From the first moments No rest for the wicked dripping with atmosphere. Literally most of the time – during my 90 minutes with the game, the gloomy environment is constantly damp, a cloudy island where bandits and worse lurk among soggy ruins.
Its inhabitants – including my created character, a mystical warrior named “Cerim” – have a wonderfully lanky, grotesque look, like classic portraits, their paint running in all the rain. And that's just the normal people – when I encounter the giant mutant that serves as this build's boss fight, I can see how ugly really looks. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
No Rest for the Wicked is a Souls-like action RPG – expect the deadly, methodical combat and careful exploration of Dark Souls, with the top-down perspective and loot customization of something more reminiscent of Diablo 4. But I didn't want to start there because just rambling about genres and inspirations would be the most boring way to talk about a game that immediately drew me into its world and wouldn't let me go.
You'll know developer Moon Studios from its groundbreaking debut Ori and the Blind Forest, and while that partly explains the immersive graphics and effortless sense of place, the island of Isola Sacra feels miles away from that game's enchanted wilderness. With talk of kings, heirs, dogmatic religion and unholy plague, it's a bigger, grander story – but also a more humane one, dealing with the plight of ordinary people caught up in horrors and cruelties beyond their control.
As Cerim, seemingly shipwrecked on the shores of Sacra, dressed in rags and wielding the first large stick I encounter, it falls to me to face the gathering darkness. Or at least initially against the local band of robbers.
Given its soul-like influence, battles against this unpleasant force are, as expected, all about caution and precision: dodging, blocking and parrying at just the right moment, looking for opportunities for slow but powerful retaliation. But here too the game stands out in its own way.
Fights take up space in a really exciting way – perhaps thanks to the low-hanging arms everyone seems to have, attacks have long reach and long swings. Throws really cover the ground, and most enemies either have special attacks that will hurl them at you or devastating ranged attacks that force you to keep closing the distance. Not only do I have to pay attention to my surroundings, but I also have to use them in interesting ways – jumping over gaps, luring enemies into bottlenecks, and at one point even swimming to safety before launching a fireball from a nearby sandbar.
That's the other piece of the combat puzzle: runic attacks. As you strike with your weapon, you recharge your focus, and when you have enough of it, you can spend it on special attacks. With a dagger that might be an attack strike, while the staff I carry in most of my practical exercises is a choice of three fiery spells. The result is that each weapon has its own built-in rhythm: deliver simple strikes until you're charged up, then look for the perfect moment to unleash all hell, be it sprinting back to an elevated position to get out of there to rain down with fire, or to interrupt an opponent's stumbling attack with a sudden, stabbing blow.
It's clear that there's a lot of depth yet to come to this combat mechanic. Temptingly, many of my weapons have empty slots into which additional runic attacks could be inserted – the thought of customizing my own preferred set is very tempting. I'm also interested in experimenting more with Dark Souls' unique twist on the weight system; Instead of simply slowing you down, heavier gear actually changes the way your character moves. Near-naked characters can dodge quickly instead of rolling, while heavily armored warriors can use their slow dodges to shoulder charge at enemies. I'm sure each will prove useful in different situations.
But one of the things that surprises me most in my time with the game is that the thing that saves my life more often than anything else isn't a weapon or a piece of armor, but mushroom soup. Instead of relying on auto-refilling health flasks, the best way to restore your health is through food consumption. This means collecting ingredients as you explore – mushrooms, herbs, rat meat, crabs – and cooking them up on a campfire. It's a nod to another major inspiration of No Rest for the Wicked, one that becomes more apparent the more I find crafting resources and even tools for mining ore, digging up roots, and chopping down trees. It's… a kind of survival game.
The collecting and crafting feels secondary to the core action and exploration, and while I don't delve too deeply into the systems in the time I've been playing the game, the conclusion seems to be that most of these resources go into crafting and upgrade flow, and enchant your loot instead of building settlements. But that touch of Valheim, especially the reliance on home-cooked food, makes me feel more connected to the world and more dependent than in the endlessly hostile worlds of most soulslikes and action RPGs. My demo ends just as I reach a large settlement, but the promise is that once you're there, you can buy and customize a house, farm the land between trips, and help rebuild by further expanding these systems – suggested by Article I Discover Wooden Boards and Clay.
My last stand before my time runs out is a duel with the large, grasping monstrosity I mentioned as it staggers around in a rain-soaked field. As I wallow through its wild swings and sprint through the mud to carve up its fleshy mass, I feel like I'm just beginning a truly unique journey. It takes a lot to make a Souls-inspired game stand out these days, and believe me, I'm more cynical than most when it comes to FromSoft's many imitators. But No Rest for the Wicked refuses to stand in anyone's shadow, combining a rich tapestry of expertly deployed influences with a world that begs to be explored. It may always be cloudy on Isola Sacra, but the future of Moon Studios looks brighter than ever.
