Dolmen, we tried Koch Media's Brazilian soulslike
Dolmen
When Koch Media unveiled the Prime Matter label, the publisher's intent was clear: to support newly formed teams in developing more ambitious projects than common indie titles, in the hope of finding at least one unexpected hit. The trailers shown have certainly not impressed, but between games clearly still very rough and quite derivative works, some have managed if only to capture some interest.Among these, one of the most solid was Dolmen: a soulslike developed by Massive Work Studio (a Brazilian team) apparently not particularly innovative from a gameplay point of view, yet capable of distinguishing itself for its setting markedly inspired by horror games and for the technical sector in any case superior to what is normally expected from the products of a software house with such limited resources.
We recently had the opportunity to test a fresh build of the work of Massive Work, and after having faced all kinds of monstrosities (and being cracked more times than we would like to admit) we are ready to give you our first impressions.
Here, then, is our tried and tested Dolmen.
Hey mom, the necromorphs are back
Dolmen: these eggs have clearly been placed there by "something" Dolmen puts you in the shoes of an unspecified captain grappling with a very dangerous expedition on the pia neta Revion Prime. As expected this is not a pleasure trip: immediately after landing, our alter ego finds himself in the middle of ruins invaded by monstrosities of rare ugliness and "redecorated" by organic walls that seem to have been taken over by the worst Alien bootlegs. , pretty clear indication that something has gone wrong.A setting of this type normally goes well with a narrative close to the titles of From Software, minimalist and closely linked to the careful exploration of the maps, yet the game's developers seemed too enthusiastic to us to tell the story, so much so as to have filled most of the initial areas with testimonies and communications aimed at explaining what happened. All in all? The plot did not seem particularly original - the primary inspiration is Dead Space according to some statements, and the elements in common are noticeable - but it is structured enough to intrigue and push the player to actively search for the terminals that delineate it. Don't expect who knows what narrative background from Dolmen, the focus here is clearly not the lyrics.
Dolmen: a handful of elemental bullets can overturn a fight In general, however, we are dealing with the usual bad experiment contrived, which turned Revion Prime into the haunt of a bunch of hideous creatures and mutated humans. More than enough classic base to justify a lot of healthy fighting to the death. Fortunately Dolmen does not disappoint from this point of view. a soulslike Dolmen: among the choices for the melee there are also the greatswords If you look at the fundamental mechanics of Dolmen the inspiration is clear: it is an action RPG with a development system based on statistics, almost identical in fighting a host of other Dark Souls clones. The classic maneuvers are all there: parry if equipped with a shield with the possibility of performing parry with the right timing, light and heavy attacks, and even a jump attack after a sprint. Corpse run and fixed checkpoints with regeneration of all enemies are clearly not missing from the appeal. The main difference here lies in three specific aspects: the use of long-range weapons, energy management, and the presence of an elemental system. They are rather curious distinctive factors, which do not allow you to approach Dolmen as you do with a soulslike municipality, although the presence of effects linked to the elements is the most significant.
Dolmen in fact allows you to use a gun (which can also be aimed at manually) at any time to damage enemies from a distance, however using it temporarily consumes one's energy bar - not to be confused with that of stamina, which is linked to dodging and attacks as always - although the damage inflicted is usually quite negligible (and therefore the melee tends to remain almost always the most efficient solution). The aforementioned energy is also needed to regenerate your life points in battle, but healing consumes it permanently, so regenerating a couple of times can render the bullets useless and increase the risk of returning to the checkpoint.
Wisely managing this resource is very important, since the objects that reload it require an active animation that is too long-lasting, which leaves the player uncovered in front of any attack. In this soulslike, put simply, resource upgrades and the ability to get through battles without a scratch are more central than in other similar games, because a simple cure is an action that can bring huge disadvantages.
This should lead to a decent rise in the level of challenge compared to other exponents of the genre, but there is a downside that counterbalances the need to keep an eye on energy: the elemental system, in fact. Both firearms and close combat weapons can inflict elemental statuses and enemies usually have specific weaknesses that allow them to do enormous damage if abused properly. Acid, for example, lowers defenses, fire does damage over time, and ice slows down opponent's moves, and this basic triptych of malus can be exploited to support varying fighting styles, from very defensive and weighted ones to those extremely aggressive and risky.
Overall, this is a good idea, but it is not enough to raise Dolmen to the level necessary to deal with From's titles. In fact, there are various ingenuities linked to the general balance (certain statuses are undoubtedly more useful than others), to the response of the commands and to the refinement of the mechanics; the level design did not seem to us the most inspired, and the enemy patterns are all too often circumvented by keeping the distance with your firearms. Not that the experience as a whole is negative, for heaven's sake; it's mostly stumbles that demonstrate the team's limitations at the reins, and put Dolmen more on the level of a Mortal Shell or The Surge (to be optimistic) than the most acclaimed titles out there. It must be said, however, that there is still a lot to discover, from a weapons crafting system that we have only marginally analyzed, to the most advanced bosses, so it is not impossible that the work of this Brazilian team will be able to surpass our forecasts. at launch.
Dolmen is unlikely to revolutionize the soulslike genre, but Massive Work's work seems solid enough to win over a decent fanbase of enthusiasts, and if nothing else it brings in some interesting mechanics beyond systems classics that we have come to appreciate. The limited resources of the team are noticeable, mainly in some obvious ingenuity in the design, but there is still a lot to discover, and who knows if the title fails to surprise us.
