Stray Blade: Proven of a truly ambitious RPG

Stray Blade seemed like an ambitious game to us from the moment it was released. And ambition seems to bring Dot Idle Games on the right track. This spring, we had the opportunity to attend a presentation of Stray Blade, which we strongly recommend to take at this link. To sum up a lot, Point Blank’s action fantasy RPG is supported by three key pillars: exploration of the vast game world necessary to collect useful objects for crafting, a very technical and deep combat system, which is given to the players’ inclination by the vast arsenal, and finally dynamic a game world management system.

Despite our busyness Leak Knife test At the booth of publisher 505 Games at Gamescom 5055, we can’t be sure of all the elements that make up this interesting action RPG, but we certainly had the opportunity to clear a few doubts.

Game World

The site where Stray Blade was founded is there acre valleyIt will be characterized by several distinctly distinct areas. The part of the map that was discovered during our testing was a height-enhanced open space: a main opening that served as a game center, complete with a prayer temple where one rises after each death. A path between the rocks led to a high hill; From there we went through several camps to reach a more fortified camp near a bridge. From an artistic point of view, if the explored part of the map doesn’t make us cry for a miracle, is pleasing to the eye, but remains somewhat nameless in the characterization of the environments and wildlife, the response to the wide variety of plants, flowers, different metals and other items that can be found in the game world. Each item collected will be a valid component for crafting recipes but above all for crafting equipment.

An important element of the script is change and it never stays static. The mechanism underlying the hero’s rebirth (or you can choose to play as a male or female character) is a curse that binds his soul to the Valley of Acrea. When you die, as stated, you come back to life in the last activated temple, but the process is not instantaneous. It will take some time for the spell to rebuild the protagonist’s limbs, and in the meantime, many things can happen in the world. For example, it may be the night our hero wakes up, or it may be that a camp has fallen into the hands of an enemy faction that has been invaded by wild animals or simply abandoned.

Arsenal and weapons

But Stray Blade’s feature is not so noticeable when exploring the map, but noticeable when opening the map. game menu. As we told you in our preview, this RPG lacks one pretty typical feature of the genre: character class. Forget knights, assassins or barbarians, inventory will make the difference. Stray Blade’s weapon menu is remarkable: 35 weapons including swords, spears, shields, knives, heavy weapons and much more. By successfully completing fights, you gain experience points, which turn into skill points when you reach the maximum limit. These points should be spent for passive advantages (classic more health points, more stamina, etc.) or to upgrade weapons, this is a non-urgent process.

In fact, each weapon in the inventory has about three different mastery levels that can be unlocked by using the weapon in combat. when it is 100% mastery only then can you invest a skill point to get the unique weapon art of the weapon.

Thirty minutes of testing at the show certainly wasn’t enough to examine the entire upgrade system, given the very long gun leveling process, but according to the 505 people who guided us through testing, that’s about the mechanism.

It’s pretty interesting, because learning from an RPG and pouring all the building components into weapons is as fascinating as it is risky. Also, weapons that need to be built blacksmith forge. No weapons will be left as enemy loot in Stray Blade, nor will any attempt be rewarded. To obtain a weapon, it must be found project reference gathered the necessary materials and finally built it. It’s then used up to the maximum mastery level and is completed with a skill point spend to unlock the weapon art… counting the weapons are 35, there’s a lot of work to be done.

war

All this variety of weapons is clearly used in the phases of war. warStray Blade maintains a rather conservative nature, but in a positive way. The combat system is structured similarly to traditional spirits in terms of moves: a light attack, a heavy attack, a dodge if equipped with a shield, a counterattack, and a dodge all. executable actions from our hero.

Accompanying actions is a sign of life and durability. What surprised us was the operation of the latter, which in philosophy is much closer to Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice and its opponent’s imbalance system. Not for attacking and rolling, we will consume stamina every time the hero absorbs an enemy blow; In the event of an unrecorded direct hit, the gauge will drain more than a parry or counterattack. This applies to us as well as to enemies who, once exhausted, will fall at our mercy and can be killed instantly by a special execution.

The hand-to-hand combat is accompanied by a little help from Stray Blade’s protagonist, Boji. Sitting between a dwarf and a very angry koala, the Boji is a valuable ally that can be summoned into battle at the push of a button. When summoned, the sprite launches a ranged attack, which is very useful for distracting enemies or breaking chain combos. It can be used up to four or five times just to consume its magic. Bogie’s enchantments are also tied to a gauge and can therefore be upgraded with skill points, such as the hero’s life and stamina.

For example, to balance a very dry fight where there is no jump attack but only a few actions mentioned above, the developers decided to create the window of the game. attack time. After approaching the game with extreme lightness and lightheartedness, we quickly realized that Stray Blade was not joking. Timing to attack, counter and dodge is surgical, with very narrow response windows. Responsive, lightning fast and accurate to milliseconds this combat system will make many players happy; It will be very interesting to stress this aspect of the game with all the weapons in the arsenal!