Lie or Die#

Lies of P is a Souslike released in 2023, and only recently I gave it a chance and played through. The game draws a lot of inspiration and game design from the original Souls series, but has enough to stand on it’s own and be an enjoyable experience even for new Souls fans.

Speaking of new Souls fans, that’s where I fit in. Lies of P is my second souls game. I was a bit scared to challenge myself with another souls game, but I’m really glad I did. Lies of P is a gorgeous game and does almost everything right, deserving an 8/10

Souls Base#

As I said in the Nightreign review, I see soul games as mechanical intensive games. Lies of P is no exception. It has the regular base you expect: light & heavy attacks, dodge, parry, stamina and character attributes. Differently than the souls games though, this one has a better balance between parries and dodges during fights

One of the biggest differences is the Guard Regain mechanic. Generally when you miss a parry you receive the attack’s full damage, but in Lies of P if you block too early, you take reduced damage and gain Guard Regain. When you have Guard Regain, attacking an enemy will convert it back into HP. This is a very friendly mechanic, since it doesn’t punish players for attempting parries and encourage them to be more aggressive when they miss.

Level Design#

Perhaps one of the biggest praises I can give to this game is the level design.

Visually it’s stunning. The game mixes a Belle Epoque style with Steam Punk. Everything is grand and intricate. You see the lavish but decadent Hotel Krat, the heavy industrialized factories, the wasteland left by society, it’s amazing.

Mechanically speaking, levels are predictable. You can explore without being afraid of losing progress since the game has plenty of checkpoint routes back to Stargazers. It is somewhat similar to God Of War, a main linear path with secondary offshoots that rewards the player with items and upgrades.

But that doesn’t mean the levels don’t include the additional trolling with enemies hidden behind corners, just out of sight from items.

If you are a seasoned player, you’ll feel right at home while playing this

Weapons, Items and Upgrades#

In Lies of P you have a vast choice of weapons for different play styles. You can also combine weapon blades with different handles to suit you better.

I personally played the entire game with the starting rapier. That’s possible due to the upgrade system, which upgrades a weapon up to +10. To upgrade a weapons you need Ergo and the specific upgrade material. Just like Elden Ring with regular and somber smithing stones, Lies of P features regular moonstones and dark moonstones, generally regular weapons will use the regular moonstones and boss or special weapons will get the dark version.

Besides the main hand weapon, Lies of P has offhand weapons called Legion Arms. Much like Bloodborne, Legion Arms have their special ammunition and various effects. I’ve tested a few such as the flamethrower and the poison thrower but I ended up using the grapple. The arms give gameplay some more variety to deal with enemies and bosses.

And finally it has items. I’ll be honest that I didn’t really use items all that much, because the classic gamer syndrome of stocking up everything until the final boss. There are a few different throwables to aggro distant enemies and to deal some damage overtime, there are AoE consumables to create status afflicting areas, there are items to prevend ergo loss on death and there are single use grindstones to grant status effects on weapons.

Items can be bought from the shops or killing enemies and you shouldn’t ignore them. Biggest proof is LilAggy’s run beating the game without using a weapon at all.

Outside the world of equipables, there are 2 methods for permanently upgrading Pinocchio: levels and quartz. I won’t go into levels since it’s standard souls stuff, but with quartz they were able to implement a pretty interesting system: You have a skill tree with levels and each level have 4 upgrades. Each upgrade requires some amount of quartz to become active, such as dodging twice with animation cancel. But for each quartz you add, you can select another permanent effect such as more heals, more damage, stamina regen, etc. Initially the system can be quite overwhelming, but it doesn’t take long to get used to it.

Lore#

As with any souls game, the story is secondary. Lies of P has more exposition to the lore though, even if you ignore documents and item descriptions you will get a grasp on what’s going on. They really got it right on having lore told through the environment too. It ties in with the enemies, the visual design, element affinities and overall game progression.

And for those who were expecting the story is a retold version of the original Pinocchio, it’s not even close. The only similarity is the lying system, because otherwise the game is a tale of machines revolting against humans along with a deadly disease spreading throughout Krat. I felt the lore doesn’t have the same depth and mystique as Elden Ring (which is my prime example), but it has more than enough to stand on it’s own feet.

Inspiration#

At the time I played and finished Lies of P, I still hadn’t played Bloodborne. But it takes me quite sometime to write a full review, and since then I have finished Bloodborne as well. To me is clear how Bloodborne served as an inspiration for Lies of P, both for gameplay aspects (main hand weapons and off hand ‘gadgets’) and on small details such as the healing animation and even quite a bit of lore. I can’t help but think about the resemblance of the Healing Church with the Alchemists, the Carcasses with the Beasts and so on

Bloodborne is a pretty unique souls game overall, so in retrospect I really like how Lies of P caries the legacy forward.

Conclusion#

As it is for a souls game, Lies of P can be pretty frustrating at times, and has it’s fair share of questionable design decisions. The game makes up for it through great gameplay mechanics and variety of build options, topping of with an original lore. This puts Lies of P on a solid 8/10 for me