Elderborn

Elderborn (stylized in caps as ELDERBORN) is a first person action game by a Polish studio Hyperstrange. The developer advertises the game as a metal AF (action fantasy) slasher -- a good analogue would be Doom (2016) but instead of guns, you get blades and hammers. Elderborn is very much an indie title in scope; a playthrough shouldn't take more than 5 hours. But it is a fun 5 hours; Hyperstrange did absolutely nail the gameplay.

The riddle of steel

There is a story in Elderborn, or rather, some sort of background narrative for why you're assaulting the city of Jurmum on your own. It is told in the most boring way, a prolonged yapping (or so it feels like) over some still images -- you might as well just skip the intros and interludes and jump straight into the action like in Doom. I reckon that the story could've been told in an even more concise manner. A game clearly inspired by Conan the Barbarian does not need a complex plot.

In the first chapter you fight through the maze-like catacombs under the city and in the second in the actual city. There's also a third chapter -- more of an epilogue -- in which in you fight all the past enemies in repeated arena fights. It felt like padding, really, that then ended in the nonsense that the ending is.

Production value -- or the lack of it -- shows in the visuals which are pretty ascetic. The HUD and menus in particular are ugly as hell. At least the game runs well -- on Unity no less. But I guess the engine is better for games that don't have massive event, skill, and equipment scripts going on.

Crush your enemies

Like in a boomer shooter, there's no sprinting and the default movement speed is fast -- and only gets faster when you spend points in the Speed stat. You have a dash as well that works as a dodge (with i-frames I believe). With a perk it can be used while airborne to shortcut a route and/or to negate falling damage.

Dark Messiah of Might and Magic was more than likely one source of influence -- the game's Steam blurb even uses the term 'dark messiah' -- because there is a kick action. You can use it to push enemies off balance or to simply launch them off ledges. Copiously placed spike walls are not a thing unfortunately but I still appreciated the kick.

Soulslike features show up in Elderborn as well. Enemies, chests, and breakable pots give you essence, which is the game's experience points. Upon death, you leave your current essence on the spot and revive at the currently activated fountain. You have from-kills-filling healing "flask" that can also be filled by resting at a fountain -- which also respawns all enemies on the level.

Like in Doom, each weapon has a challenge that rewards essence upon completion. Once your essence bar is full, you can level up at a fountain to spend a point in Might, Speed, or Resilience. At certain stat thresholds you unlock perks which too come with challenges for even more essence. There are only 9 perks but you're unlikely to get them all in one playthrough without some extensive grinding.

Weapons are varied although having two spears and two-handed swords feels redundant -- maybe they could've included an axe of some sorts instead. A shield would have made sense with the one-handed blades too. Each weapon has a different special passive: the Old Blade gives a 20% damage reduction while wielded and the Bronze Katars do more damage with each consecutive hit on the same target, for instance.

Slower weapons can be used to block enemy attacks, although blocking strong ones will leave you staggered. Faster weapons instead have a parry whose window seems to depend on the particular weapon: I found it easier to parry the leaping frog people with spears than with the sickles. A successfully executed parry gives you a brief slow motion and the ability to do a high damage riposte. That kind of stuff always feels so good in games.

I think one thing Elderborn's melee combat is missing is having some action that locks you in an animation with an enemy model. That would make the combat feel even more tangible. Like how Doom has its glory kills or the Dishonored games their executions and the possibility to lock your blade with the enemy's.

Completionist's woes

For a completionist, Elderborn will last quite a bit longer than 5 hours. Technically it would be possible to do everything in two playthroughs but it would be one massive struggle. Beating the game on Iron Man mode on your first run would probably take a few restarts just because of all the instant death traps there are. You would also need to combine the run with the achievement that requires you to skip leveling up. Thus even combat would be more dangerous. And then on the required New Game+ random enemies spawn as essence conduits that makes them more durable and each of their attacks kill you instantly -- not something you want while playing on a permadeath mode.

But because Elderborn isn't long, going for the different achievements separately wasn't too time-consuming. The achievements that took the longest were the ones that require finding every chest in the game and killing each enemy on a level without using a fountain to heal/revive.

Hyperstrange is a small publisher in addition to being a developer studio; they have a handful of different titles under their belt. Their latest (I think) released, developed title is Blood West, which seems interesting to me because it apparently has immersive sim elements. I'm just not a huge fan of the weird west setting. So many titles in that genre of fiction in the recent years. But I might check it out in the future due to how good Elderborn felt to play.