Beautiful anime art style meets slick soulslike gameplay
By Paul Hunter
AI Limit the upcoming soulslike from Sense Games and CE-Asia is coming out later this year on PS5 and PC, but before the big release, the team let me play a brand new one-hour demo on Steam. This game's been getting attention ever since Sony announced it as part of their China Hero Project and from what I played in the demo, fans have a lot to look forward to. Let's get into it!
The demo starts with you waking up as Arrisa, a highly advanced life form known as a Blader who has the appearance of a human, in a dark, hostile place known as Sewer Town. In true soulslike fashion, you don't have a weapon to start, but thankfully a corpse near your starting position gives you your first blade. The demo is focused almost entirely on combat, sort of like one large gameplay tutorial, so it's not clear why Arrisa awakes in a dank sewer nor what her purpose is.
From the game's marketing material, we do learn that the world is on the verge of extinction due to a substance known as Mud that has created monsters everywhere, and a Blader's role is to repair the Branches the provide hope for a new life. Branches are this game's version of bonfires, which as you might expect, allow you to spend souls to upgrade Arrisa and her weapons, provide a fast travel means, and resets the world's enemies.
Looking more closely at the combat, R1 is mapped to your light attack and R2 to your strong attack, while holding R2 delivers a powerful charged-up swing. Dodge and dash are mapped to separate buttons, which took a bit to get used to, as my Dark Souls brain always thinks of them as the same button.
Arrisa can wield magic and early in the demo, I got a railgun beam that locks onto targets and strikes fast. Unleashing magic is done by holding L1 and pressing the R2 button. Each sword also has a unique weapon art, accomplished by holding L1 and pressing R1, and deals significant damage, although the animations are longer than regular strikes so you need to time your arts well.
With so many soulslike on the market these days, they all need some new mechanic to help differentiate them, much like Thymesia's two separate enemy health bars or Mortal Shell's hardening ability. For AI Limit, this means adding a Sync Rate bar below your HP, which affects the gameplay in significant ways. When your Sync Rate is low you'll deal less damage, and conversely, when the meter is high you'll inflict greater damage. Building up your Sync is done by striking enemies with your sword, and on the flip side, taking damage will reduce your Sync. Fully depleting the Sync Rate will put Arrisa in a temporarily vulnerable state.
There's one other factor to consider, and that is that using your magic spells and weapon arts will also reduce your Sync Rate, meaning there's a fairly significant tradeoff. Unleash a couple of magic spells or art attacks and you'll quickly chew up your Sync Rate, putting you in a weakened state and at risk of getting staggered. The developers clearly want all players to be proficient swordfighters as mage builds simply aren't possible given how fast spells reduce the Sync Rate and sword strikes are the only way to build the meter back up again.
Visually, AI Limit is a stunner with its gorgeous anime art style that contrasts nicely with its gloomy visuals. There will be obvious comparisons with Code Vein, but AI Limit still stands out as its art aesthetic is much closer to Bloodborne given the derelict buildings and harrowing aqueducts the demo has you explore.
I also loved the sci-fi influences as most monsters seemed more mechanical than flesh, and there was one particular giant robot mini-boss that impressed and got me interested in learning more about the game's lore. Aside from Dolmen and The Surge the sci-fi soulslike genre remains largely untapped, giving this game lots of space to really stand out.
Throughout the demo, there were a few doors that remained locked, with an in-game message telling me to come back and explore these sections when the full game releases. Given that the entire demo took place in Sewer Town, it was a bit hard for me to understand the full scope of this game, but what I can say is that the sewers are huge even with the locked doors gating some of the content. The adventure takes place in Havenswell, the last surviving city, which the developers say features layers of slums and a sky city above the lake, hinting at other locations we'll get to explore in the full game.
About midway through the demo, I was given an option of three swords to choose from, roughly equating to dual swords (for a Dex build), a straight sword (for an all-around build) and a large sword (for a Strength build). I chose the large sword knowing how powerful strength builds are in Dark Souls and I also pumped my souls into levelling up my HP again because I knew bosses would hit hard in this game. Weapon power scales to stats, much like in all FromSoftware titles.
Over the demo, I got access to new equipment like costumes that provide unique stats while also changing Arrisa's appearance. There are also unique equippable necklaces called a Nucleus that actually determines how many souls are retained after death and how many you gain when defeating enemies. This is a huge game-changer for soulslikes, as it means you can customize the risk/reward. You could play it safe by retaining a large chunk of your souls on death, but it'll be at the expense of absorbing a portion of enemy souls upon defeating them. Conversely, it does appear there will be Nucleus that increases the number of souls you'll acquire, but at the risk of losing more should you die.
One other interesting gameplay note is that AI Limit has no stamina meter, encouraging a highly aggressive gameplay style. Partway through the demo I acquired the ability to parry enemies and mastering this skill is essential to victory over tougher foes and bosses, giving off a distinct Seikiro or Bloodborne vibe. Successfully parrying an enemy will stun them and opens a window to counterstrike with a devastating blow.
The demo's final major boss was stylish and deadly, requiring precise parrying to defeat as the brute offers very few downtime moments to strike back. It's a two-phase boss with the second phase being significantly more challenging as the boss flies around the battle room at tremendous speed and has unorthodox attack patterns making parrying difficult to time. If this boss is any indication, AI Limit will be extremely challenging, although perhaps new items or gear may help even the battlefield.
Developer: Sense Games
Publisher: CE-Asia
Genre: Action RPG, Soulslike
Modes: Single-player
ESRB Rating: TBC
A key was provided by the publisher.
By Paul Hunter
AI Limit the upcoming soulslike from Sense Games and CE-Asia is coming out later this year on PS5 and PC, but before the big release, the team let me play a brand new one-hour demo on Steam. This game's been getting attention ever since Sony announced it as part of their China Hero Project and from what I played in the demo, fans have a lot to look forward to. Let's get into it!
The demo starts with you waking up as Arrisa, a highly advanced life form known as a Blader who has the appearance of a human, in a dark, hostile place known as Sewer Town. In true soulslike fashion, you don't have a weapon to start, but thankfully a corpse near your starting position gives you your first blade. The demo is focused almost entirely on combat, sort of like one large gameplay tutorial, so it's not clear why Arrisa awakes in a dank sewer nor what her purpose is.
From the game's marketing material, we do learn that the world is on the verge of extinction due to a substance known as Mud that has created monsters everywhere, and a Blader's role is to repair the Branches the provide hope for a new life. Branches are this game's version of bonfires, which as you might expect, allow you to spend souls to upgrade Arrisa and her weapons, provide a fast travel means, and resets the world's enemies.
Looking more closely at the combat, R1 is mapped to your light attack and R2 to your strong attack, while holding R2 delivers a powerful charged-up swing. Dodge and dash are mapped to separate buttons, which took a bit to get used to, as my Dark Souls brain always thinks of them as the same button.
Arrisa can wield magic and early in the demo, I got a railgun beam that locks onto targets and strikes fast. Unleashing magic is done by holding L1 and pressing the R2 button. Each sword also has a unique weapon art, accomplished by holding L1 and pressing R1, and deals significant damage, although the animations are longer than regular strikes so you need to time your arts well.
With so many soulslike on the market these days, they all need some new mechanic to help differentiate them, much like Thymesia's two separate enemy health bars or Mortal Shell's hardening ability. For AI Limit, this means adding a Sync Rate bar below your HP, which affects the gameplay in significant ways. When your Sync Rate is low you'll deal less damage, and conversely, when the meter is high you'll inflict greater damage. Building up your Sync is done by striking enemies with your sword, and on the flip side, taking damage will reduce your Sync. Fully depleting the Sync Rate will put Arrisa in a temporarily vulnerable state.
There's one other factor to consider, and that is that using your magic spells and weapon arts will also reduce your Sync Rate, meaning there's a fairly significant tradeoff. Unleash a couple of magic spells or art attacks and you'll quickly chew up your Sync Rate, putting you in a weakened state and at risk of getting staggered. The developers clearly want all players to be proficient swordfighters as mage builds simply aren't possible given how fast spells reduce the Sync Rate and sword strikes are the only way to build the meter back up again.
Visually, AI Limit is a stunner with its gorgeous anime art style that contrasts nicely with its gloomy visuals. There will be obvious comparisons with Code Vein, but AI Limit still stands out as its art aesthetic is much closer to Bloodborne given the derelict buildings and harrowing aqueducts the demo has you explore.
I also loved the sci-fi influences as most monsters seemed more mechanical than flesh, and there was one particular giant robot mini-boss that impressed and got me interested in learning more about the game's lore. Aside from Dolmen and The Surge the sci-fi soulslike genre remains largely untapped, giving this game lots of space to really stand out.
Throughout the demo, there were a few doors that remained locked, with an in-game message telling me to come back and explore these sections when the full game releases. Given that the entire demo took place in Sewer Town, it was a bit hard for me to understand the full scope of this game, but what I can say is that the sewers are huge even with the locked doors gating some of the content. The adventure takes place in Havenswell, the last surviving city, which the developers say features layers of slums and a sky city above the lake, hinting at other locations we'll get to explore in the full game.
About midway through the demo, I was given an option of three swords to choose from, roughly equating to dual swords (for a Dex build), a straight sword (for an all-around build) and a large sword (for a Strength build). I chose the large sword knowing how powerful strength builds are in Dark Souls and I also pumped my souls into levelling up my HP again because I knew bosses would hit hard in this game. Weapon power scales to stats, much like in all FromSoftware titles.
Over the demo, I got access to new equipment like costumes that provide unique stats while also changing Arrisa's appearance. There are also unique equippable necklaces called a Nucleus that actually determines how many souls are retained after death and how many you gain when defeating enemies. This is a huge game-changer for soulslikes, as it means you can customize the risk/reward. You could play it safe by retaining a large chunk of your souls on death, but it'll be at the expense of absorbing a portion of enemy souls upon defeating them. Conversely, it does appear there will be Nucleus that increases the number of souls you'll acquire, but at the risk of losing more should you die.
One other interesting gameplay note is that AI Limit has no stamina meter, encouraging a highly aggressive gameplay style. Partway through the demo I acquired the ability to parry enemies and mastering this skill is essential to victory over tougher foes and bosses, giving off a distinct Seikiro or Bloodborne vibe. Successfully parrying an enemy will stun them and opens a window to counterstrike with a devastating blow.
The demo's final major boss was stylish and deadly, requiring precise parrying to defeat as the brute offers very few downtime moments to strike back. It's a two-phase boss with the second phase being significantly more challenging as the boss flies around the battle room at tremendous speed and has unorthodox attack patterns making parrying difficult to time. If this boss is any indication, AI Limit will be extremely challenging, although perhaps new items or gear may help even the battlefield.
Final Thoughts
My one hour with AI Limit was a blast and I can't wait to get my hands on the final game later this year. The stylish anime-inspired visuals combined with the new Sync Rate system are more than enough to make this title stand out in a crowded genre. Sense Games is onto something great here, which bodes well for this independent team and makes me even more glad that Sony's China Hero Project supports promising games like this.
AI Limit details
Platform: PS5, PCDeveloper: Sense Games
Publisher: CE-Asia
Genre: Action RPG, Soulslike
Modes: Single-player
ESRB Rating: TBC
A key was provided by the publisher.