Early Access Preview — No Rest for the Wicked
Become a holy warrior who must purge the Pestilence on an island riddled with political unrest in No Rest for the Wicked.
The Austrian developer Moon Studios is mostly known for their two Ori games, but with their latest game they’re treading a completely different path. With No Rest for the Wicked, they combine the isometric hack & slash gameplay of Diablo with the brutality and precision combat of Dark Souls, in an adventure that is as grimdark as both aforementioned series. The game launched in early access on PC two weeks ago, giving players a chance to devilish experience the studio is concocting.
A Deadly Endeavor
Ready to dive into this adventure, I started with the creation of my character and the first thing I noticed, was the shape of the bodies for either the male or female character. With legs and arms that were way out of proportion for the character, the developers certainly went for a distinct look. One that I personally wasn’t a big fan of I must admit, but while playing (and wearing clothes), this wasn't something that stayed on my mind. Quickly after creating my hero, I found my self on a boat on route to Isola Sacra, the main location of the game.
This island has succumbed to political strife after the death of king Harol. On top of that, there’s also a plague called Pestilence ravaging the island, turning many of the inhabitants into ravaging monsters. As a member of the Cerim, a group of holy warriors, the people of the island count on you to purge this plague, while also navigating yourself through the political turmoil that’s taking place in the background. Of course, your mission doesn’t start out as planned and after an assault on the ship you’re on, you wash up on the beach after a shipwreck.
Precision combat
As soon as you start exploring the island, you’ll understand why this game is being compared to both Diablo and Dark Souls. The first one is of course the most obvious one, as No Rest for the Wicked utilizes a similar isometric point of view and it lets you slice and dice your way through fierce enemies in a dark medieval setting, while also featuring loot system with a grading system. For those looking for a Diablo style game, the comparisons end here however, as this game shows to have more in common with your average soulslike title. Instead of hacking your way through hordes of enemies, you’ll have to methodically combat your enemies, ideally one at a time, in order to survive the harsh world of No Rest for the Wicked. Many ingredients, such as stamina management, the importance of dodging and parrying, hard hitting enemies, stat leveling, limited checkpoints, shortcuts and interconnected level design, will feel overly familiar to the fans of this genre.
The combat doesn’t feel as fulfilling at the moment however, as it is somewhat sluggish, especially if you use a two-handed weapon. The stamina consumption and recovery also don’t feel right at this stage. Because of this, I have the feeling the game trickier than other soulslike games. There’s certainly room for improvement here to make the combat more fluent. Something that also could use some fine tuning is the lock-on feature. Especially in combination with the isometric viewpoint does this make fighting against multiple enemies slightly difficult.
Speaking of this isometric approach: No Rest for the Wicked has a beautifully, handcrafted world that also includes a certain level of verticality. But because of the viewpoint and fixed camera, it can become tricky navigating the world. It isn’t always clear where you can take a path to reach higher ground for example. Because of the density of the world, it also isn’t always clear where you need to be. When I was in the city of Sacrament for example, I had a quest marker on my map, but I kept passing by it, not knowing what I was doing wrong. It turned out that there was some stairs I missed that would take me to a higher level where I needed to talk to someone.
Carefully cutting a diamond
Luckily, since the game is still in early access, the developers still have time to iron out the kinks in the game and it’s clear that this game certainly benefits from being launched in early access. This allows Moon Studios to balance the game based on the feedback of the players. There’s still work to be done when looking at things like inventory space and management or how the Cerim Whispers function as checkpoints and fast travel points. Even on the technical side, there’s still a lot of things missing like proper DLSS support or even the fact that you can’t even rebind your keyboard keys (although the game really plays better with a controller). Moon Studios already released a number of patches after the less then ideal launch of the game, so it’s clear that they really take this project at heart and are trying to make something special.
That No Rest for the Wicked will not be your average action RPG should be apparent when you look at the unique, painterly visual style of the game and the fact that it also includes elements of crafting and city building that further expand the gameplay of this game. Only time will tell how this game will grow, but we already now that multiplayer will be added to the game, as well as additional story content and hopefully more endgame content aside from the Crucible, a randomized dungeon with various challenges and randomized loot to be earned. Moon Studios still has its work cut out for them, but No Rest for the Wicked certainly has the potential to be something worth discovering for fans of dark and visceral action RPG’s.
Played in early access on PC.
Download code provided by the publisher and PR agency.
