A game developer has to be pretty brave to attempt a Soulslike, I feel. Just the fact that they’re still called Soulslikes, nearly a decade and a half on (and surely longer than it took for “Doom clones” to turn into first-person shooters), is probably a sign. FromSoftware just keeps banging out top notch examples of a genre they created, and follow-ups, in Bloodborne, Sekiro and Elden Ring, that all have their own distinct variances from the core template, so plucky pretenders to the throne really need a unique selling point. The Surge has its near-future sci-fi stylings, Nioh leans into character action game combat, and Jedis Fallen Order and Survivor combine Uncharted-esque traversal with a little movie licence from the seventies. New contender Lies of P has, umm, puppets.

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Lies of P is consistently weakest where it cleaves too strongly to the From Software formula and strongest where it innovates. Weapons for instance can be broken down into two components: a blade (or equivalent bashy/stabby bit) and a handle, which can then be recombined however you like. The blade dictates the type and amount of damage done, while the stat scaling and move set are attached to the handle.