With Lies of P (Xbox, PS5, PC), a new Soulslike has emerged, which many players are already celebrating as “Bloodborne for PC.” MyMMO editor Benedict Grothaus played the action RPG … but only managed to progress with breaks for his pulse.
Despair and contempt. Those are the two feelings I experience when I start Lies of P. Despair because I know I’m going to get my butt kicked again. Contempt for myself because I know I somehow enjoy it.
I’m not sure why, but I have a thing for games that just make me suffer. This ranges from roguelites that I can’t win to insanely hard games like Vermintide to Soulslikes – like Lies of P.
Actually, I hadn’t planned on playing the game at all. But it’s in the Xbox Game Pass and according to How Long to Beat, it should only take around 30 hours. After 4 bosses, I have reached 10 hours and I don’t feel like I’m nearing the end.
Lies of P lures with a truly fantastic setting: a Victorian city with a story that follows the famous fairy tale of Pinocchio. Only in a brutal way. Puppets are slaughtering people and I, as “P,” am supposed to save the survivors.
And yes, the game is really fun. But why does it have to be. So. Unbelievably. Hard?
The trailer makes me very excited for Lies of P. But it is much harder than it looks …
Elite enemies are unfairer than any boss in the game
Like every good Soulslike, there are roughly four types of enemies in Lies of P:
- normal trash mobs
- somewhat tougher elite enemies
- mini bosses
- bosses
The normal enemies die even if you just hit them once with a heavy weapon. And just like in Dark Souls and Co., they can be deadly if you make really bad mistakes. Nothing new so far.
Everything above that is simply unfair. Elite enemies hit so hard that I really have to pay attention. Mini bosses are even worse: they can wipe out an entire health bar with a combo, even though I’m playing a build with relatively high defense and health. Which sadist thought this up?!
I have now died to mini bosses and elite enemies more often than to bosses – with one exception. My absolute nemesis is a flaming trash can. No other enemy has sent me back to the bonfire as often.
The exception is the third boss of the game, a retired guard puppet. The boss has harassed me so much that I quit the game with Alt+F4 and went to the gym to relieve my frustration. In the middle of the night.
Here you can see my torment against ONE of these misguided candlesticks:
The greatest strength of the game is also a major weakness
The visuals and the setting of Lies of P are what make the game stand out from the Soulslike genre. Even the reviews from GameStar and GamePro praise exactly that: living puppets as enemies and the city of Krat simply look fantastic.
However, the theme bears a major problem. The enemy design is indeed really cool, but the jerky movements of the automatons make it hard to read their attacks correctly, which is important for Soulslikes.
The result is that the announcements look similar, sometimes identical – especially when it’s still dark and raining. Lies of P already relies on a parry system. That means: I have to block at the perfect moment.
Many mechanics of the game build on that, and yes, it’s cool that blocks and parries also work against bosses. In the Soulsborne games, this doesn’t work to that extent. But the exact timing is sometimes almost impossible.
The nightmare of every RPG player: I have to use items!
The really bad thing is that Lies of P only gets harder the more I fail. Because simply “brute forcing,” that is hammering through with blunt force, doesn’t work. I have to concentrate and play really well. With every attempt.
More specifically: in certain fights, certain items are almost mandatory. Do you remember the alchemy system from The Witcher 1? Just like that. If I know that an enemy uses certain attacks or is weak against certain elements, I have to use them. There’s no other way, unless I play perfectly. And that… simply doesn’t always happen.
Whereas all those powders and resins in Dark Souls were somewhat only for min-maxers and speedrunners and rarely really necessary, my supplies in Lies of P run out even against elite enemies and mini bosses.
“Dude, played for 2 hours and am still at the first boss, dude, this is not fun at all”
Curious as I am, I read some reviews. In the Xbox app, the game currently gets a rating of only 2.9 stars. Very unfair, in my opinion, especially since almost all negative reviews with one or two stars simply complain about how hard the game is.
People, that’s exactly what it should be. I found Dark Souls 3 already challenging, and Bloodborne perhaps even a tad harder. Lies of P, however, really wipes the floor with me. And honestly? That’s okay. Not every game has to hold my hand.
In addition, there are really cool features like the combination of weapons and grips for more builds, special “legion weapons” and an expanded skill tree. Far more than in Dark Souls, I can play here however I want.
And I enjoy playing. Because I want to suffer, and because the feeling of reward in Lies of P just hits really hard. Defeating a tough boss or even just getting past a mini boss releases dopamine like the first kill on a raid boss.
And as a pleasant side effect, the game might also drive me back to the gym more often when I can’t progress and rage quit again…
I’m not imagining that Lies of P is so hard. Even people who should know better are being pushed to their limits:
Twitch streamer is furious about the new game, but then remembers that he’s being paid for it
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