A PS5 surprise: Stellar Blade

When I first read about the obnoxious outfits and physics in Stellar Blade, I thought it was a gimmick. Then I read a little more and the comparisons to Elden Ring, and soulslike games, along with the science fiction, futuristic, and apocalyptic setting; I thought I'd give the demo a go.

I did. I then played the demo again, after frustratingly trying to get good.

Then, it clicked. Fluid combat, an incredible soundtrack, character models that are motivated by carnal hedonism, where the developers played the classic card of "know your audience". This leads to the surface level looking like the cover of tasteless magazine, but there's a diamond underneath the veneer. There's a game with complicated combat mechanics and challenging gameplay.

Do you wish Elden Ring was a science fiction setting? Do you wish that it wasn't a quiet, lonely wasteland? Do you wish it had some cities with meaningful side-quests? Okay, all of this is a stretch and its safe to say that these are very different games, but what is not different is the level of satisfaction you get while slaughtering enemies that are overwhelmingly more threatening to you than you are to them.

Stellar Blade follows Eve, who is a womanly android with one purpose, kill the Naytiba threat. Naytibas are horrifying aliens that wanted to wipe out all the existence of life on Earth. Life is a funny term, because there's sort of four "Races" of life on the Earth of Stellar's Blade's world. There's good-ol organic humans. There's Androids. There's hybrids, where people have taken the best of both worlds, and finally, of course, the enemy: Naytibas.

The game beings in a very linear fashion, but then slowly opens up to a main hub and different "worlds" where there's a multitude of things standing between you and your success.

Often times, that success is based on killing creatures, or finding lost items, but some times, it is the journey of trying to get from A to B via platforming puzzles.

Whether you follow the core story, or take the time to do all the side quests, all of it feels rewarding, and the unique setting and landscape / level design is done well.

But with a game of the visual fidelity of Stellar Blade, that's not what people are talking about. I mean, just look at Eve:

To compare her to Lara Croft, and to try to defend a game based on its gameplay merits, tight combat, and uniquely presented setting is relevant when it comes to Stellar Blade. While some of the outfits are incredibly revealing and flashy; they are of course, entirely optional.

What matters here is that they're just costumes. There's no contrived "oh, you must wear this thing to go to this place" - its all a choice you make along the way whether you want to go find some outfits and flaunt your stuff, or whether you'd prefer to get killing, collect some machine cores, and craft some upgrades.

You can upgrade your "exo-spine", which increases your offence, defence, or makes collecting items and XP easier. You can even make yourself weaker if you find that combat is too easy. I that's you, please go and check yourself into a psych clinic and get some medication, Stellar Blade's challenge level remains constant, and steadily increases as you progress through the Naytiba arsenal on your quest to eliminate them all.

Beyond the visuals, the gameplay, the quests, there's one incredibly surprising element of Stelar Blade: the soundtrack. There's a mix of instrumental stuff, but the pop-rock with subdued vocals adds so strongly to the setting of the game, which has flourishes of the original Devil May Cry, with destroyed buildings looming with almost impossible scale over the character model.

Stellar Blade is the sort of thing you have to play to understand, and the way the story ends, leaving the game open for a sequel, while at the same time being a complete story means that this will be a cult classic for years to come.