CI Games’ Lords of the Fallen sequel, The Lords of the Fallen, is shaping up to be another incredible action-RPG from the Sniper Ghost Warrior developers and Hexworks. However, is the gaming world really ready for another gritty souls-like game after FromSoftware’s 2022 release Elden Ring? We’re all still talking about Bloodborne, which dropped in 2015, and we have a funny feeling Elden Ring is going to be heralded as one of the best RPG games out there for a long time. Well, whether the world is ready or not, The Lords of the Fallen is coming – and it looks like there are parts of it that will feel a little familar to Elden Ring fans. The Lords of the Fallen might just have a boss that’s “nearly identical” to Elden Ring’s formidable Malenia.
In a recent interview with Edge Magazine, Hexworks’ creative director Cezar Virtosu explains that The Lords of the Fallen’s development team “braced for impact” when Elden Ring arrived, detailing that the fact “[the game’s] breakthough weapon, the flail,” was showcased in the first Elden Ring trailer hit particularly hard.
In addition to this, however, he notes that the development team saw that “one of [The Lords of the Fallen’s] bosses was nearly identical to Malenia”. If you want to know which boss this is, just check out our Elden Ring boss order here.
While we’re sure that Virtosu and the development team know that sometimes, video games do similar things and it’s not a bad thing, it is a shame that an ambitious game like The Lords of the Fallen could be compared to a giant like Elden Ring before it has even dropped.
In a similar fashion to how the Elden Ring director was inspired by “masterpieces” like Breath of the Wild and Elder Scrolls, it’s clear that Hidetaka Miyazaki’s FromSoft games were an inspiration for The Lords of the Fallen’s development team. However, despite development on this game beginning years before Elden Ring was announced, you have to wonder if the studio has taken too much inspiration from the Dark Souls series. Visually, what little we have seen from The Lords of the Fallen does look stunning; however, it’s definitely all things that you wouldn’t be shocked to see in a FromSoft game.
The funny thing about it all, though, is that Virtosu is very up-front and forward about the inspiration Hexworks has taken from FromSoft games. Virtosu explains that “Miyazaki is our daddy and granddaddy… Without him, we wouldn’t have any jobs”.
While it doesn’t sound like that’s necessarily true, as we’re sure the apetite for action-RPGs would be there with or without the Dark Souls series, it does highlight how influential the series has been on the gaming landscape – and how influential Elden Ring is already. We know The Lords of the Fallen looks a little like Elden Ring, but we still think this is going to be worth checking out. It might even be one of the best PS5 RPG games or best Xbox RPG games we get our hands on.
If you want to know everything else Virtosu had to say about The Lords of the Fallen in a post-Elden Ring world, you can check out edition 381 of Edge Magazine right here. You can also find out more about The Lords of the Fallen release date right here.