DLCCODE VEIN - Season PassLoading store offers
CODE VEIN
CODE VEIN sends you through connected dungeons where weapon choice, Blood Codes and a partner shape each fight. At ≈ $4.43 from 
Kinguin, the confirmed low for this offer makes a good entry point if you want a story-led challenge with room to tune your fighting style. Steam PC supports solo play and co-op, and player reviews are 83% across 46,570 reviews.
It suits players who enjoy adjusting abilities and gear rather than sticking to one class. Set out alone, bring an AI partner, or team up in co-op. With Steam at $59.99 and ≈ $55.56 saved through the merchant, CODE VEIN is a timely pick if its flexible combat appeals to you.
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Price History
Past 36 months · Updated dailyHistorical Low~ $5.002026-10Current Low Across Stores~ $8.09GamesPlanet DEvs. Historical Low+62%
Prices cover Steam and 39 authorized stores; only legitimate offers are counted. The chart shows weekly market-wide lows and Steam's official price across the past 36 months.
01About CODE VEIN
CODE VEIN pairs a story-driven journey through connected dungeons with demanding fights against the Lost. Venture out alone, with an AI partner, or in co-op with another player. Shape your Revenant with weapons, Blood Codes and Gifts, and change class at any time to alter your approach. On Steam PC, 83% of 46,570 player reviews are positive. Steam lists Traditional Chinese, English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese-Brazil, Russian, and Spanish-Latin America as interface languages.
Credits
K
Composer
Go Shiina
Developer
Bandai Namco Studios
Publisher
Bandai Namco Entertainment
Lowest recorded in 36 months
$5.002026-10-02 · GamesPlanet DEBase game · same records as the chart above; USD history, not a regional Steam low.Language support
| Language | Interface | Subtitles | Audio |
|---|---|---|---|
| Traditional Chinese | Yes | Yes | — |
| English | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| French | Yes | Yes | — |
Show 8 more languages
| Language | Interface | Subtitles | Audio |
|---|---|---|---|
| Italian | Yes | Yes | — |
| German | Yes | Yes | — |
| Spanish | Yes | Yes | — |
| Japanese | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Korean | Yes | Yes | — |
| Portuguese-Brazil | Yes | Yes | — |
| Russian | Yes | Yes | — |
| Spanish-Latin America | Yes | Yes | — |
Steam PC edition data · 2026-11-11
02Before you buy
Play modes
Steam PC lists single-player, multiplayer and co-op. The game description says you can team up with an AI partner or another player in co-op.
Language and audio
The Steam language list includes English interface, full audio and subtitles, along with several other interface languages.
03Frequently asked questions
What kind of game is CODE VEIN?
It is a story-driven action experience built around connected dungeons and challenging fights against the Lost.
Can I play with a partner?
Yes. The description mentions both an AI partner and co-op with another player.
How can I customize my combat style?
You can use weapons such as bayonets, axes and spears, customize abilities through Blood Codes, and change your class at any time.
Popular Steam reviews
Native-language selection · 10 reviewsSelected helpful reviews in this language show both recommendations and criticisms. This selection does not represent the overall positive rating; opinions reflect the version reviewed.
RecommendedSteam player
Code Vein Review If you enjoy and find the review helpful, please follow my curator! StarsDeck Sum up + Progression is satisfying. + Vestiges are a unique way to build lore and story when compared to similar games. + Souls-like gameplay that brings new elements that make it different and give it personality. + One of the best character creators. A huge amount of customization tools to shape your character. + Fun side diversions including side dungeons, quests, vestiges, trading through friendship points and more. + The story gets better as the game progresses, generating interest from the player and evolving into a series of developments. - Doesn't quite live up to the potential it has when compared to other games of this style. - Takes a while to get good, players must get to the 5th area (not counting the home base) to truly experience what this game has to offer, which might turn them away before they get there. Introduction Code Vein is a soul's base game that sticks to the core elements but brings new ones to the table. It manages to create its own identity and make a name for itself in a genre that's been popular. Weapon styles, classes, and skills have a lot of variations making the game combat fun to experiment with and tailored to personal tastes. Its unique storytelling and mechanics set it apart from its peer and creates a sort of hybrid that is an interesting addition to these types of games. Gameplay Code Vein gameplay features a huge array of options when it comes to combat. Weapons have their unique moves in contrast to many soul games, which creates their fighting style in the game. Gear can affect movement, changing the type between a roll or a dash or affecting the skills used in combat. Classes feature a bunch of archetypes from healers to tanks to battlemages. The mix of these creates a loadout that you can use, and it is rewarding to see one own character become stronger and shaping their approach to enemies, exploration, and bosses. For example, a defensive style with a lance, using long reach to hit enemies before they can even strike you can be combined with defensive skills such as area knockbacks that push enemies away, projectiles of ice to have a long-range option and defense boosts. Apart from the customization options, the game follows the traditional formula. Players explore dungeons, find the boss, beat it and keep moving on. The difference here is the AI system that the game has chosen to implement as buddies you can take with you. The game is always based on having a buddy with you so some parts can feel unfair if you don't have them, but they don't make the game a breeze. While how they will exactly act to a situation is random, my experience with them is that they usually do a good job at tanking enemies, assisting in damage and saving the player from death through healing. It is satisfying to see your loadout work well together and hit enemies, exploring the depths of it while getting a sensation of achievement when getting something that clicks together well. Classes can be changed at any time outside of combat which allows for a fluid experience when trying out new skills and weapons as well as providing options on the fly. Strong points The game strong points are its story which if you take it seriously and give it a chance, is good. I know some players are not into the anime visuals, but if you see past that it will make you invested in it. The combat which features lots of options never gets stale and is satisfying to use your loadout to its max capacity. The character creation and design feature a good array of mixers and options while keeping a design that is not overwhelming or filled with unnecessary elements. One of the things that the games have going for is regarding encounters with the enemies are the ambushes. Sometimes, enemies will appear in larger numbers. This is a great idea as it creates tense moments when being surrounded and changes the pacing when progressing through dungeons. Defeating all these enemies will give a good chunk of haze which is the equivalent of souls in other games and sometimes hand out special rewards. This is where the strategic part of the game comes in, knowing where enemies could come front and what type of attacks they use will dictate your approach to them. Combat is fast and ambushes can be ruthless so knowing when to fight and when to retreat is key. Story The game story is possibly the best it has to offer along with is combat. The pace is well maintained and is never too slow or rushed, making the world more tangible to the player. The story features character development and it also expresses a lot of emotions, from moments of happiness to sadness or regret. During the first hours, it can seem a bit melancholy, but once you get past that you find out it is a more complex story that at first glance. One of the core things that keep Code Vein unique among its peers is how it approaches the foundation of its lore build and story. To do this the game has something called "Vestiges". Vestiges are divided into parts and each of them explores a segment of the character, whenever they are their origins, story, beliefs or development. These are well crafted, short yet impactful. Through connecting the dots across various vestiges, one can piece together parts of the game's story. How the world came to be or how the characters related to one another. When a game makes a character likable and to care about them in 10 minutes, that is an achievement. Paying attention to vestiges will allow for a better experience story-wise while making classes stronger. It offers lore and attracts player through the offer of progression. Some Notes The game runs well on a GTX 1060, solid 60 FPS on the highest settings. Online can be clunky sometimes but my overall experience with it was decent. Early parts of the game can be lacking, however, once one reaches the 5th area in the game (the "white" area) it becomes an improved version of it. Bosses start to be more challenging with and more special while enemy design evolves into complex versions that represent a huge danger to the player. Finally. Exploration stops being straightforward as puzzles and multiple paths begin to show and areas become much bigger. AI partners are a mixed bag, some people like them, others hate them. Sometimes they are useful and smart, and other times they can be lackluster. Overall my time with my partners was good and they live up to their job, assisting me in meaningful ways and not feeling particularly overpowered but rather like a useful companion. What Makes It Special What makes the game special is that it tries to break the mold of a genre that has been static for a long time. It takes its share of risks by introducing new elements and changing how the story is told through a more common medium rather than through imagination. Its character creator is probably one of the most complete and complex ones, it has tons of options and people can go crazy with it. Is a huge improvement in this genre and it looks very pretty to the eye. Main character design is also fantastic, keeping a low profile yet looking good aesthetically. Conclusion Code Vein is a fantastic new IP and it has a lot going for it in this genre. I think this is a game that could get its following and that could be seen more of in the future. With its approach to storytelling, huge options in a combat that is fast-paced with a strategic mindset and depths, it is a game that I can recommend to any fan of the soul's series and players who like this kind of game.Show moreShow less
30.8 hours at review914 people found this helpful
Not recommendedSteam player
I played this game for 14 or so hours before finding it boring. I really couldn't put my finger on why I wouldn't like it, it had similar item, combat, and enemy systems to Dark souls and Bloodborne. I thought about it alot, and the story was great, it was solid story, so that wasn't it. The items were awesome too, you had great stuff in that department. The enemies were diverse and very not ridiculous in their mechanics. So what was it? The answer surprised me. Combat. I looked back on it awhile, and I finally figured out that what was wrong was the combat. The single most important aspect of the game was botched. How you might ask? Combat was unsatisfying, and when I say that I mean that when you hit something, it didn't feel like you were hitting something. It felt more like you were spamming an attack to get rid of an nuisance rather than fighting for your life against something. Enemies didn't stagger or feel like they were being hit at all most of the time, and what's more, this translated to almost everything besides the weakest of enemies. It felt more like I was hitting an animated doll rather than a thinking enemy, which is a surface level in most things like this, but it matters significantly.Show moreShow less
14.5 hours at review753 people found this helpful
RecommendedSteam player
There's a badass soulslike minigame in my Character customization simulator.Show moreShow less
1 hours at review769 people found this helpful
Not recommendedSteam player
One of the things that really shine in this game is its character build system. There are no parameter “points” for you to distribute as you level up. You don’t have to predetermine your playstyle before everything starts only to cry at a weapon/spell you found later that doesn’t suit your build but you do want to play with. Your parameters are preset in this game as bloodlines and you can switch between them anytime you want with no cost. Want to try on a new weapon you stripped from your dead foes but your current bloodline cannot equip it? Then switch to a bloodline that can! Get bored with slashing and slamming all the time? Then switch to a casty boi in no time! Although you can’t alter those preset builds, you are allowed to combine skills from as many bloodlines as you like to create customized hybrid build. The more you progress, the more freedom you will have creating your own builds. Bosses are well-designed. Their attack moves are highly variant and bring forth some serious threats for players to counter. Maps are multi-layered and, in some maps, routes are so complicated that exploring can be quite challenging and time-consuming. Some people criticize on it but I like CODE VEIN’s map design anyway. The game has almost everything needed that can distinguish itself from Dark Souls and should have established a solid stand as a brand new hardcore ARPG series. However, CODE VEIN ruined it in the worst way possible. The game has a really serious problem. In the first few areas, you get beaten up by bosses, by mobs, by traps. Then you get up, you learn, you try again and finally you overcome. It is exactly the stereotype we love in this genre. This turns out to be a different story when you progress to the midway. There is seldom a chance any more that you CHALLENGE a boss. Instead you just simply … trample them over. Your damage output starts to become ridiculously high. Or it is the Health Points of bosses that becomes ridiculously low -- It has to be either way since you will find that you can easily out-damage any boss with a random +4 or +5 weapon in your 50s. Bosses still have lots of moves. They can still deplete your heath bar in a single hit. But they are also so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ squishy that you can kill them in such a short time before they put up any real threat. From the 4th area to the 10th area, I killed almost every single boss in my FIRST run. Most of the time the boss fight would not last for more than 2.5 minutes. They just die so easily before I even witness all of their moves. I am NOT some skilled action game player. I never managed to kill ANY boss in Dark Souls in first run, not to mention ending a boss fight in 2.5 minutes. I was always the one that get beaten up and lick the ground. It is because I failed so many times that I started to learn. It is because the enemies seem so strong and unbeatable that makes me feel like challenging them again and again. And it is this exact process that makes me feel so accomplished and satisfied in the end. In CODE VEIN, however, especially from 4th area on, most likely you will find yourself killing bosses with less effort and trust me it is NOT because your skill has improved. The game made it this way. You will see how your attacks do ridiculous damages to boss’s health bar and which you NEVER experience in ANY Dark Souls games in your FIRST RUN (In NG++++ it is possible). I really hate it when games sell false sense of accomplishment by corrupting the balance between boss’s health amount and your character’s attacking power. Killing a boss like this simply brings me no satisfaction at all. The deep dungeons are also a joke. As end contents the routes are supposed to be complicated and encounters proved hard and worthy. But disappointingly you walk on roads straight as 5th Avenue and just happen to beat up the same bosses you killed before but with EVEN LESS HEALTH POINTS. The idea of reviving boss fights for players to challenge to their heart’s content is by itself brilliant, but it makes no sense that those revived bosses are so WEAK and you can’t even fight them on equal grounds. These are no contents for you to continuously challenge and have more fun. They plainly exist to waste your time. Things may get better with DLCs coming out and bosses may not be that squishy and start to have NORMAL health bar in NG+++++, but given the experience I doubt I would spend time on new game+ in near future. In all, CODE VEIN is a decent game. Although it failed my expectation, I would have to admit I enjoyed the storyline, the animations, the fully-voiced characters and the atmosphere. Would still give a try on its sequel, were it to have one. It may or may not worth the price, depending on your taste. Recommend to: Those who enjoy anime and would like a story that do have some weight. Those who enjoy beating up bosses in various flashy ways more than getting f***** up over and over again. I love Io my waifu nomatterwhat NOT recommend to: Dark Souls maniac who expects an experience just as challenging and satisfying.Show moreShow less
31.3 hours at review570 people found this helpful
RecommendedSteam player
I'm writing this as a Dark Souls veteran (1000+ hours) who doesn't really care for Anime. First off - is this Anime Souls? Absolutely. But is it a bad ripoff? Absolutely not. Overall comparison: - movement is a bit more floaty in this one - Combat feels a bit less beefy but still very good - Weapon movesets have been replaced with active skills which I like more. You unlock them over time and after mastering each skill you can mix and match cross classes - Bosses are very similar to Souls but still feel fresh and challenging - most of the consumables and game mechanics are basically 100% copy&paste from Souls, which I don't mind because of the familiarity it creates for players like me - Level design also feels very similar with shortcuts and gorgeous views along the way The story gets interesting very fast with elements of post-apocalypse, underground rivers of Blood, Vampires etc. When it comes to the art style - I'm not a fan of Anime in general, but holy hell this game looks gorgeous! The characters are lively animated, the world is interesting with lots of details, it's colorful and the character customization is the best I've ever seen in any game. You can not only change your person itself but you can also customize different outfits and change between them whenever you want. Fashion Souls+ Oh yeah one mention about the difficulty: some people say this game is easier than Souls - wrong. Turn the AI companion off and you'll see. First "real" boss took me 20+ tries and it felt just as rewarding to finally beat it. Overall I highly recommend this game if you're a fan of deep character customization and want a fresh Souls experience in a wonderful world with gorgeous characters and interesting story.Show moreShow less
18.3 hours at review683 people found this helpful
Not recommendedSteam player
I cannot recommend this game at full price, IMHO i'd wait for at least 25% off sale. I have played the betas, demos and online-stress test on the PS4, so I rushed my way and skipped the cut-scenes as I've seen them twice before. I had some hope that game would improve after the beta, which was clearly not the case. It is a mediocre game, giving it a thumbs down doesn't mean its outright bad. I'd rate it 6/10 Currently, the multiplayer is bugged, it depends on your steam download region, it's a hassle but not game breaking, and not the main issue, and workable around anyway. Edit: 2 people added me to ask about the workaround. Just change your Steam Download region ( Steam > Settings > Downloads) to the same region as your friend. Also, Make sure that your region in-game matches your friend's region (or set your matchmaking to all regions). and this one is a no brainer: Set up a password. Let's talk about the game itself. Sure, the game is edgy, most characters could probably cut you with their words. Even so, their designs fit the world and the setting of the game. P.S its an anime game. so expect everything to be cheesy either way. so for the characters and world, I'd say its doing good. Its nothing unique or mind-blowing. but its good enough. The combat is the main issue here, it feels severely lacking. The hit feedback on opponents sucks. The enemies get staggered with every couple of hits. There is no weapon weight factor other than the in-game system that affects your dash/roll. Edit: You do unlock weapons with different animations mid-way, and near the end. so really there are just 5 weapons in the game that were re-skinned with other names/stats, maybe slightly different animations (Probably due to the Core Cast system) . Bandai-Namco thinks that adding screen-shake whenever your weapon hits means you're getting hit feedback. Ranged weapon fire looks flying red pixel lasers from 2005, the only thing somewhat better is the caster codes. I mean come on, even indie game developers made smoother combat than this? is this the standard for triple A titles nowadays? Next, the enemy AI... Most of the enemies tend to battle-cry when they see you for 3 blue moons. you could back-stab them a 100 times and they'd still be shouting. They don't even turn around to follow you while they shout. they just stand there begging to be killed. They also like spamming attacks even when you're not in-range. Giant monsters have blind-spots that you could just stand still and they'd not give you as much as a scratch, even when they revert to the "OH YOU'RE BELOW ME SO I'M GONNA TRY STOMPING" attacks, they keep turning around while trying to do it and eventually hit nothing anyway. Only the bosses have a somewhat better AI. Tho the NPC partner makes them way too easy anyway. The Character creation is great, it has lots of options. However, that is not enough reason to give the game a thumbs up like 90% of the steam reviews. People are giving this good reviews mostly because it's anime, and are extremely biased towards that. Forgive me when I say this, I know it will trigger the weebs but, this game is very over-hyped for no good reason.Show moreShow less
2.7 hours at review547 people found this helpful
RecommendedSteam player
Dark souls , but with massive, soft, jiggly, squishy and milky anime tiddies. 10/10 Weeb stuff included.Show moreShow less
1.7 hours at review627 people found this helpful
Not recommendedSteam player
Summary I'm trying to force myself to finish this, but honestly? I'm bored out of my skull. The character creator is the most interesting thing about this game. I'm something around 80-90% done with the game and will edit this review if my opinion changes when I finally do finish the slog. EDIT: I did eventually get around to finishing this game. My opinion remains largely the same, but I'll add a few more notes and revise where appropriate. Code Vein wants so badly to be anime Dark Souls, but the combat, enemy variety, and world building fall flat. The Good Character Creator: I'm not going to lie, I spent hours in the character creator. Once you learn to use the system to layer elements and disable/combine layers of preset outfits, you can create a surprising variety of characters. I made a couple close approximations of characters from other games or series I liked for fun before settling on my final design. You can go back and tweak it at any time, too. They clearly put a lot of love into this feature and it shows. Character and Weapon Aesthetics: Assuming you are into the style, the character design and equipment are all nicely done. The women are ridiculously proportioned and costumed in many cases, though. I'm chalking that up to "because anime." The Bland Combat: The systems are the same basic Souls-esque functionality you're used to by now. Vertical attack (fast), Horizontal attack (slow), Block, Parry, etc. It's not ground-breaking, but it mostly does the job. Some movesets feel clunky and the overall execution doesn't always feel as snappy as it should. The drain mechanic is sort of interesting, but ends up feeling like a chore to get yourself back up to a functional level after each death. Turn on the option in the game menus to disable the cinematic drain camera, trust me, the novelty wears off fast. Music: There aren't really any bangers here. The soundtrack is generic and forgettable with the exception of a couple tracks in the end credits. Most of the time outside of cinematics all you'll hear is ambient noise or the same repeated "enemies are near" or "battle" tracks. Multiplayer: Nobody is ever around for multiplayer. I've tried searching many, many times and joined another player exactly once. They promptly died after I joined them and that was the end of that. I have no idea what multiplayer is like because it may as well not exist. The Bad Optimization: I've got a beast of a machine and sometimes this game just craps out for no reason. This was worse before upgrading, but now I'm up to relatively high tier specs and it still performs poorly at times. Good luck if you're trying to play around minimum recommended specs. This is a poorly-optimized console port. You'll especially feel that when alt-tabbing; Code Vein really hates to lose focus. Enemies: You've got your melee grunt, shooty boi, heavy hitter, and then a few miscellaneous beasts with little HP and minmal damage. That's mostly it; the game just reskins them and sometimes gives them an ability or a dominant element/status effect. The AI is not very bright and you can pretty much just breeze through anything other than mobs of enemies. The hardest thing you're going to have to deal with are probably the ice berserker things in the snow area. Just use fire to knock them out of iceball mode, problem solved. Skill Unlocks: Skill unlock cutscene areas are a giant time sink, and at a bare minimum you are required to load into each zone, then load back out for every set of skills you unlock. Instead of just showing things in a pre-structured cinematic, you have to actually walk through a little gallery area at slow walking speed. You cannot skip segments or go faster than the native pacing of the scene, you can only skip it all or walk through it all. Partners: The game is balanced for you to have a partner, but having an AI partner trivializes most encounters as they split aggro, deal damage, heal you, and take care of ranged things for you. Playing without a partner leaves you vulnerable to one-shot damage nonsense revealing that the healing mechanic is a crutch implemented to make the monsters hit hard enough to provide a semblance of challenge when running with a partner, but that encounters weren't scaled for unpartnered forays. Then don't even get me started on the repeated voice lines... Level System: Levels don't matter until late game. In fact, leveling puts you at a disadvantage for grinding out skill affinity to unlock things for use in other codes. Once I learned that, I stopped leveling up at all. I played the majority of the game at level 16 and I'm pretty sure I could have just never leveled at all and been fine. Just keep your gear up to date and use a decent build, you'll be fine. Post-Completion note: I made it up through the final boss of the Crypt Spire before leveling past 16. I believe finishing the game at 16 would have been doable, but adding 160 levels with the couple million haze I was sitting on did ultimately add a significant HP buffer and damage increase using scaling equipment at higher tiers, which hastened completion. Environment Design: The areas you visit are by and large open, bland, and uncomplicated. The path will take you where you need to go. The notable exception is the white Anor Londo rip-off area. That place is a frustrating maze where everything looks the same. Have fun with that if you need to backtrack or track down something you missed. NPC Interactions: Ugh. The writing is terrible here. Also, nobody moves their mouth while talking unless it's during a significant cinematic scene, despite this being released in 2019. Weird. Despite all of the cinematics, the pretense of friendship, and the tragic backstories of characters, you're probably not going to walk away caring about them at all, or what happens to them. Conclusion Would I recommend this game? Only if you are really hard-up for a Souls-like to fill your time, you like the anime aesthetic, and only if it's on a substantial sale. It's a fairly bland but acceptable offering in the genre that'll kill time if you're bored, but it's not exciting or memorable. Code Vein never really gets to a level where you feel engaged, and it never hits that sweet spot in terms of difficulty that we see in From Software titles. Overall rating 3/5. There are better things to spend your money on.Show moreShow less
49.2 hours at review267 people found this helpful
RecommendedSteam player
🌳 Graphics ☐ You forget what reality is ☐ Beautiful ☑ Good ☐ Decent ☐ Bad ☐ Don‘t look too long at it ☐ Atari 🎮 Gameplay ☐ Very good ☑ Good ☐ It‘s just gameplay ☐ Mehh ☐ Watch video instead ☐ Just don't 🎵 Audio ☐ Eargasm ☐ Very good ☑ Good ☐ Not too bad ☐ I'm now deaf ☐ My ears bleeding 👥 Audience ☐ Kids ☑ Teens ☑ Adults ☐ All 💻 PC Requirements ☐ Toast Machine ☐ Potato ☑ Decent ☐ Fast ☐ Rich ☐ Nasa 🎯 Difficulity ☐ Just press 'W' ☐ Easy ☐ Significant brain usage ☐ Easy to learn / Hard to master ☐ Difficult ☑ Souls Like 💪 Grind ☐ Nothing to grind ☐ Only if u care about leaderboards/ranks ☐ Isnt necessary to progress ☑ Average grind level ☐ Too much grind ☐ You‘ll need a second life for grinding 📖 Story ☐ No Story ☐ Some lore ☐ Average ☑ Good ☐ Lovely ☐ Better than your life ⌛ Game Time ☐ < 3h ☐ < 10h ☐ < 20h ☑ < 40h ☐ < 100h ☐ Infinity 💸 Price ☐ It’s free! ☐ Worth the price ☑ If it's on sale ☐ If u have some spare money left ☐ Not recommended ☐ You could also just burn your money 🐞 Bugs ☐ Never heard of ☑ Minor bugs ☐ Can get annoying ☐ Unplayable ⭐ ?/10 ☐1 ☐2 ☐3 ☐4 ☐5 ☐6 ☑7 ☐8 ☐9 ☐10Show moreShow less
34.8 hours at review509 people found this helpful
Not recommendedSteam player
Wait for it to be at least 25% off before you buy. I reached the ending of the base game and it is not worth the full asking price. I've tried to keep spoilers in this review to a minimum The game suffers from a minor frame rate issue, mainly when transitioning between areas. This will usually fix itself before it becomes a gameplay issue. The art style does its job well and the character creator gives you a level of customisation I haven't seen any other game come close to in this genre. Online co-op felt good, I never once lagged or disconnected during my time spent with it, load times were quick and the password filter works well. My only complaint with this aspect is that if both the host and the human companion go down at the same time, the AI companion will revive whoever is closer to them, this would mean the helper being revived instead of the host, which meant a game over. The need for communication is low and the mixture of gestures, stamps and voice lines cover your bases. Also, give us a grace period after beating the boss, I want to celebrate our victory! **People have reported that there are bugs with the multiplayer that have to do with your steam region.** The game's combat feels sluggish and at times unresponsive, in-particular the 'ranged' combat with the bayonet feels terrible and just boils down to you buffing before a fight and proceeding to stand-in-place and spamming the same button whilst your companion takes aggro. I ended up switching to a melee build near the end of the game because the ranged playstyle was so lacking. The melee combat wasn't much better and it boiled down to me using Jack/Louis' unique buff to beat down the boss, but at least I was dealing more damage without being gimped by my ichor supply. All other strats I tried just left me fighting a sack of hit-points. I can only imagine how dull combat would have been had i not kept upgrading my weapon. Every boss aside from a select few is some variant of a 'dude in armour' (generic boss design) and doesn't do enough to distinguish themselves from the rest in terms of fight design. Every boss has a quick, long-range charge, every boss has a 'get away from me' aoe and every boss has some form of roll-catcher combo with the later bosses having a room-wide attack with no attempt made to disguise any of these moves as something more; to differentiate them from their counterparts or have a unique twist put on them. Unique boss moves are a rare commodity. The level design ranges from mediocre to terrible, the waterlogged and cathedral city areas are some of the worst I've experienced in a long time. I enjoyed the interior of the cathedral and it was one of the game's highlights. Its attempt at making the companions that travel with you feel more than just a faceless NPC fall flat every time and ended up being annoying, I looked through the menus multiple times looking for a way to turn off or lessen their chatter. Every companion will ALWAYS make the same, most surface-level comment on the environment and enemy encounters as every other companion, had it not been for their voices ringing through my ears every second I would not have noticed any difference between the cast. The main-story cutscenes and lore I did sit through were boring and led to me just skipping them entirely after I reached the 1/3 mark of the game. What qualified for serious and sad moments had me laughing all the way through. I skipped all the optional lore sections/cutscenes because if your main story is that bad then I dread what your side stories are going to be like. They also lock some of the Blood Codes' (classes') abilities behind these side story cutscenes. The soundtrack is serviceable. A few songs were good, but nothing to write home about, I found myself putting on a youtube playlist while playing. Overall the game is lazy and it feels like they have tried to hide it by pulling out a bunch of fan service and tropes. The developers are relying on the art style to carry the game's reception, look to the recommended reviews for evidence of this. If the enemy design had more variety than ranged dude, fast dude, fat dude and elite dude with more than two models for each and attempted to hide their blatant copy and pasting with some different models and mechanics thrown in this game could've been so much better. Anything to make me do something other than spam light/heavy attack in every fight. The anime tiddies are tremendous though. If I could have refunded this game I would have, but I couldn't so here I am writing this review instead. The most I will do now is hop online to kill a boss with a rando every now and then, though it will most likely be uninstalled. If you have lots of friends that are playing this then you can get some more mileage out of this title, I don't know how/if scaling is implemented. TL;DR: pick it up on sale, the combat and bosses become stale and lose their appeal after the first two hours and the story is laughable. It does enough to keep you entertained for a weekend. If you are a really big fan of anime and the soulsborne hack-and-slash genre then you might be able to justify buying it at full price. If it was £10 less I would recommendShow moreShow less
19.8 hours at review266 people found this helpful
Source: original Steam user reviews. Helpful votes are an archived snapshot, not live data. Last collected: 08/15/2026.