The next game from the Lies Of P studio sounds like it might just fill a Dead Space shaped hole in my heart
No strings, only scares
Seeing great games sell too poorly for the pursestring goblins to shell out for a sequel is always a heartache, but it really stung to learn that the incredible Dead Space remake didn’t catch on enough for EA to greenlight a remake of Dead Space 2 (even if EA were a little spotty on the details). Doubly so in the wake of The Callisto Protocol - a game I still think is worth picking up on a deep discount, if you like hitting gross things with a big bit of metal. It’s quite exciting, then, to learn that the next game from Lies Of P developer Round 8 Studios might just replace that severed limb. Alongside a sequel to the puppety soulslike, they’re also working on a sci-fi survival horror game, via Eurogamer.
The original report comes from Korean news site EBN, who also say the game will use Unreal Engine 5, although a statement from publisher Neowiz say it’s too early to disclose progress.
I quite enjoyed Lies Of P myself, despite having a bit of a bias against soulslikes in general - which always seem to focus on the mechanical specifics of FromSoft’s games while not paying much attention to all the oddities, storytelling flourishes, and sense of a cohesive world that really make those games what they are. Still, I really enjoyed the level design, which leaned heavy into the Miyazaki trick of having dudes try to push you off things. Sadistic DM-style trolling, basically - one of the major components I feel a lot of other soulslikes tend to lack.
The question I have for you though, reader, is this: am I a bit of a hypocrite for feeling like this is going to be a much more original affair than Lies Of P? I shouldn’t, really. Survival horror is, at its core, just as restrictive and formulaic a genre as yer soulslikes. Maybe it’s an issue of proliferation: even if Round 8’s new title is effectively just Dead Space, I still reckon that’ll feel so much more refreshing than another soulslike, even if it hews closely to an already-established formula. Maybe I just like to call things I like “original”. Maybe I’m a big fat liar and need to go sit in a bin for a while. Who knows!
Lies of P hasn't been forgotten - it's getting a sequel, alongside some DLC. The last we heard of that, it was due by the end of this year, according to a fiscal report. “The closest we'll get to Bloodborne on PC, probably,” is what our Edders reckoned of Lies Of P. The man is 90% soulslikes by this point, so I’m inclined to trust him. “An instant must-play for Soulslikers,” he wrote, “with fantastic flexibility in its combat and old fashioned rigidity in its challenges”.