead of myself, though. That’s a good two hours into the demo (or two hours when it’s me playing. I’ll get to that in a bit).
The mood is very Bloodborne-y. I have to say that a few people in the RKG Discord were not happy with just HOW close to Bloodborne this game hewed. Apparently the text in some places is almost verbatim. I will say that I didn’t realize that, but my short-term memory ain’t what it used to be.
You get the choice of three weapons. basically, greatsword, rapier, and saber. I wanted to use the saber because I use one in real life, but it’s the quality weapon–meaning the balanced weapon. Not dex nor strength, but mid. The rapier is the dex weapon, of course. The greatsword is the strength weapon, obviously. I chose the last and we’re off to the races. The tutorial sucks, but that’s par the course for these games. From games in and of themselves aren’t that great for explaining, and this game is holding to that standard as well.
It’s not dififcult, though. The basics, I mean. RB for basic attack. RT for heavy attacks. One weird difference is Y for a special eletrical attack. You build up, ah, electric stuf, by killing enemies, of course. These are called the Fable Arts, according to Google. You can use Fable Catalcysts to get one bar of jjuice. I currently have three bars. The Y for the greatsword takes two, I think.
I don’t exactly understand, but I try to save Y for big moments. That’s the problem. It takes a long time to build up, so my brain says I need to save it. But it would make more sense to use it as soon as I get it so that I can build up more.
The combat is slick, but it feels a bit…what’s the word I’m looking for. It’s not floaty. It’s not heavy. It’s not in-between. And, really, it’s not the combat–it’s me. I’ll get to that in a bit. I did not like how the character controlled. It’s hard to explain, but I’ll try. It’s like the camera was being dragged from side to side. Not in a jerky way, but like you’re pulling something in wet sand. I got some tips from RKG peeps (turn off motion blur and adjust camera sensitivity), which hepled.
I ran around slicing throough enemies with relative ease. The game’s combat feels more Sekiro than Bloodborne to me because, well, let’s talk about the first boss. Needless to say, spoilers. This guy is called the Parade Master, though, amusedly, I thought he was called the Puppet Master. He’s a behemoth who has combos that hit so hard.
Oh, before we get to him, let’s talk about something that irks me about soulslikes–and, indeed, about the From games themselves to a certain extent. That would be how deliberately obtuse some of the information is. I think From has done a good job of easing up on that in Elden Ring (possibly to make it easier for non-From fans to get into the game), but it’s still there.
The problem with soulslikes is that they often have superficial takes on what they think a soulslike should be. I’m not saying that about this game in general, but in this particular case–how they impart info–yes. The stats? Besides the life one and the stamina one, the rest don’t really make much sense. I know they have to do with the Fable Skills, but not exactly what. Certain numbers go up, but it’s hard to suss which is better overall for what reason. I’m not a minmaxer, so pelease, just spell it out for me.
One example from the Frist Dark Souls games was all the different upgrade paths. I never did any of it. It was overwhelming and confusing. Needlessly complicated. I aprpreciate that they tiy different things, but not everything sticks.
I will say that the world of the demo of Lies of P was…sparse. It looks lush, but there isn’t that much of an enemy variant. At least not in the area leading up to the first boss. It’s mostly one police-type of puppet, with and without heads. There are also dogs. Why are there always dogs?! And there weren’t that many enemies. Plus, the environment was very limited and conrolled. Yes, it looks lush, but you really could only go in very restricted areas.
There was a black knight type of enemy in a semi-hidden area, but that was about it for the enemies. Then, we got to the first boss. Before you go in, there is a merchant from whom you can buy the two other weapons plus a few other things. There’s also a punching dummy so you can practice your parry. And get fable juice before going into the boss. And, yes, it’s clear that a boss is coming up.
I went into the boss and immediately got decimated. I tried several time to just slash at him while dodging. He has a dreaded ‘turn orange, will hit harder’ attack, but it can be deflected. Which I did not do. He’s much bigger than I am and because of my spatial issues, I had a really hard time gauging when he was going to hit me or not.
Of course, what I learned was that you have to deflect or at least guard against him. Yes, I did look at a video. No, a ‘no-hit’ video wasn’t helpful. I learned you have to block and parry, which, *sigh*. If you guard and then hit back, you can regain some health. Like Bbloodborne. But, the deflect bullshit is like Sekiro. i will say that the timing is more generous, but in a way, that made it worse for me. You had to go early. It was always a beat before I thought it would be. It was even mentioned in the video I watched. Go early. But I did not realize you could get health back from guarding and attacking. That was also in the video I watched.
I gave up on the boss. Since my medical crisis, I jsut don’t…care. I don’t want to have to push myself to the point of breaknig, especially if it’s not a FromSoft game. But something about the game kept nagging at me, so I tried again. This time, though, I kinda cheesed the boss. I did the deflecting and guarding as much as I could in the first phase and did alright. I got one crit on the boss that way.
In the second phase, though, I had no chance of parrying him. His movement was erratic and rapid, and I just could not do it. So. I did what I would do if it was a From game and a large (size-wise) boss. I circled around to the right (my right) and smacked the ass. For whatever reason, doing this had him missing me with his attacks more often than not. No Idea why, but I had no qualms about it. I beat him with a sliver of my own health left and moved on to the hotel.
It’s a really solid demo. If you like From games, especially Sekiro and Bloodborne, you will like this game. As frustrating as it was to me, I’ll continue with the demo (I know there’s more) and see how I feel about it and if the enemies become more varied.