I’m a fairly mediocre gamer. I’m no champion. I don’t do crazy, time-bound challenge runs on unbelievably high difficulty settings. But I do like a good, fair challenge that can naturally extend a game’s play-time and increase my sense of accomplishment at the end, all without overstaying its welcome.
That’s why I love Souls games! Dark Souls isn’t always easy, but it’s methodical, deliberate, mostly fair, and immersive. It’s a welcome change from hit-scan shooters with aim-bot AI, in which the highest difficulty settings sometimes feel less like tests of skill and more like throwing yourself at the mercy of unfair super-bots and random number generators. Since I’ve played the Souls series and Sekiro multiple times, I know what makes a game in that genre good. And Mortal Shell absolutely has that secret sauce!
About Mortal Shell
So, let’s say that you enjoy challenging games, and this one here is starting to pique your interest… But unlike me, perhaps you’re not obsessed with the niche video game genre of Souls-likes. Maybe you haven’t heard of Mortal Shell. What do you need to know about it?
Well, for starters, Mortal Shell is an action role-playing game (RPG) with a somewhat slow pace that focuses on its combat system. If you like tight melee combat systems, this is for you. If you like talking your way out of every potentially bad situation, like you can in Obsidian’s The Outer Worlds, then not so much.
Japanese game developer FromSoftware pioneered this sub-genre of tough action RPGs, starting with Demon’s Souls in 2009, and they perfected their formula with 2011’s Dark Souls. Like Dark Souls, Mortal Shell takes place in a dark, mysterious, and violent game-world that’s full of enemies to fight and loot to collect!
The cover art for Ashen
Even within the Souls-like genre, though, there are some big differences from one entry to another. Ashen, for example, is another recent Souls-like, but its world is a bit less dark, it focuses on co-op gameplay, and it has an open game-world.
The Surge
Then, way off in another far-flung corner of the Souls-like universe, there’s The Surge. This sci-fi romp obviously looks and feels quite different from Dark Souls in terms of its game-world, even though it shares many of Dark Souls’ core mechanics.
Harros playing the lute in Mortal Shell
And here’s Mortal Shell, sitting somewhere on the sub-genre’s spectrum that’s much closer to the original inspiration, Dark Souls, and much further from games like The Surge or Jedi: Fallen Order.
The Dark Souls games have always offered co-op and online help messages from other players, but they have focused more on single-player. Mortal Shell maintains this single-player focus and distills it even further, cutting out co-op and help messages entirely. It’s just you against the world!
Praise for Mortal Shell
A review video from Fextralife
While there are some outliers who didn’t much enjoy this game, many users and critics praise the title for its combination of a solid, straight-forward, and satisfying combat system, a beautiful graphics engine and art style, a mysterious and lore-rich world, and a decent amount of replay value.
Collectors, get psyched for the physical release!
In fact, Mortal Shell has done well enough in sales and reviews as of now, a bit less than a month after release, to warrant the mass-production of disc copies of the game for a physical release in October!
Mortal Shell’s Story
One of the game’s ‘sesters’… But this one seems a bit different...
As it is with most Souls-like games, Mortal Shell has a fairly limited main story, expanded upon by a treasure trove of rich and mysterious lore. Essentially, your main quest (without spoilers) amounts to battling through the game’s different zones to find sacred items that will help another character out of a bad spot. And for this kind of game, that simple story works just fine.
The lore and world-building, in addition to the excellent combat, make the game a fun challenge that you will want to keep coming back to.
To discover more elements of the lore around the game’s characters and world, read item descriptions and reveal the name of the shell that you are currently playing as. These descriptions will offer clues as to what happened in the game-world before you arrived.
Mortal Shell’s Gameplay
Striking!
Reflective of the rest of its sub-genre, Mortal Shell has a tight core gameplay loop that is simple to understand yet difficult to fully master. The game focuses primarily on combat, encouraging you to face off against foes ranging from other humanoids to huge, monstrous bosses.
Harros meets Sester Genessa
However, there are also strong elements of exploration and discovery, as you move through distinct, well-designed zones of the game-world and pick up and use new items whose effects are unclear at first.
One great example of the item familiarity system is the lute. It’s a guitar-like instrument that you will find lying around in the game-world. You can pick it up and take it with you, and if you want, you can learn to play it! The first time around, of course, you’ll sound… not so hot. But if you keep at it, then you’ll improve with every practice session and learn a few different songs!
Tiel the Acolyte
The more that you use new items, the more familiar you will become with them, enhancing their positive effects.
The Combat in Mortal Shell
Mid-battle!
Let me clarify what I think of the combat - Mortal Shell is definitely not a completely thoughtless Souls copy-cat!
The game puts its own unique spin on Souls mechanics. For instance, you don’t roll and block constantly anymore. In fact, you don’t get a shield or any way to block at all. You have two replacement defenses - dodging and a skill called ‘hardening.’ Hardening lets you stand still and briefly turn to stone, completely absorbing the next attack from any nearby enemy.
As opposed to blocking hits with a shield or a large two-handed weapon, hardening opens up new creative avenues. Do you have a really powerful attack that you can’t wait to use, but you’re afraid that you’ll get interrupted during the long animation? Harden mid-way! The enemy will swack you when you’re petrified, getting staggered, and you’ll be able to follow through on your deadly move. That’s just one of many different strategies you will figure out over the course of your time with Mortal Shell.
Another unique change to Souls combat is Mortal Shell’s version of classes. Instead of creating a custom character and picking a ‘class’ from a list of options, such as a warrior, a thief, and a mage, you inhabit a shell of your choice. There are four shells - Tiel the Acolyte, who is very quick and agile, Eredrim the Venerable, who has a lot of health, Solomon the Scholar, who has ‘resolve’ for special attacks, and Harros The Vassal, who is well-balanced. All of these shells use melee combat.
A frightening show-down!
For a deeper dive into mechanics and strategy, take a gander at a combat video guide from Boomstick Gaming, right here!
The Objectives System in Mortal Shell
What an odd fellow...
Mortal Shell handles objectives and quests in a really natural way, similar to Dark Souls. By that, I mean that it doesn’t really have explicit objectives. There’s no giant golden arrow on the game-map forcing you to go somewhere in particular, and there’s no huge exclamation point floating awkwardly over the heads of characters that you will meet throughout the game.
You can talk to some characters, and some of them will tell you interesting bits of lore or ask you to perform certain tasks, but it’s up to you when and how to tackle these objectives. You won’t even get the ‘main quest’ until you reach a certain early-game zone and talk to a character there…
But if you’re looking for some side content, here’s a guide from GameSpot for a secret quest-line that leads to a special ending…
Hard mode for all of you experts.
Glutton for punishment? Try the hard mode! It’s perfect for you hard-core Souls-like gamers who are actually really good at this genre.
Sweet Graphics
Body-snatching in progress.
As I’ve already mentioned, Mortal Shell is a beautiful game (in a dark and creepy way). On my desktop PC with an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1660 Ti GPU, an Intel Core i5 9400F CPU, 16 gigabytes of DDR4 RAM, and a 500 gigabyte solid state drive, the game runs quite well. I’ve never had to deal with a crash, and bouts of micro-stutter were very rare. The frame-rate and frame-pacing seem to be very solid, enhancing the realistic and gritty graphics that are powered by Unreal Engine 4.
Take a look at Mortal Shell PC gameplay, running at 4k resolution (3840x2160) and 60 frames per second here!
About The Developer: Cold Symmetry
The developer Cold Symmetry and publisher Playstack London.
To some of us, Mortal Shell seemed to come out of the blue. The game was announced relatively quietly a while back under the working title ‘Dungeonhaven.’ It was being developed by a brand-new independent game studio called Cold Symmetry, with a small team of around 15 people. Compare that to some huge triple-A video games that are developed by international teams of 200 people or more!
Frankly, given how small the development team is, how new the studio is, and how beautifully the game looks and plays, I’m impressed!
Mortal Shell’s Price And Availability
The price of Mortal Shell is easily one of its most attractive features. For this fun, challenging, and polished package, you’ll only need to shell out $29.99 at full price. That’s a good value! Many other Souls-like games cost $50 or $60, even when they’re released by smaller developers.
Availability is a bit of a different story. On the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the game released on the standard store-fronts for those platforms. On PC, Mortal Shell released exclusively on the digital Epic Games Store. It won’t be available on Steam until 2021. For some players, that might mean it’s better to wait. I can only tell you that in my experience, this game downloaded and ran properly when I bought it from the Epic Games Store. Plus, you can add Mortal Shell to your Steam library as a non-Steam game, so I managed to use the Steam Controller and Steam overlay in this game with no problems whatsoever.
Platforms and the release date
Mortal Shell - My Final Verdict: 8/10 (Great)
The Foundling (you) inside a mortal shell
It’s not a perfect game by any means. And it’s not for everyone. If you don’t care much for Dark Souls, then this may not be for you. But if you have any interest in the Souls-like genre, I’d say this game is worth a shot, especially with its compelling price-point.
Mortal Shell offers a stream-lined single-player Souls experience for fans of the genre. It does so with beautiful graphics, solid technical performance, an interesting world full of lore, and some unique twists on classes, combat, and item usage. It’s worth a buy for fans of this game category and style!
Behind The Score
Pros
- Length (if you like short, replayable games)
- Presentation
- Performance
- Mechanics
- Affordable price
Cons
- Epic Store exclusivity on PC (but it’s not a major concern)
- Length (if you prefer very long games)
- There’s no mage class or magic system
- Only a few weapons
- No real sound-track (the lute replaces that)
Praise the Sun for another great new Souls-like!
