The developers of Phantom Blade Zero claim they’re trying to channel “pre-Elden Ring” FromSoftware level designs for the game, even if they’re adamant it’s not a Soulslike.
If you’re a fan of classic hack-and-slash games like Devil May Cry and Bayonetta, you’ve no doubt been in the same boat as me over the last few years. Every time a promising action game is shown off, it turns out to be a Soulslike, Stellar Blade being one of the most recent examples. Thankfully, Phantom Blade Zero’s development team has been very focused on letting players know the upcoming game is not a soulslike. But even if it’s primarily an action game, it doesn’t mean there’s no Souls DNA in there.
Speaking to GamesRadar+, Phantom Blade Zero’s developer, S-Game told us the game is built on three pillars: Devil May Cry-lite combat, Souls-lite level design, Resident Evil-lite atmosphere and narrative. A rep for the studio told us, “On the Souls-lite level design side, we are definitely a fan of and inspired by the pre-Elden Ring interconnected, tight level design.” The rep also revealed that the game’s director, ‘Soulframe’ Liang, “actually went to school for architecture, so the level design is something that’s very important for us and we want to have very robust levels, have a lot of depth to them, very dense.”
Liang later told us, “Anything that is useful and good for us to make our pillar, a playable kung fu movie with exploration and character progression, we’ll make use of it. Whether it’s exploration from a Souls game or vibes from Resident Evil or combat from this hack-and-slash game, we’ll take that and bring them together. But the overall experience is still very coherent. It’s not ripped apart from something else.” I got my hands on the game back at SGF 2024, and it’s a demo I’m still thinking about to this day thanks to its intense combat, but I never got to experience this Soulslike level design, but if it’s anything like early Dark Souls, I’m down.
Speaking of FromSoftware, it just announced a new game, so be sure to check out everything we know about The Duskbloods.
