Achilles: Legends Untold – Preview

If you know anything about Greek mythology, you’re probably familiar with Achilles. He was one of the most important heroes during the Trojan war, but he also had his share of run-ins with the Greek gods and fought many other dangerous creatures. No wonder Dark Point Games figured he’d be an interesting guy to make a Soulslike action RPG about. Achilles: Legends Untold has been in early access for almost five months now, letting people experience the first chapter of this epic story. We decided to also take an early look.

The game opens with a short cutscene showing Achilles and his armies arriving in Troy at the start of the war. From the moment you step off your boat, you’re fighting enemies left and right as you make your way into the city. True to mythology, however, Achilles does not survive the battle and instead meets Hades in the Underworld. Hades is gracious enough to return Achilles to the land of the living, but this won’t come without a price. This is where the real journey starts, as you find yourself running errands for the god and battle with many other divine beings along the way.

The game’s cutscenes are surprisingly well-rendered and add a lot to the story. These cinematics are what sew the plot together, as there’s not a lot of background info or world-building that happens in the game outside of these cutscenes.

As mentioned above, the graphics of Achilles are very decent in the cutscenes. The game itself looks a bit rougher around the edges, though the isometric point of view goes a long way in covering up the clunkier animations and lack of detail in some of the environments. At certain spots, you can get a cool vantage point that shows you the map better. The locations themselves are very sizable and it’s cool to see how much care the devs took in recreating Greek myths, both in these sets and the designs of the various characters.

Currently, the game has a good soundtrack with enough variety to keep things interesting. Typical for this genre are the boss fights and the themes that come with them, something this game also nails. You’ll certainly feel like you’re fighting a mythological creature twice your size with this soundtrack blasting in the background. The game does have full voice casting which is really nice as well.

Achilles: Legends Untold is an action RPG that borrows a lot of Soulslike elements, though the combat does tend to feel more hack-and-slash, especially near the start. You have the expected light and heavy attack, a shield to guard with, and a dodge roll that you can use to evade stronger attacks. As you play the game, you can unlock more special abilities, and those do elevate the combat above just mashing buttons. For example, you can throw your shield so it becomes an impromptu long-range weapon. Keep an eye on your stamina through all this and don’t rush into combat head first though or it’ll be your doom. It’s also best to keep a health potion handy just in case.

The game borrows the Dark Souls mechanic of bonfires. These are spots you can rest at, which recover your health completely, and you can spend your earned experience (or fate as it’s called in this game) here to make your character stronger. When you do this, all the enemies aside from bosses will respawn. Speaking of bosses, these are the best thing about this game. They’re fun to fight and pose a challenge, compared to a lot of the normal enemies who attack you one or two at a time. Regular enemies are easy to stun lock, though they do seem to use slightly more advanced tactics later in the game. Various available weapons that you can upgrade mean you can pick a fighting style that fits you best.

The game also offers an online co-op option. This is where you can team up with a friend to fight enemies and collect loot in a big procedurally generated dungeon. It’s a nice touch that all the skills and goodies you collect in this mode do carry over to your single-player game too. Speaking of: while the game currently only has one chapter of the campaign available since it’s early access, there is a New Game+ in case you want to keep playing and upgrading your character.

Conclusion

Achilles: Legends Untold is shaping up to be a worthwhile Soulslike title for enjoyers of the genre. While we haven’t seen the full game yet and there are some minor glitches at times that hopefully can be solved as the game develops, there’s clearly potential here, and if you enjoy fighting bosses, you’ll certainly have fun with this one. We are looking forward to the game’s full release to continue our untold legend.

Jessica

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Games are my escape and writing is my passion.

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