Valor Mortis has just dropped, delivering players into a brutal reimagining of the Napoleonic Wars complete with mutant magic, grimdark storytelling, and some of the greatest body horror in gaming history. Though many Soulslike titles can be formulaic to a fault, Valor Mortis enters the genre with a brave new approach. This desire to change things up didn’t just deliver an interesting new take on the genre’s mechanics, but also delivered one of the most original Soulslike settings out there, and one that is undeniably one of the coolest in gaming.
Taking a peek behind the curtain into the Soulslike genre, you’ll see a pattern: grim, washed-out fantasy settings where emaciated peasants saunter through rocky fields, and tarnished knights sit upon crumbling castle towers. Cataclysmic events have often left the world barely inhabitable, and magic is often a destructive force that comes at a steep price to cast.
Dark fantasy defines the Soulslike genre, because the genre itself is defined by Dark Souls. It is easy to understand why titles inspired by the titular franchise would want to lean into the original aesthetics of a dark fantasy world, especially when the aesthetics are so charming to begin with. A game is not less creative simply because it failed to reinvent the wheel, but when a title does branch out from the typical mold, it’s appreciated all the more.
Of course, not every Soulslike title is the same flavor of dark fantasy. Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order takes the genre into a galaxy far, far away and follows the titular Jedi as he tries to survive the oppressive rule of an empire that wants him dead. Sifu takes players through the mean modern streets of a classic martial arts movie, mixing in a unique supernatural twist. Lies of P ditches the dark fantasy norm and instead delivers an oil-drenched steampunk nightmare that parodies the classic Pinocchio mythos. While dark fantasy is the norm for the genre, there are exceptions, and they definitely stand out for it.
Still, there has yet to be an entry into the genre that delves deep into historical fiction the way that Valor Mortis does. The aesthetics of the Napoleonic Wars are often ignored in gaming unless they are being directly translated into historically accurate games, such as Total War: Napoleon or Guts & Black Powder. Taking the iconic visage of one of history’s most memorable conflicts and mixing in fantastical reimagining isn’t just fun; it shows a level of creativity on the part of the game’s development team that you don’t see in every corner of gaming these days.
It isn’t just the way that Valor Mortis incorporates magic, impossible parkour, and gorgeous, fantasy-adjacent environments that makes its historical fantasy stand out. It’s the way the game has introduced, and mastered, horror.
Choosing to take Soulslike combat into the first-person perspective was just one of the unique ideas Valor Mortis brought to the table. The game’s Napoleonic world has twisted almost beyond recognition, reshaped into a grotesque and horrible setting that makes other zombie apocalypses look tame. Soldiers maintain their ability to swing sabers and fire flintlocks, but otherwise have become grotesque abominations of twisted tissue and wet bone.
We’ve seen horror down across plenty of historical eras, with most choosing to settle in a more modern setting between the 1980s and 2010s, if not directly in our modern day. We’ve never seen an apocalyptic, zombie-like setting in the time of Napoleon’s wars, and the aesthetics work too well. Pristine uniforms corrupted by splatters of blood and torn asunder by ravenous claws, artfully crafted sabers swung in wide arcs to sever limbs and slash open bellies, and proud generals reduced to mutated monsters, unable to escape the battlefields they once commanded.
More than simply an aesthetic decision, Valor Mortis truly leans into the horror of its setting to make some truly cutting commentary. The game’s protagonist, William, dies at the start of the game, and yet is still revived by the mysterious crimson plague and immediately begins to hear orders from Napoleon Bonaparte himself in his mind, demanding he push onwards and win glory for his empire. The protagonist himself is a bleak commentary on the relentless nature of war, and how one soldier’s sacrifice is never enough. The game brings up questions about perspective, using the first-person camera to make you question if protagonist William, who feels shockingly unsurprised by the horrors around him, is a reliable source of information. The way the environment and soldiers twist together into one is a pretty potent, if not obvious, commentary on dehumanization.
Valor Mortis is, for sure, one of a kind, and brings a load of fresh new perspective into the Soulslike genre.
