Lords of The Fallen Fails To Capture The Magic of A Soulslike

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Obaid Ur Rehman

At HI Digital I test and write about different hardware configurations to show other PC users what they can expect from their build. My end goal is to educate the masses to make the right decision when they are looking for new PC parts to buy

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I am an avid Soulsborne and Soulslike enjoyer who has the urge to try out every release in this genre. Lords of the Fallen is no exception, despite the many issues I had with its predecessor.

I couldn’t even force myself to finish the first game. So, once I heard that a new Lords of the Fallen game was coming out, my hopes were high for a much-needed improvement. The trailers and gameplay successfully pulled me in, and I eventually played this Soulslike on day one.

It was a noticeable upgrade over its predecessor, but any Soulslikes released in 2023 would have had big shoes to fill. While the release was a massive success for CI Games, it failed as a Soulslike in my book.

Why it matters: Lies of P was released just a month earlier and succeeded in raising the Soulslike bar.

Technical Issues & Level-Design

I played Lords of The Fallen as soon as it was released, but oh god, was it a mess of a launch. Constant crashes, poor framerates, and whatnot. However, those were the least of its problems. Level design became one of my biggest dislikes as I played on.

The beginning is okay enough, and the first few areas had decent-level design. The Pieta boss fight was enjoyable, too, as long as I ignored the fact that she had only two movesets. Thank god there was a phase 2.

Now, let’s see what made me dislike the levels: Pilgrim’s Perch. The game’s controls are hardly designed for precise jumping, yet this area is full of platforming sections. Enemies are also littered around the level to make matters worse.

They fight you at a long distance, and when combined with the frustrating jumping, this level becomes a real problem. I don’t understand how the team got jumping so wrong in a post-Elden Ring world.

Pilgrim's Perch is bad and maybe the worst.
byu/echoinging inLordsoftheFallen

Other frustrating areas include the Lower & Upper Calrath, Sunless Skein, Cistern, Revelation Depths, and Bramis Castle.

A common theme in such areas is the quantity over quality approach to enemies. You’ll find bosses reused as common enemies, making it seem like the developers ran out of ideas and just filled the levels up without giving it much thought. I don’t understand how this made it past the testing phases.

Bad Level Design? How About Bad Boss Fights Too?

Despite the poor level design, I forced myself to play the whole game. I tried my best to like it, but I couldn’t. The battles against Umbral Natives, Rhogar Enemies, and Hallowed Sentinels weren’t half as challenging as making it through the poor levels.

Most of the bosses I fought were too weak, and I defeated them using the starting class weapon of Hallowed Knight. The only time bosses presented a challenge was because of how badly they were designed.

Poor hitboxes are a major problem in the game. While these have always existed in FromSoftware’s games, I found the problem to be more prominent in Lords of the Fallen.

We can consider the Gentle Gaverus and The Hollow Crow bosses as examples of poorly designed encounters. Both bosses rely on spawning various enemies throughout the battle, making them annoying rather than difficult.

As someone who despises gank bosses, they instantly became my least favorite fights.

Who the fuck thought that a non-stop adds spawning in a boss fight is fun? Even Remnant did away with this bullshit
byu/mmmmmmiiiiii inLordsoftheFallen

However, I did enjoy the battle against Lightreaper. This fight was epic all the way through, and I savored the fact that the boss would appear, show us how unprepared we were, and leave.

So, the last boss. Well, it was a gimmick battle and a bad one on top of that; what else can I say?

Good Mechanics, Bad Implementation

The dual-world mechanic was arguably one of the most innovative features I have ever witnessed. It’s fascinating that you don’t die when killed in the game and instantly transition to the world of the dead.

However, I believe it wasn’t properly implemented. This is mainly because many places require you to be in the Umbral world, and there are way too many enemies spread for you to do that.

Do you need to pass through a door? Wait. There’s an Umbral entity blocking your path, so solve a puzzle, and if you dare to take your sweet time, the reapers will hunt you down and kill you miserably.

Ultimately, there was a lot wrong with Lords of the Fallen, so it failed as a Souslike for me. I enjoyed Lies of P much more, but CI Games is now working on a sequel to the former. I hope to see the biggest problems addressed in the sequel by its launch in 2026.

Obaid Ur Rehman

[How-To Guides Expert]

Laiba, our tech guru at HI Digital, simplifies and crafts How-To Guides with a Google IT Support Certificate. Beyond tech, she captures the city’s aesthetics through her lens. Join her journey where tech meets creativity!

Get In Touch: Laiba@hidgt.com