Bleak Faith: Forsaken, the preview of a souls-like with interesting ideas
Bleak Faith
Born of one of many successful Kickstarter campaigns, Bleak Faith: Forsaken is a new souls-like action RPG. The key features? A dark world, a warrior in armor with a sword and shield and a great focus on exploration and an unforgiving combat system.Let's see our first impressions in this preview dedicated to Bleak Faith Forsaken.
The world of Bleak Faith Forsaken
Bleak Faith: Forsaken proposes a classic warrior with a sword, shield and armor Bleak Faith Forsaken will propose an open world, known as the Omnistructure. The team explains that the goal is to propose labyrinthine areas that push the player to always be curious about what he might find in a passage that he has not yet had the opportunity to explore. Speaking a little more practically, it is said that Bleak Faith: Forsaken will include both open zones and more linear areas.The final impression will be that of playing some sort of metroidvania. The team wants to awaken that feeling of "wonder and excitement you felt when you first played a video game". However, this does not mean that it will be all pink and flowers, on the contrary, Bleak Faith: Forsaken, like many souls-like, will always make us feel in danger, with only a few safe areas, outposts where we can rest, prepare for what is about to arrive and manage its own resources.
Without being able to try the game first hand it is obviously impossible to know if the exploration will be satisfactory, but thanks to a gameplay video we have been able to see that, in addition to simply moving on foot, it will be possible to immerse yourself in water, moving around in complex environments (and paying attention to the oxygen level, which will probably put a lot of pressure on us). We can also see that Bleak Faith Forsaken will allow you to climb walls using handholds, in the style of Uncharted and Tomb Raider.
These are two methods of exploration not typical of souls-like, which tend to leave us very fixed on the ground. The game world of Bleak Faith: Forsaken could therefore prove to be pleasantly complex to explore and a certain glance may be required in order not to miss every available path.
The fights
Bleak Faith : Forsaken will propose labyrinthine environments Obviously a souls-like is not only exploration, but it is also (and above all?) Fighting. From this point of view, Bleak Faith: Forsaken offers us all the basics of the genre. Our character, controlled with a third-person view, has life points and stamina, the latter that is consumed by attacking and performing dodges. We will be able to choose a starting class and enhance our character: it also seems that some choices are not reversible, so we will have to carefully choose which direction to go.Based on the gameplay trailer and the statements of the developers, we can say that the fights are fast paced, which will require attention and reflexes. The character can use various types of weapons: for example, we can see the classic shield and sword combination, but also various long weapons, such as a spear and a scythe. Again, it's impossible to comment without trying the game firsthand: souls-likes need responsive controls, and the developers know this; precisely for this reason they ensure that they have created a robust and, more importantly, varied combat system.
You must know that Bleak Faith: Forsaken will allow you to approach combat in various ways. First of all it is possible to approach enemies in stealth mode, also taking advantage of areas in which to hide (such as patches of tall grass) so as not to be noticed by the opponents and hit them from behind with a critical hit that is able to eliminate them.
Bleak Faith: Forsaken will also include large environments such as a forest Once in battle, you can fight hand to hand, but also from a distance and you can use the skills of Technomancer, or the "magic" of Bleak Faith: Forsaken. Through the various videos we see for example that the character can hit area with ice but also evoke dark shots that fall from above and hit the boss on duty. The character also has various disposable items, from heals to recover life to power-up items useful in the most dangerous situations.
Speaking of the bosses though, we were shown a sort of skeletal griffin. The enemy attacks in various ways, with charges, tail blows, pecks and laser beams, even summoning minions during the fight to put a spoke in the wheel. The variety of this clash is promising: we hope it is a symbol of the care taken in the design of the boss fights.
Finally, remember that surviving will not be just a matter of coming out victorious from the clashes. The game world will put us in trouble with various types of altered status also caused by the environments. Furthermore, the Omnistructure will not be a static region: the inhabitants are divided into factions and have a dedicated artificial intelligence that will push them to compete with each other, growing and expanding. Some enemies may even disappear in a game because they are defeated by other opponents.
This is an interesting idea that could help replay value, as long as it has a significant impact on the playing areas without ruining their structure and layout. rhythm. Certainly, and this reassures us, the most important plot areas will have a more guided structure and this AI system will not be able to subvert the original design of the developers.
Dark, maybe too much
Bleak Faith: Forsaken, some environments seem promising In closing, we want to have our say on the visual and stylistic impact of Bleak Faith: Forsaken. It is useless to analyze the technical side in detail, since for the moment we have only had the opportunity to see non-definitive versions of the game, but we would like to comment on the more artistic side of the work.Bleak Faith: Forsaken will point a lot of dark colors and, in the area that we can see in the video, gray is the master. The result is a little too homogeneous, at least for the section shown. Fortunately, some images also show us different areas, such as wooded areas and a desert. Hopefully the indie nature of the project hasn't forced the developers to skimp on variety. Not only because on a graphic level it is pleasant to change areas, but also because in a large labyrinthine world it is risky to be in all very similar areas: the player could struggle to orient himself and the experience would suffer.
We know well that audiences are always hungry for good souls-like and Bleak Faith: Forsaken aims to be just that. What we have seen so far is intriguing, especially in terms of exploration of the game world that promises open areas, others linear and a structure reminiscent of metroidvania. Combat follows the canons of the genre, with a mix of stealth, close quarters, ranged combat and a system of magic yet to be seen in detail.
