Throwing takes a lot of courage Steel rises Enter the soul-like ring. It’s a popular arena that has grown over the past few years as more people dive into the genre known for its intense action, healthy challenges, and creepy fantasy worlds. If a game can be as different as The Surge 2 or the Nioh series, history has proven the move worthwhile. But for every success story, there are twice as many bombs that they can’t stand the obvious and inevitable comparisons to some of the best games released over the past decade. SteelRising, in my mind, after the full game and a few changes, wasn’t very impressed.
Let’s start with what you probably already know. SteelRising is a third-person action game in which you venture through multiple levels, in an environment full of difficult enemies, and then meet a giant boss to pose a major challenge. You have rechargeable healing items that can be restored at set rest points, as well as a variety of consumables that aid in combat. Killing enemies provides currency, which in turn can be used to upgrade your character and weapons. It’s like a soul. If you’re reading this review, you probably know exactly what Steel Rising is based on.
For what it’s worth, this foundation is pretty solid! Your actions as a French murder doll in combat let you weave between attacks and combine powerful combos with regular, heavy and special attacks. Apply enough pressure and you can break your enemy’s stance, allowing you to deliver a devastating attack. Backstab is not here, but replaced by a generic sneak attack that you can land on any and all unwitting automatons. If you’re fretting over some Dark Souls-esque moves, feats like this really do send those sweet signals to your brain.
Right now, that life-and-death action in SteelRising has flaws everywhere. What’s clear to me through two separate games is that many of the weapons feel a little clunky in combat. Stiff and illiquid. Now, this is most likely intentional by the Spiders team, as the extraordinary addition to the revolutionary French setting is a walking (and in your case speaking) animatronics around Paris. But the occasional slow and clunky attack line on non-supermassive weapons made me pass up a few options. However, I did find solace in agility weapons, which are nimble in your hands and sometimes ballet, which is a pleasant surprise amid the wide range of unappealing options.
When it comes to weapons, we have to mention elemental reactions. Because they also hide a major problem I had with the game. By using weapon skills, you can deal fire, ice or electricity damage, and when these damage stack up to a certain level, an explosion effect occurs. You can set enemies on fire, causing continuous burning. You can also electrify them for extra damage! The problem is with ice, as it allows you to freeze enemies and bosses. Yep, that’s right: unless the big bad boss you’re facing is an ice user, you can freeze them for a few seconds.
This way the sails of my first playthrough disappeared. Special moves that apply elemental effects use a limited resource called an alchemical capsule, which is a natural way to limit how often you can use your most powerful moves. This isn’t great in my opinion – it penalizes me for using some of the coolest aspects of my build and encourages the most conservative approach when first traversing an area. What if you need to cash out your most powerful attack later?
So it’s easy to find yourself saving up until you reach the boss, at which point you have an amazing remaining capsule that allows you to chain most of the bosses in Rise of Steel to death with ice weapons. If you do choose this game, we recommend staying away from cryo weapons – they really pull their fangs out of an otherwise tricky title.
What about settings? I’ll make it clear – I love looking around revolutionary Paris, with its villages and palaces, its marinas and its alleys. It’s really an intoxicating setting, and while you obviously don’t get the variety of landscapes you see in high-fantasy or dark-fantasy titles, I never felt as though I was in an overly fictional Paris. It’s as if you could wipe the robots off and leave behind a war-torn historic France.
It’s the perfect stage to infuse some truly ridiculous, extravagant, and — yes, terrifying — enemies throughout. That’s why SteelRising wasn’t working hard enough — not crazy enough, and it almost broke my heart. The vast majority of enemies you’ll be fighting against are two-legged robot soldiers with swords, guns, or flaming axes. It is largely humanoid and brutish, with even more elite foes taking a largely unadorned form. I’d trade higher-level rotating Assault Acolytes and towering contradictory wards for something exciting like fire-breathing or ice-breathing snake hunters, or something crazy like some bosses.
The story of Steel Rising is an entertaining one that oozes between regions and combines a devastated Paris with a steampunk fantasy disaster. The narrative flows through SteelRising in three forms: the mysteries behind the robots destroying the city, the rising political power against King Louis XVI and his cronies who are responsible for the destruction, and discovering a deal with your own characters. While I obviously wouldn’t break these threads, I would say that each thread varies in its ability to be graceful and charming.
The secrets behind your character and keeping the big bad guys at bay are the most mundane of the gang, with the big twist and the subtle signal of the airfield marshal signaling the plane to land. The French uprising itself is depicted among a group of famous nobles, generals, scientists and more, which keeps me less fascinated than starving, desperate, doomed citizens locked in their houses. I did dig into the secrets behind the murderous robo-lens man, but upon reflection, I’m again frustrated that the common enemy isn’t more sophisticated – the foundation is there to justify it.
A special shout to approach your character’s voice. Early in the game, you – as a robot – speak with a robot. Makes sense to me! While it does have the unfortunate effect of making me less concerned with them, it makes me feel as though I’m driving an art store mannequin with a gun and a chain. However, they slowly became more emotional, which exploded in a scene late in the game that managed to wrest my interest back.
The overall experience with SteelRising was lackluster, but there were some pleasant caveats. Thanks to your character’s cooldown system, your stamina bar refreshes quickly, allowing you to keep attacking at the cost of a lot of cold, which can freeze you if used casually. It’s a nice spin on the traditional fighting formula that encourages aggression. I also like the compass: it’s an active tool that points you in the direction of the main quest and side quests, but the point isn’t to point to items in the area, allowing me to venture through buildings without worrying about getting lost. The game also has a secondary mode, and I’m sure those who come to this type of game will be very grateful to those who do it for the atmosphere and engaging story rather than being dicked by Fume Knight over and over again.
Consider everything in SteelRising as a whole, and it’s clear that Spiders’ action-RPG debut isn’t some inexplicably exciting experience. It’s not a trendsetter, and it doesn’t push the boundaries of the soul-like subgenre too much. However, it’s fun in the game’s outbursts. There’s quality here: among the many medium fillers, some great thoughts and moments evoke your auditory response. I do hope the team at Spiders will revisit the genre later, take the best out of SteelRising, and try again.
Games will tickle parts of your brain like big players like Elden Ring and Dark Souls, even if it’s less intense. If you absolutely want more of this game, or are just looking for a fair weather, pick it up with moderate expectations.