Phantom Blade Zero - A New Hack & Slash ARPG
Feb. 18, 2024Phantom Blade Zero – A New Hack & Slash ARPG
The story of Phantom Blade 0 is going to be the main story of the Phantom Blade world, with the mobile game Phantom Blade: Executioners being the prequel. From the prequel, we can surmise quite a lot about what to expect in the Phantom World.
The Phantom World is a fantastical version of the Ming Dynasty era of China from the 14th to 16th century. In this world, the setting builds upon Chinese Wuxia, a fantasy theme of China regarding the adventures of martial artists, with concepts of chivalry, loyalty and justice. PB0 will build upon Wuxia with its own twist by including mythological creatures that you will fight and fantastical abilities that impact the story.
In this world, you play as Soul, an elite assassin serving for an organisation known as the Order. The Order is a powerful institution that exists for the sole reason of maintaining the check and balance between forces of good and evil. To accomplish their task, they need exceptional agents, thus Soul was adopted by the patriarch of the Order and trained into an expert of espionage and assassination. His job was to remove any person or faction deemed “disruptive” by the Order, and he did so with excellent results.
However, one day the Patriarch of The Order was murdered, and Soul was framed for the crime. In the ensuing manhunt, he was gravely injured and practically dead, but he was miraculously healed by a mystic healer who took him in. Even so, the cure was not enough to save him from death completely; he now has 66 days to live, and in that time he must solve the mystery behind his foster parent.
As this is technically the sequel to the story of Phantom Blade: Executioner, we can deduce that some characters will be returning, but now as enemies to Soul, as he “betrayed” The Order. You can think of it like seeing a prequel movie showing a younger John Wick with his cool friends, and then you watch the actual John Wick to see how he has to kill them all. One character that is definitely returning is one we saw at the very end who draws a blade, called Zuo Shang. Zuo Shang was Soul’s best friend, but their bond was shattered as a result of his endless ambition in the events of the prequel. Now, we see that he serves as one of the main antagonists, hoping to wait out Soul’s 66 days before he can do anything about his framing. It’s possible that Zuo Shang killed the patriarch of the order to become the next successor, but nothing has been confirmed on what purpose he or any of the other characters shown play in the story yet.
The gameplay of Phantom Blade 0 can be classified as a Semi-Open World ARPG Hack and Slash. Players will unravel the story and explore the vast world of Phantom Blade which harbours many secrets, side missions, treasures and other activities.
The main quest will follow Soul’s journey to unveil the real culprit behind the assassination. This story will be a completely singleplayer experience which will amount to about 30-40 hours. Alongside the main quest, you will be able to complete several side quests that can be found throughout the many areas within the world . Each area is unique in its design and terrain, and will be populated with unique quests, hidden locations, and even secret bosses. Traversing rocky areas and large gorges will make use of the parkour climbing system within the game, allowing Soul to wall run on certain walls and traverse through rough terrain. There was also a horse carriage shown within the trailer, so maybe players will be able to travel through areas by horse as well.
When it comes to progression and how Soul improves through the game, players will develop Soul’s combat potential in the form of weapons, armour, artifacts and skills that Soul can learn and master. Powerful items and abilities are usually obtained as treasures found in chests or hidden areas, but bosses will also drop skills or gear, which probably will be exceedingly unique and change how you approach combat. All gear will be upgradable, so we can also expect some kind of material gathering system within the world.
Once players finish the main quest, they will receive one of multiple endings most likely based on decisions made beforehand, or certain side quests or activities they need to complete in advance. What’s interesting is that this isn’t where Phantom Blade 0 will end; on top of the additional singleplayer content like hidden zones and side quests, S-GAME will be utilising some of their Mobile Game experience to create special endgame content. This has been said to include multiplayer dungeons, boss rushes and rogue-like abysses. We don’t see this too often when it comes to singleplayer ARPGs, so it will be exciting to see if they can pull this off, and add to a good 40 hour experience with an optional multiplayer grind afterwards.
With that being said, the actual difficulty of the game has been stated to be more lax than you would expect from the fast paced gameplay seen in the trailer. It has been stated that there will be some form of soulslike elements within the game, but without the added difficulty and punishment. The general vision seems to be making the game approachable, so that people will be able to fully enjoy their experience without needing “lightning reflexes” that they would require in a game like Ninja Gaiden or Sekiro.
The combat of Phantom Blade 0 takes an approach that differs from the deliberate and strategic gameplay you would see in the likes of Soulslike games or the Monster Hunter series. Since the devs are huge fans of beloved hack and slash games from the 2000’s such as Ninja Gaiden and Devil May Cry, Phantom Blade 0 employs high-octane, fast-paced combat reminiscent of the sleek and dynamic moves seen in 1990s Kung Fu films, mimicking the style of martial artists like Bruce Lee.
The weapons Soul will be using in combat include a primary and a secondary weapon, called a Sha Chi, meaning Shark Tooth. The primary weapon will always be a blade, as Soul is primarily a blade master. Throughout the game, you will find different types of blades and dual blades which differ in length, shape and weight and all have different movesets based on these realistic characteristics. For Sha Chi, the types of weapon will differ greatly. There will be over 20 different types of Sha Chi weapons in the game, all with different functionality such as cannons, axes or hammers which have been said to have the special ability to break shields, like the loaded axe from Sekiro.
The main combat system will revolve around dodging, parrying and executing Combo Chains; a system that allows for players to equip multiple movesets despite the limited set of buttons on a control. This system is something S-GAME has designed from their years of experience with the limited input functionality of Mobile Games, and it works by editing skill orders in 2 chains and simply pressing 2 buttons to release quick and complex combos. If implemented well, I imagine that this approach to combat will allow any player to look flashy and lightning fast, regardless of whether you have amazing reflexes or not.
However, there will still be depth and a high skill ceiling within the game. In the trailer, we can see that a large part of combat is deflecting multiple enemy attacks in succession to create openings to attack. Players will also realistically dodge attacks by bending their upper body to avoid incoming blade attacks, or rolling to dodge explosions or just doing a bunch of backflips and body twists to masterfully avoid dual wielding opponents. All of these moves have been shown to be used simultaneously while fighting multiple opponents at once, but given how many inputs there seem to be, it’s hard to imagine exactly how they intend on implementing all of these different actions.
We have seen a few different skills so far which are probably usages of Combo Chains or skills found within the game. The first one is a bi-directional attack used to attack enemies on behind and in front of Soul with a backwards kick and a lunging forward stab with his blade. The next ability we saw was Soul climbing up a pillar using the brute strength of his massive calves to launch himself from a height and deliver a devastating midair attack. Another midair ability we see is a jumping 3 spin barrel roll which leads to a 360 AOE spin attack to stylishly defeat a couple of enemies. The last one shown was a powerful forward flurry of strikes with dual blades, pushing the enemy back and possibly breaking their stance. There are also other ways to fight besides head on blade clashing, like using the environment or stealthing behind enemies to assassinate them.
In terms of enemies you face throughout the game, there will be human opponents to face as well as mythological beasts from Chinese Mythology, or just Chinese culture in general. For example, an enemy that really surprised me was the metallic “dragon” at the start of the trailer. This is actually a lion based on the design for the costume worn during the Wǔ Shī (Lion Dance) in Chinese New Year. 2 experienced dancers go underneath the long costume of a Lion under the head and the tail to perform a dance on high poles ranging from one to three metres in height, lead on by the beat of drums, cymbals and a gong. Its very interesting to see the human mimicry of a lion be used in this fictitious world as an enemy/boss, and this gives you an idea of just how creative S-GAME have gotten with their setting.
Other enemies shown include an armored humanoid figure with a black abyss for a face, a grotesque disfigured monster alongside an armored figure donning gold and purple, and a few bosses. Enemies had a variety of different weapons and movesets, like one of the bosses using a chain link and flail, another using a cannon arm and an enemy using dual chains in the carriage fight. I’m excited to see what other ideas they have for enemies in combat and their cultural significance, as there seems to be a bunch of creatures and beings within this world that are definitely inspired by something, although I cannot quite place my finger on what.
Overall, the combat is undoubtedly going to be the selling point of the game and it’s looking to be shaping up as a really innovative system that places emphasis on realism and being stylish. All of the animations in the game are going to be handcrafted based on referencing from Motion Capture, so we can probably expect some insane moves to come out of combat later down the line.
In terms of platform availability, there have been no exclusivity deals signed yet between S-GAME and Playstation, so we can probably predict a next-gen console and PC release.
Castielle
Senior Editor at Fextralife. I enjoy gaming, playing and watching sports, cooking yummy food, watching a good movie and hanging out with Fex.
