The game is not yet fully completed, but the content of the first page is already quite complete.
The protagonist will awaken in the graveyard and guide the player's actions with their inner voice.
After traveling along the road and arriving at the first campfire, the protagonist sits down and the player can then choose a class, weapon, and other customizable personal traits.
The combat system in "Soul of Mortals" is quite diverse.
Players can choose one of five classes before the game starts.
Each class comes with two initial skills and two initial items, usually five health potions and a very basic weapon.
There are fifteen different weapons in the game, ranging from melee to ranged.
Each class paired with each weapon will create a unique synergy, resulting in different combos. The system will only teach the two simplest and most basic combos; the rest will require players to explore on their own.
In other words, there are 75 different battle routes to choose from in this game.
The battles themselves are more strategic and challenging.
Aside from the bosses, all the monsters in the game also choose a route from fifteen different weapons, and the combat AI is very sophisticated, knowing how to use almost all combos.
It's not enough for players to master their combos to deal damage; they also need to understand the enemy's attack patterns and use abilities like blocking and dodging to evade attacks.
It tests not only operational skills and combat awareness, but also involves issues such as reaction speed and resource management...
Even star-level players who are used to hardcore strategies can easily be killed in one combo by monsters they don't understand.
Of course, besides a direct confrontation, there are other approaches.
For example, bypass the enemy in front of you and go to the back to get an item that can counter him;
For example, you could go back to camp, switch to a ranged weapon, and use a strange terrain feature to shoot him from a distance.
There are also some enemies you can just charge through to, grab the item behind them, and then the protagonist can die...
After all, the protagonist of "The Mortal Soul" is actually a soul.
So what if the body dies? As long as I get the "soul coins" from the box, that's all that matters.
As for that enemy, there's no need to provoke him anymore!
In this way, in addition to the experience gained from leveling up game characters.
Players can even feel as if they have an experience bar.
For example, the very first enemy in the game is specifically designed to "always use a weapon that counters the player's weapon".
Therefore, players who are unfamiliar with the combat controls will basically be slaughtered on their first encounter.
After dying, the protagonist restarts from next to the campfire, losing some sanity.
The moment the concept of sanity appeared, many test players immediately got excited!
—Isn't this the novel system that the leader mentioned at the press conference?
Sanity is something that is very difficult to replenish. As sanity drops, strange dark shadows will gradually appear in the protagonist's field of vision, and eerie, crazy whispers will be heard.
Once the sanity value drops to zero, the protagonist will truly die, and their corpse will turn into a small monster called "Shell" that remains in the game.
Players can only create a new character and start over!
If you're lucky, you can even get back some of your old equipment and soul coins by defeating that "shell".
Of course, the current Alpha test version hasn't done that much yet, so players don't need to worry about losing all their sanity for the time being.
At most, you'll just get killed a few more times by the monsters in the tutorial level of a game...
"Holy crap, this is a hidden boss, right?!"
"Why does this little monster do so much more damage than me?! I'm using a short dagger, and he's using a gun, how can I possibly hit him?!"
One skilled player was almost brought to tears of humiliation.
Fortunately, he was experienced in the game and had enough wit in combat. He quickly figured out the two combo attacks of the monsters and defeated them by dodging twice with great difficulty.
As the monster's corpse dissolved into the darkness, leaving behind two pitiful soul coins spinning in place.
He let out a satisfied sigh.
"Ah! That feels so good!!!"
Defeating this tutorial monster actually brought him endless satisfaction.
It felt like when I was playing the End of Days mod in Minecraft, and finally managed to defeat a difficult boss after an hour of hard work!
He stood there, recalling his two perfect dodges; and that combo, a cool fourteen-hit combo, which he had invented himself, something the system hadn't mentioned...
He only died twice, yet he figured out the enemy's attack methods and distances. Does that mean he's too much of a genius?
The expert brother happily picked up his sword and continued forward, only to encounter another small monster.
And this monster was hiding on his head, jumping down to ambush him!
A single leaping slash, a critical hit that strikes right to the soul!
Holy crap!!!
The expert died mysteriously again, only to be reborn by the campfire, filled with resentment.