As a connoisseur of both traditional soulslikes and parry-based ones, I have watched, mournfully, as my fellow FromSoftware enjoyers hit Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice—a game with some of FromSoftware’s best boss battles ever, no competition—and bounced off it like a rubber blade. I’ve often gone on record to defend parrying on this site, despite the haters: Done well, these games are awesome. Parry fatigue? Bah, I say!
I get that seeing a parry in every action RPG is getting a smidge wearisome, but if a game’s built around timed blocking, rather than just using it as an excuse to ignore balance? It can become a delicious game of rock, paper, scissors that sees you riding a knife’s edge between victory and death. Redirecting lightning at the top of Ashina Castle is utterly imprinted onto my memory, nothing else can compare.
Anyway, I’ve been quietly glad to see that Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has encouraged people (who’d be otherwise turned off by the secret sauce of ‘Sekiro is a rhythm game, actually’) to start feeling that beat—including our own video producer Midas Whittaker, who invited myself and hardware writer Jess Kinghorn to wax lyrical about how cool and sexy and hot we all are for liking parrying, now.
Okay. Mostly me—Midas and Jess are the greenhorns, whereas I have swept in as the right bumper sage (you aren’t playing Sekiro on Mouse and Keyboard, are you?) to basically give a long list of recommendations for which games you should try if Clair Obscur gave you the parry bug.
But! I think there’s something to be said for, as Jess puts it, creating games that capture the same essence of Sekiro without all of the other bits—an accidental tutorial for one of FromSoftware’s under-appreciated greats that has prior naysayers “thinking perhaps it’s time to give FromSoftware’s oeuvre another go.” Taps earpiece: Yes, hello? We got ’em, mission accomplished.
It also means that, hey, if you weren’t into parries before? You’ve got a rich feast of some really good parry-based soulslikes to gnaw into. Lies of P developer Neowiz has, in particular, been cooking. Watch the video above for our full spiel on the subject, and feel free to give your own takes on parry-based games—love ’em or hate ’em—in the comments below.