Lords of the Fallen - Review @ RPGamer

RPGamer reviewed Lords of the Fallen:

Lords of the Fallen Review

Don’t Call It a Comeback

When the original Lords of the Fallen released in 2014, the action RPG space was a somewhat different sort of place than it is today. True, Dark Souls had already left its mark on the genre — in fact, Dark Souls II released the same year as Lords — but the Soulslike landscape was still in its infancy, with many important evolutions taking place over the next near-decade. This means the recent Lords of the Fallen reboot has far more to live up to than the original did. While it addresses many aspects lacking during the franchise’s first outing, the overall experience still misses the high-water mark it aims for, with a glut of gameplay systems and wonky mechanics rearing their ugly heads each time a measure of success is achieved elsewhere. It outpaces its predecessor in terms of quality, to be sure, but not enough to make for an emphatic recommendation.

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Given the amount of time between Lords of the Fallen’s initial outing and its reboot, this new release feels far less like an attempt to right the ship and more like its own thing. This is a positive, as it certainly forges a strong identity of its own, and provides a robust amount of content to back it up. But much like its predecessor, it struggles to push past its self-imposed limitations, in this case revolving around its combat system and dual-world gimmick. With frustrating encounter designs and a need to fine-tune some aspects, the game veers from joyful to jarring and back again far too frequently to let a sense of fun be its main takeaway.

Scores:
 
BATTLE SYSTEM: 3
INTERACTION: 3
ORIGINALITY: 4
STORY: 2
MUSIC & SOUND: 4
VISUALS: 4