I was recommended The Surge by a friend when we were talking about soulslikes. He said this game was how he originally got into them. It was on sale for like $5 so I thought why not, but I got a little worried about how much fun I was going to have. AA western soulslike made by the team that made... Ankh, Blood Knights, and most importantly... Lords of the Fallen... Plus a dystopian near future setting, and a gimmicky mechanic the combat is based around... I wasn't very hopeful.

I'm very glad to say my expectations were misplaced. I didn't play Lords of the Fallen, but I've certainly heard about it, and whatever issues they had there seem to be gone here.

The combat, especially because of the limb-targeting gimmick, feels a shade clunkier than you might be used to with nearer soulslikes, but feels solid as hell. That gimmick becomes less gimmicky when you realize it's the main way you unlock the vast majority of equipment, and becomes a fun sort of scavenger hunt that changes how you approach enemies. Not to mention, the execution moves give a nice finale to combat with some real finishing animations. However, a bit of a harsh critique to throw on the combat as a whole is that every weapon of a weapon type shares the exact same moveset, and every humanoid entity shares a similar one, making each different weapon of a weapon type just a reskin with stat changes... but however again, each weapon type has a different chain you can go into, with a result of somewhere like 20 different chain attacks you can make, so the lack of variety in weapons is, to some extent, made less detracting.

Further into gameplay, one of the biggest souls aspects that The Surge is missing is the vast majority of its jrpg mechanics. You can level your core, upgrade your equipment, the whole mechanic of implants, but there's no stat-leveling to be seen, nor any form of 'magic' or secondary build options. As a result, it loses most of the satisfaction present in leveling up, though as a result trades for much greater simplicity and a nice fluidity in being able to change your entire build at pretty much any time. They did decide to throw in set bonuses to the gear, but I was never really much of a fan of that mechanic (too limiting in variety for not much gain, to me). What mainly replaces the rpg aspects is the implant system, in which you can find and swap in/out different mechanical and utility boosts- somewhat of a massively expanded "ring" system. I do quite love this system, and it adds a decent amount of variety to the combat.

Story-wise I was fairly worried- everything about The Surge's presentation gave me the impression of a Michael Bay blockbuster action movie, which is a bit of a far stretch from the abstract storytelling methods used in soulsborne and utilized by most classic soulslikes. It definitely retains some share of the action movie genre throughout, but I feel quite wrong. What actually remains is a brutal story of The character work is similarly strong, with several sympathetic storylines to traverse.

Despite the differences noted above, the inspiration in the game is obvious. The Surge started development only a year after Dark Souls 2, and it's clear the ways they were inspired by the game- lots of mirrors exist in the game. The combat, though lacking DS2's infamous/famous "floatyness", runs with its inspirator's fast pace. The character writing is almost point exactly like DS2- in 2, characters and their respective questlines mainly exist to display the effect the hollowing curse has on the people of Drangleic, and more often than not end tragically; either dead or otherwise devoid of hope or purpose. The Surge steals this design remorselessly, but executes it well. The characters, story, and ending made me a feel a similar way to how I felt when I beat Dark Souls 2 for the first time- as middling as the majority of the cast, but satisfied with the conclusion, even if no true solution will ever be found.

It does not only take from Dark Souls 2, however. Its level design takes major inspiration, actually, from Dark Souls 1's, with the majority of levels wrapping in on themselves in clever ways to create a sort of python. Though there isn't a gargantuan amount of areas to explore, the content within them gives plenty of time to take in the world, and the way the areas adapt through the story extends its time greatly. The number of bosses is quite lacking, with only around 5 major ones I believe in the game, with some varying quality to them. Some areas as well have moments where the developers seemed to go somewhat stir-crazy in their pursuit of a tangled circle, and it can feel maze-like at times (some parts of Central Production B suffer greatly from this). Even still, I was shocked every time I took an alternate path and found a shortcut back to the beginning of the area, and I was left agape every time a shortcut led to a shortcut led to a shortcut.

It's no true soulsborne game, and it's further imperfect in its originality. In my critiques, I failed to even mention the numerous bugs and clunky qualities that slow down the game at points or otherwise lock you entirely out of certain character questlines. However, with some strong writing, fun combat though lacking variety, some more original mechanical replacements for the jrpg soulsborne classics, and top-notch level design, the game holds its own strongly. Its negatives seem to match what I presume was only a AA budget, and it makes up for it as well as it can.

Strongly recommended for fans of Dark Souls 2's writing and general combat (minus those who are dedicated to magic), and for fans of Dark Souls 1's level design, and even more greatly recommended for soulslike fans that are used to the general clunkiness present in these sorts of games.

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