Our author Irie was at the gamescom 2019 at the THQ Nordic booth and tried out the cooperative hack & slash Darksiders Genesis. And that three times.
Darksiders Genesis was one of my highlights of E3 2019. Even though I am not a big fan of the Darksiders franchise, the first teaser trailer for the co-op ARPG immediately piqued my curiosity.
However, being a silly person, I forgot to schedule an appointment at the THQ Nordic booth at the fair. Instead, I played the gameplay demo several times at the booth.
This is what Darksiders Genesis is about: The story of Darksiders Genesis takes place before the events of the first game, where the apocalyptic rider War is wrongly blamed for triggering the apocalypse. In Genesis, we will learn how it came to be and what the actual background of the events that have unfolded over three games are.
Although you play as the two brothers War and Strife in Genesis, it primarily revolves around Strife’s story. You get to know him as a character and learn more about his motivations.
According to an IGN interview, Strife differs in character from his siblings. He asks uncomfortable questions and questions the motives of the council. His “working methods” are also quite unconventional compared to the other riders.
His casual sarcastic nature and the synergy with the always-serious War often brought a smile to my face while playing. It’s a kind of “buddy movie” in the form of a game, and my first impression was that it works well. Strife and War make a cool team and the humorous timing is often well placed.
Sympathetic characters are essential for me in a game, and the interactions between the two brothers in the demo made me want more.
Strife is fast, stylish, and sexy
This is the gameplay of Darksiders Genesis: Even though Darksiders Genesis, with its isometric perspective and heaven-hell setting, strongly resembles Diablo, it has fewer parallels to the game than one might expect.
The aspect of randomly generated loot is completely absent, for example. Instead, Genesis has several of its own gameplay mechanics that have become traditional for the Darksiders games. There are again:
- Souls
- Upgrades for health and wrath
- Abysmal armors
- Finishing moves that can be executed once the enemies’ HP is low enough
The new feature of Genesis is the “Creature Cores” left by enemies after death. These cores can be used to expand the skill trees of War and Strife.
The skills and passive abilities in these trees change depending on which Creature Cores you insert. Some provide minor buffs like “+ x% attack power,” but there are also rare cores that grant special and unique abilities.
For example, if you found the core of a Hellhound enemy and put it in the skill tree, it can happen that a Hellhound companion is summoned in battle. He fights by your side.
It’s a simple example that isn’t exactly groundbreaking, but I think such a system has a lot of potential for fun builds. Another cool aspect is that you can change your skill build in the middle of a fight and adapt to situations.
This is how the characters play: You can play the two characters War and Strife in co-op or alternately in solo play. You can either switch freely between them or they will be automatically switched when one of their HP bars drops to 0.
Both characters have their own set of special abilities in a selection menu, which they can switch between freely in battle.
I found that War feels similar to how he did in Darksiders 1 during gameplay. He has new moves and combos, but he is still the War from the first game in the series. He still has his Chaos ability, which transforms him into his Chaos form.
For the first time since the announcement, everyone could also play Strife. As someone who generally prefers rogue-like fast classes in games, I fell in love immediately. Strife is fast, stylish, and sexy. It was really fun to play him.
His abilities are more geared towards ranged combat, which makes him work well with War in co-op. Strife’s strength is directing the fight from a distance, although he also has two daggers for close combat. In co-op mode, he would therefore rather act as a flanker while the War player takes care of the enemies upfront.
Different puzzles in solo and co-op
Dungeons: The two main aspects of the dungeons in Darksiders Genesis are the puzzles and exploration. The dungeons differ depending on whether you play solo or in co-op mode. Players will not encounter the same challenges in both modes, as mentioned in an interview with IGN.
War and Strife have unique gear abilities that come into play when solving puzzles. This means there is a constant switch between the two brothers when exploring dungeons solo. For co-op mode, it means that both players are kept busy even outside fights.
What stood out to me while playing was the actual size of the demo dungeon. Even though I only followed the main path, I noticed multiple offshoots that were accessible through platforming puzzles. These side paths were well “camouflaged” and not immediately visible at first glance.
It gave me flashbacks to the SoulsBorne games, where careful observation and exploration of the environment are rewarded with new paths and shortcuts. You see a passage somewhere down or to the side and wonder how to get there and if there is something interesting.
I had the impression while playing that this aspect has been further developed in Darksiders Genesis.
This is why I found Darksiders Genesis cool: When you look at the description of Genesis in the article, you quickly realize that it doesn’t sound like an innovation bomb. The gameplay mechanics have already been implemented in many games in one way or another.
Nevertheless, testing Genesis was so much fun that I lined up for it multiple times. Genesis doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but it doesn’t need to. The gameplay is cool, makes you want more and the story sounds exciting and is told with humor.
I have been waiting for a casual co-op action game that I can play with my better half for a long time, and Darksiders Genesis looks like just such a game. Oh, and the soundtrack sounds really great too.
If you want to see the gameplay in Darksiders Genesis for yourself now, check out the long co-op demo from gamescom here:
