Three years after the Kickstarter campaign, the great looking dark sci-fi action RPG Hellpoint from Cradle Games and tinyBuild is confirmed for launch with Linux support on April 16.
Hellpoint is an intense, dark sci-fi RPG set on a derelict space station orbiting an ominous supermassive black hole. Taking inspiration from games like Dark Souls and Dead Space and movies like Event Horizon and Hellraiser, Hellpoint is doubling down on co-op multiplayer (with both split-screen and online support) while immersing players in a twisted narrative involving Cosmic Gods, quantum physics, and extinct space civilizations. Sounds awesome, everything I want in a sci-fi game.
Check out the brand new trailer:
Direct Link
Feature Highlight:
- Souls-like gameplay in a unique setting: Explore the derelict space station of Irid Novo and face bizarre enemies with a tight and unforgiving combat system.
- Occult space story: Blending science and fantasy, the intensely atmospheric dark sci-fi setting will keep you searching for answers.
- Dynamic World: The Quantic System acts as a dungeon master; slightly transforming the game world every time you die and triggering events as the station revolves around the black hole.
- Jump-in co-op and PvP multiplayer: Ask a friend to press Start to join a couch co-op session or call for assistance online. Hellpoint offers a full, uninterrupted co-op story with shared loot drops.
- Split-screen support: The full Hellpoint experience is available in jump-in/jump-out split-screen multiplayer.
Nice to see a proper simultaneous release across Linux, macOS, Windows! Definitely going to be taking a good look at this, expect some thoughts up after release.
You can wishlist it now on Steam.
Quoting: NanobangAs a rule, I avoid games advertising themselves as "souls-like."
Boss battles that I can only win by first figuring out the boss's attack-pattern quickly bore me, and Dark Souls struck me as a game built almost exclusively out of this kind of boss battle.
The whole try & die, repeat ad nauseam mechanic simply tires me out. Its monotony and tedium far exceed any sense of accomplishment I get from beating the boss. I'm not saying it's bad or that those who enjoy this mechanic are somehow in the wrong, it just isn't what I want from my video games.
All that said, the term is "souls-like" and not "souls-clone," so I really should try the Hellpoint demo and see for myself.
I have the same feeling towards Dark Souls as you. However there are also games advertised as Dark Souls-like, which actually aren't as much (but since Dark Souls is popular, they always want the association to that game).
1. Memory-based:
This is the actual Dark Souls system, where you need to know the attacks the boss does before you are able to defeat a boss (since often boss attacks have no 'tell' or ramp-up). Sinners is nice example of such a system as well, didn't enjoy it at all. These always feel very unfair when you die as you literally couldn't do anything about the death blow.
2. Skill-based:
The skill-based system is often still advertised as Dark Souls-like, just because they employ an attack/block/dodge control scheme. Combat often still has patterns, but all attacks have 'tells' and the difficulty is more on whether you master the combat or not. In these games you can defeat bosses on first try (in theory), without first memorising their attacks. These games feel more fair as you generally know exactly what you did wrong during the death blow (too slow, wrong decision, wrong button press, etc.)
Games I liked that fall more or less in the second system, so maybe interesting for you (not a lot, these games are pretty rare):
- Furi; Got me into the genre and still haven't find a game with combat this smooth.
- Lords of the Fallen; A mix of both depending on the enemy, but I like it enough. Mobs are actually more challenging and fun than the bosses in this game.
- Remnant: From the Ashes; More focused on guns than melee, but still ticks the skill-based box.
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