One take a look at new stop-motion Metroidvania The Spirit of the Samurai is greater than sufficient to seize your consideration. Mixing the side-on 2D motion of Hole Knight or Ori and the Will of the Wisps with a spooky, horror-tinged Japanese setting paying homage to Nioh, its lovingly handcrafted animations make it one of the vital eye-catching video games I’ve seen shortly. But after sitting all the way down to take a better take a look at Gamescom 2024, the extent of management you’re given over the way you combat is what’s actually gained me over.
Constructed by Digital Thoughts Video games and revealed by Kwalee, in The Spirit of the Samurai you combat in opposition to once-dead warriors introduced again to life by a robust Oni. You step into the function of three characters – samurai Takeshi, tiny spirit Kodama, and warrior cat Chisai – every of whom brings a distinct facet to the gameplay. You’ll should make the most of each weapon and trick at your disposal to tackle the undead warriors and monsters rooted in Japanese mythology as you discover this distinctive 2D Metroidvania.
The main target of fight falls, as you’d anticipate, to Takeshi, who could make use of a variety of weapons together with katana, bow, and spear. The important thing right here is the best way that strikes are chained collectively. As you progress, you’ll unlock a lot of completely different assaults, every of which may have its personal specialties. A few of these is perhaps extra apparent, equivalent to a quick swipe or a long-ranged poke, whereas others would require some experimentation. Maybe a sure transfer is great at coping with shield-bearing enemies; you’ll should attempt it to seek out out.
Crucially, it’s as much as you ways you select to mix these abilities. You should utilize your unlocked assaults to construct customized combos, every of which might be assigned to varied directional inputs. This offers you full freedom over the way you combat – when you’ve ever been up in opposition to an Elden Ring boss and wished you possibly can strip that slower third hit out of your combo string, in The Spirit of the Samurai you’ll be able to. It’s also possible to use the fitting stick as an alternate strategy to ship assaults, permitting you to manually make use of any directional combo no matter your present dealing with.
Whereas The Spirit of the Samurai’s distinctive look was already sufficient to seize my curiosity, seeing its combo system in motion completely grabbed my consideration. I spend most likely extra time than I ought to fascinated by the nuances of weapon movesets, so that is very a lot enjoying to my pursuits. It jogs my memory a little bit of the change abilities applied in Monster Hunter Rise, or – to return a little bit additional – the equally designed combo system of stellar however oft-overlooked 2006 PS2 motion recreation, God Hand.
The Spirit of the Samurai is about to launch within the fourth quarter of 2024. Kwalee says it is best to anticipate it to be round eight hours in size, that includes roughly 1,500 handmade animations together with animated cutscenes and full voice performing all through, carried out in English by voice actors of Japanese heritage. I’m actually desperate to see extra – when you’re in the identical place, you’ll be able to wishlist it now on Steam.
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