I never replay games, but... [Lies of P]

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When Overture, the DLC for Lies of P, came out, I was ready to dive in, remembering how much I loved the base game back in 2023. I played it on release as a part of Xbox Game Pass, enjoyed it tremendously, but unfortunately didn't write a post at that time. So, consider this my love letter to Lies of P, the best soulslike out there that just got a whole lot better.

If you've never heard of Lies of P at all, it is a soulslike loosely based on the Pinocchio fairy tale by Carlo Collodi. You play as a puppet created by Geppetto, dormant but then suddenly awakened by a mysterious voice. You make your way through the city of Krat: once a thriving capital of progress, now — a ruined city drenched in blood after the puppets, commonly used by people or employed in public services, abandoned their duties and massacred the citizens. Your task is to find out what happened and also figure out who you are.

If you are familiar with the original tale, you'll find that Lies of P kept many of the characters but reinterpreted them to fit the new narrative and the game's worldbuilding. I absolutely adore the story; it's very well-written, rich in details and smaller storylines that you can explore if you're curious.

There are two things that I think about when Lies of P comes to mind: the truth-or-lie system and combat mechanics that make this game really unique among all other soulslikes I've played. You are a puppet, which means that you cannot lie and can only tell the truth. At the same time, you're a special creation of Geppetto, so you CAN lie if you so choose. So, what will it be? Will you be a good boy and always tell the truth because it's the right thing to do? Or will you lie because sometimes, maybe, lying is the right thing to do?

I remember it so vividly: on my first playthrough I decided to tell everyone the truth because, in my mind, clearly, it was the right path towards the good ending, if the game had a few of them. And then an elderly lady, disfigured by a horrible disease, looks at the portrait of herself when she was young and beautiful and asks me if she still has a trace of that beauty. And I can tell her that no, she is deformed and ugly now, or I can tell her that yes, she is still the beauty from the portrait, aged gracefully. That was the moment that I realized that the game is not as plain and simple as I initially assumed, and that maybe there is a little bit more to being a human.

Throughout the game you navigate multiple quests and personal stories in a similar manner, and when someone's story is told, you receive a vinyl record that you can then play in your hub area. The music in Lies of P is simply fantastic; very often I chose to just hang out in the hub listening to my favorite records before braving the next area.

When it comes to combat, Lies of P readily accommodates every type of player there is: dex types like myself who like to be nimble and deadly; heavy types who like to hit like a truck, and even arcane types who rely on the various powers on the prosthetic arm. There is something for everyone, and the flexibility of style does not end here, oh no.

Every non-legendary weapon can be disassembled into a blade and a handle. The blade can be upgraded for damage, and the handle is what carries the moveset and stat scaling. By shuffling around blades and handles you can craft some incredible weapons that perfectly fit your playstyle. It is so much fun that I want it in every game now. Not every combination makes sense as sometimes the type of damage the blade does doesn't really work with the moveset of the handle, but still there are plenty of combinations to play around with. For example, if you love your dagger, but the prospect of getting too close to the enemy is not all that exciting — you can take the dagger blade and slap it onto a spear handle. The weapon would have the moveset of a spear but the stats of the dagger blade including its high critical rate. Even better, if you assemble your weapon but it doesn't scale with the stat that you need, you can change that too! Shuffling weapon parts around costs nothing and can be done at any stargazer checkpoint so you can experiment as much as you like.

Your Legion arm also offers a lot of variety: from a simple string that pulls an enemy to you to technical marvels that inflict elemental damage, shoot like a miniature canon or act as a shield. Each arm has a small but mighty upgrade path that opens up some really cool abilities.

In Lies of P the sense of progression is matched up nicely to the challenges you encounter: the rewards are meaningful, and every time you level up, use a quartz to enhance your abilities or upgrade a weapon or a Legion arm — you feel it instantly.

Last but definitely not least (maybe should have been first) — there is a Perfect Guard system, essentially parries, which I love so very much. It scratches my Sekiro itch, and I loved studying bosses with my dex build to learn their patterns and perfectly deflect their blows. With Perfect Guard you can stagger enemies and even break their weapons. You don't really have to do that to progress: there are also dodges, and the game doesn't punish you for just dodging out of the way, but parrying is something that I personally enjoy but struggle to find implemented correctly in games. In Lies of P it's very good — not without flaws — but very good and enjoyable to use.

So, I played it on release and was ready to dive into the DLC two years later. I went to Game Pass again to find that the original game was not there anymore, and my save files weren't either. I searched far and wide for them on my PC, found none, thought I could still somehow extract them from Xbox, but the answer was no, I couldn't. In the end, I was faced with an exhausting conundrum: just leave Overture and watch someone else play it or get Lies of P on Steam and replay the whole thing because the DLC becomes accessible somewhere closer to the end.

It is exceptionally rare for me to replay games, even if I like them a lot. Of course, when I was younger and not many games were available to me, I replayed Diablo and Neverwinter Nights countless times, but honestly, not many games since then. I play videogames largely for stories, and when a story is known to me, I see little sense in replaying it again when I could be immersed in a new story.

Currently there are only two games that I am ready to replay at any given moment if I feel like I need some deep contemplative rest in a videogame: one is Hollow Knight, my number one cozy comfort game. And number two is Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice because it's the best game in existence. It's so perfect that I did a whole project retranslating it from Japanese to gather all the rich historic, cultural and religious context that might have been lost in translation. Check it out, if you haven't; the research turned out to be full of the most fascinating stuff.

But these are the only two games.

I'd been mulling over it because while I loved nearly everything about Lies of P when I originally played it, well, I have already played it. My playtime back then was about 30 hours, and it's a fair bit of time that could fit a couple other titles I planned for this year. Then I remembered that I heard on the grapevine that the developers REALLY leaned into quality of life stuff and the game is now better than ever. I am still not sure whether or not this was the drop that tipped the scales, but I decided to play Lies of P again, and play through the main game as quickly as I possibly could just to get to the DLC entry point. At the time I thought I'd skip every single side quest, pay no mind to telling lies or the truth because I didn't need to complete the game, I only needed to reach the DLC. But all these intentions dissipated like a morning fog because I found myself helplessly falling in love with Lies of P all over again :D

The developers DID double down on quality of life features. The main thing theу added, or, rather, shifted compared to my first playthrough on launch, is the ground roll. Two years ago, the ability to roll to the side while downed and stand up was AN ABILITY that you could unlock closer to the last third of the game. Before that time, should you be thrown onto the floor by an enemy, you'd just lie there and eat all the damage with your face, until the combo is over. It was awful, and by far the nastiest part of gameplay that made some bossfight or some enemy encounters infuriating because you could do absolutely nothing but just wait until the character stands up. If he got any HP left to do that with, that is.

Now it's a walk in the park. If someone slaps you hard enough that you fall, you can just roll to the side and stand up. It's not even an ability; it's just something your character can do by default. Amazing. Some bossfights where the first move of a boss' long combo was to try and knock you to the floor to then beat to a pulp feel much fairer now, when one mistake is not your undoing. Encounters with my least favorite enemy — a walking oven with a shovel who also has a similar combo of bashing you with the shovel and then bashing you on the ground as if it wants to dig out your grave with you already in it — became much more pleasant now that I could just roll to the side. What a simple thing that we often take for granted in so many games and yet it makes such a difference :D

If I could use one word to describe Lies of P, it would be 'smooth'. This word, I find, is rarely applicable to soulslikes, but in this case, I assure you, this is the word. All trading is made a breeze by the additional menu that allows you to break down your Ergo chunks without leaving the merchant's screen; your core can be easily recalibrated if you want to reinvest your Quartz. After you finish the game, replaying bossfight becomes available to you: you can challenge the ones you enjoyed the most, or play through a gauntlet to fight bosses consecutively if you're into that kind of thing.

The next big change came with the introduction of difficulty levels. Upon release, Lies of P had only one difficulty, now the hardest, called 'Legendary Stalker'. With a big patch they added two more: Awakened Puppet, which makes the combat easier, and Butterfly Guidance, which is essentially story mode. The difficulty can be changed at any point.

Now, I know that the difficulty in games is a powder keg of a discussion topic. However, the addition of these two new options had zero impact on my personal game experience: I chose to replay the game at the Legendary Stalker difficulty because it suited my definition of fun best. I had played through the game on this difficulty before and thought I could handle it. If at any time I had felt that the game was getting too challenging to the point of not being fun for me, I would've changed the difficulty without thinking twice. Videogames are meant to be played for fun. It would never occur to me to belittle another player or devalue their experience because they chose the difficulty that better suited their preferences; I think it's ridiculous. What I care about the most, is that my friend, who was always interested in Lies of P but couldn't play it because it was way too challenging (they don't typically play soulslikes at all) successfully played the game, had a lot of fun, and we finally got to talk about it, discuss the story, who liked which boss, you know, the gamer friends stuff. It was amazing! I am super happy that I can now share Lies of P with more people including those of my friends who don't play soulslikes. In my opinion, if a game offers difficulty settings, a player is free to choose whatever option corresponds to their idea of fun and leave all other players to their respective choices.

I went into the DLC as soon as it became available to me, but to be completely honest, I was taken aback by the difficulty spike and the highly aggressive enemies with long combos. I played through a chunk of the DLC before deciding to go back into the main game and level up some more. After that, I found the DLC to be reasonably challenging so that's what I would recommend doing. Reach the last boss of the main game and then go to the DLC. There are some downsides to this approach too: if you complete the DLC before the last two chapters or so, a few places and dialogues would get additional details, but, having seen the changes, I don't think they are so drastic or so very meaningful that it's worth suffering through the DLC while being underlevelled.

I loved Overture not only because it tells a story that is only hinted at in the main game and explores the characters that are vital to the story yet only mentioned, but also because in Overture the developers tried a lot of new things, and I really appreciate it. It is a bold DLC. For example, they added two more weapon types — I liked the talons, but not so much the bow — and assisted boss encounters where you can call not a faceless Specter to help you out, but an NPC for whom this fight is story-relevant. This is by far my favorite part of the DLC, and I wish there was more of it in the main game too. These select bossfights are a spectacle, and it's obvious they were designed for you to call upon an NPC. The NPCs you fight with are not your typical fools good only for aggroing the boss but not so much for damaging it. These guys got MOVES, and some of those are breathtaking.

In Overture the story feels tight and dramatic; the urgency of it and your personal involvement leave you breathless as you pursue the Legendary Stalker, always one step behind. This is a gorgeous DLC that, perhaps, shows on a smaller scale what the developers have in store for us in the sequel. If you have played the game, or just thinking about it, and find yourself wondering about the DLC — pick it up. I loved it.

Lies of P is a perfect combination of overcoming challenging fights, traversing complex yet perfectly readable areas, uncovering secrets and making decisions in the dark, beautiful setting of a classic fairy tale. It is a joy to play. With all the quality of life updates, a great DLC and new difficulty settings it is now better than ever. If you wanted to try this game, but were deterred by the difficulty, or by the soulslikeness of it — well, you're in luck. You can now play the best soulslike there currently is at whatever difficulty fits you best and just have an amazing time. I do not regret one bit that I replayed Lies of P, even though I was hesitant to do so at first. I just fell in love with it again, and had a fantastic time again, so what's there to complain about?

Of course, this is just my opinion; if you're an avid soulslike player and have other recommendations, please drop me a comment below. I am cursed to play soulslikes till the end of time anyway. If you've tried Lies of P and the DLC, don't hesitate to share your opinion as well.

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Thank you very much for your time. Take care.