No Rest for the Wicked veers Ori dev closer to actual Soulsbourne territory

There was once a time where I played Ori and the Blind Forest (and later Ori and the Will of the Wisps) and had the same thought as many others. It was basically platforming with a Dark Souls level of difficulty. After giving it some thought, it's a silly thing to say, something that one says in the moment after dying for the 30th time trying to make the same sequence of jumps and avoid the same beds of spikes. It sounds even sillier today now that Ori developer Moon Studios has taken a step back and asked itself, "What if we make a game that's actually more like Dark Souls?" That's what No Rest for the Wicked is and Shacknews recently had the opportunity to try out an early build.

No Rest for the Wicked takes players to the year 841. The benevolent King Harol has passed on, but the time for mourning is short. The Pestilence, a plague that corrupts all it touches, has fallen over the neighboring Isola Sacra. The newly-crowned King Magnus isn't exactly out to help anybody there, either. He is sending out Madrigal Seline and the forces of the church to purify the lands through indiscriminate slaughter. Players take on the role of a surviving Cerim, a holy warrior out to defend the land against the Pestilence. As the Cerim, players must not only fight off the growing Pestilence, but also survive the ruthless attack from the church.

After a brief run through a basic character creator, players wake up on the shores outside of Isola Sacra. While this type of setting has been done before, Moon Studios brings forth a gorgeous hand-crafted art style that has rapidly become its signature. The difference is that while the Ori series was known for its colorful landscapes set against a nighttime backdrop, No Rest for the Wicked's atmosphere is much darker and more ominous.

Combat is where the Soulsbourne comparison surfaces. Players will pick up various weapons and shields along their travels, but must exercise strategy when using them. They must find openings to strike, play defensively to parry enemy strikes, and use their dodge roll to avoid incoming hits. Fighting against individual foes can be challenging, especially because even holding up a shield won't protect against all incoming damage. Even in this short slice of gameplay, I died frequently.

Over the course of their journey, players will be expected to learn the ins-and-outs of intelligent combat. That includes knowing when to sneak up on foes. It's possible to slowly approach an enemy until a button prompt appears, which is an opening for a lethal strike. This helped me stay alive a little longer and even let me ransack a few grottos for treasure.

Gear is essential and players will find a lot of it by looting the corpses of fallen foes and random folks who have succumbed to the Pestilence. It's also possible to beef up your character through some side activities. Shovels and fishing rods allow players to dig up treasure and reel in a quick meal, respectively. Fires offer up a chance to cook up various ingredients found along the journey into more effective dishes. Just be wary of how much you're carrying, otherwise encumbrance will slow you down.

Normally, I'm not a Soulsbourne kind of guy. Games like this are either too unforgiving for me or require a level of patience that I don't have, but No Rest for the Wicked does have one major plus going for it. It's possible to create a realm and share it with three friends. Those four players with access to that realm can jump in and progress at their leisure through online multiplayer or everyone can simply play individually and make incremental progress on the story themselves.

There's much more work for Moon Studios to do before No Rest for the Wicked sees release. That's why the game will start off on Steam Early Access later this year. Once it's ready for a full release, look for it on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S.

These impressions are based on an early Steam code provided by the publisher. It may not be representative of the final product.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?