Eldest Souls: How to Survive the Old Gods

Time to Beat: 6 Hours, 10 Minutes

I imagine developers encounter significant difficulty in creating a game composed entirely of boss battles. Conventional action games and platformers contain a variety of enemies, puzzles, and lesser encounters. A pure boss battler doesn't provide weaker foes for practice combat, or intricate riddles. It must persuade the player of its value with a limited number of combat sequences. Over the past nine years, I've only reviewed one such game, Titan Souls. Although the Dark Souls series contains a variety of other elements, it, and other Souls-like games are famous for the design and importance of their bosses. Acid Nerve's sequel to Titan Souls, Death's Door, felt like a boss game, despite including a significant number of minor battles and puzzles.

Unlike Death's Door or Dark Souls, Eldest Souls is pure boss battler. The player battles only bosses, with a grain of exploring, and a hint of puzzle solving. It contains no enemies other than the eight normal bosses, three optional bosses, and one final boss. In the limited world of Eldest Souls the protagonist fights elder gods, encounters a handful of NPCs, and collects a few crumbs of items.

In the opening cinematic Eldest Souls steals openly from the energy of the original Dark Souls. The story begins with an initial endless peace of emptiness. Yet from this barrenness, something unique arises, disturbing the stillness. Unified solitude succumbs to chaotic conflict. Conflict descends into an extended darkness, and in that darkness, with humanity struggling to survive, a chosen one steps forth. Eldest Souls expounds further on the interactions between mortals and Old Gods. Compared to Dark Souls, the opening of Eldest Souls lacks subtlety. It's directly enunciated, to its detriment. The descriptions lack the gravitas and mythic weight of Dark Souls and its sequels. Beyond the opening, scraps of paper, littered across the landscape, expand on the plot. These records recount the experiences of people who experienced the realms cataclysmic ruin.

Eldest Souls deposits the protagonist in a boat sailing to a desolate shore. A path leads through a winding and decayed ruin to the remains of a once grand castle. The protagonist's forward progress is blocked by debris; the detritus of armies, battles, and apocalyptic existence. The first threat the protagonist encounters is a rolling log that falls out of nowhere. This was my first death. And my second. This rolling beam covers the entire screen, without any shelter. A single touch of it slays the protagonist. So how can death be defied? By Dashing. Dashing, like rolling in Dark Souls, or dodging in Nier: Automata, renders the protagonist temporarily invulnerable. The protagonist of Eldest Souls has three Dash charges. Each Dash charge refills in 3.5 seconds. Dashing is essential to avoid this initial trap. Instead of future traps, of which there are almost none, Dash is deployed judiciously and precisely against the bosses to come. 

The first boss, The Watchdog, isn't far ahead. Fortunately the protagonist is always ready. Behind his ragged red cloak he drags his oversized sword, a grimmer version of the type popularized by Cloud's Buster Sword. During this tutorial boss, popups pause the game and explain the various mechanics of combat. The first is Bloodthirst. The protagonist has two attacks; a regular swipe and a brutal charge. The player activates the charge attack by holding the attack button. After a moment the protagonist rushes towards their foe, unleashing a broad stroke. When this attack connects, the sword gains a bright red glow. This is Bloodthirst. While thirsted, additional attacks gain life-steal. Hitting with life-steal is essential to surviving fights. Life-steal isn't strong enough to tank through boss attacks, but dodging isn't either. The player needs to hit with life-steal to repair the damage they couldn't avoid while Dashing.

The protagonist hits with a three swing combo. Bloodthirst is on a timer, so I always ended my combo attack with a Bloodburst. The game says, “[Use] Bloodburst to destroy the enemy defenses.” What does this mean? I've never thought about it. I assume it deals bonus damage. Or temporarily reduces the enemy's defense, allowing for bonus damage with each additional hit. In the chaos of battle it's difficult to discern the exact effects of any special attack. With attacks, dashing, and Bloodthirst/Bloodburst, I vanquished The Watchdog. I didn't even die, and by this success I was deceived. Eldest Souls' difficulty was overstated, I believed.

When I defeated The Watchdog I received a Skill Point. Each boss rewards the player with a single Skill Point. Without sufficient information the player must choose one of three fighting styles: Windslide, Berserk Slash, or Counter. Each offers a unique fighting style, composed of a skill tree. The player can only have one fighting style active at a time, but can reset and re-select their fighting style and Skill Points at any time. I chose Windslide which favored Dashes, movement speed, and healing. I chose it without calculating the details, and stuck with it the entire playthrough. From a limited sampling on Reddit and Steam, it appears most players choose Berserk Slash.

After the Watchdog the player advances towards the outer wall. Don't forget to explore the area. It contains a few Key Items, a couple of papers from long dead souls, and the first NPCs. Sargent Russ, a wounded soldier, doesn't function as anything more than a cowardly living note, but Edd the Wanderer is different. Edd, a harp wielding bard, follows or precedes the protagonist from hub area to hub area. Depending on the player's perspective he is either an uplifting soul who guides the player onward with wise words of wisdom, or an annoying twit that snidely criticizes the player's every choice.

Another boss stands in the player's path, the Guardian. Though one of the easier bosses, he taught me that besting Eldest Souls wouldn't be an untroubled task. I died eleven times to his tower shield and giant ax. With his eventual defeat I claimed the Corrupted Grasp Shard. In addition to a Skill Point, every boss drops a Shard. The protagonist has six slots for shards. Shards empower the Active Shard, infuse Bloodburst, Charge Attacks, Dash, and also slot into two spots on the chosen Fighting Style. Shards add damage, increase healing, function like a grappling hook, extend the time of effects, shield the protagonist from damage, and boost the protagonist's movement speed. Adding a Shard to a slot isn't permanent. Like Fighting Styles, the player can reorganize Shards whenever they wish. Eldest Souls is tough, but it grants the player the freedom to redesign their character without hindrance.

Beyond the Guardian, the protagonist enters the first hub area. It contains Edd, another NPC or two, and two more bosses. To progress the player must defeat both bosses, claiming their essence. Combined, they cost me thirty-five lives. Unlike Dark Souls, Eldest Souls doesn't offer a clear reason why the protagonist revives after each death. Exploring the first larger area is essential for picking up more Key Items. Exploring is aided by Attunement, Dash, and the terrain. Scattered across Eldest Souls are crystal pillars. Attuning to them saves the game, and activates a teleport location. The player can teleport from any crystal pillar to any other they have attuned to. Clicking a pillar opens up a map marked with every active location. Unfortunately the map doesn't indicate the player's current crystal pillar. This is a minor issue, but would have made travel easier. Dash is useful because it speeds the player along the path, while allowing them to avoid the few pitfalls. Eldest Souls is surprisingly generous in some elements of exploration. The protagonist can't fall off cliffs or into water. But it contains a few sneaky obstacles that kill the player in a single hit! These aren't punishing, just annoying. Despite the many deaths, the player suffers no ill effects. There is nothing to lose, and no respawning enemies to fight again.