Blades of Fire

With fun, challenging combat and a fantastic weapon-forging system, Blades of Fire is one of 2025’s most surprising videogames for all the right reasons.

When brutality meets cleverness in a soulful metroidvania adventure.

Some games have such unique and engaging formulas that it's hard to put them down so here's Blades of Fire which is one great Soulslike.

Take God of War, Dark Souls and Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, put them in a blender along with some new elements such as being able to craft weapons and target specific body parts, and you have Blades of Fire. Its map design can be devious at times, and its enemy placement a little questionable, but overall it's an engaging, and rather epic, adventure.

Blades of Fire tries something new with its combat, truly excelling as a result. Those that devote the time to its blacksmithing and weaponry will no doubt have fun slicing and dicing (and piercing and blunting).

MercurySteam follow up the career high point of Metroid Dread with a dark fantasy soulslike full of neat ideas. Blades of Fire dares to make the case for weapon degradation being a good thing and succeeds. The fun characters, secret-stuffed level design, and terrific combat don’t hurt either. A really pleasant surprise.

There’s no denying that a new soulslike being announced and released isn’t as exciting nowadays as it once used to be, due to how bloated the genre is nowadays. There are new ones coming out pretty much every time I wake up these days. However, Blades of Fire did pique my interest before launch, mostly because it was being developed by MercurySteam, a developer I have a lot of respect for. They ar...

Blades of Fire is a well-made package focusing more on crafting creativity than physical battles. It forces players to take a more thoughtful approach instead of prioritizing fast-paced action.

Forged in Frustration

Blades of Fire has unique mechanics that are refreshing in a genre that seems to be oversaturated as of late. Having to switch between weapons on the fly and target the correct body part adds a layer of strategy to each encounter, making combat more exciting, especially during big boss fights. This is where Blades of Fire shines the most and is the reason to play the game. Unfortunately, too many ...

If Blades of Fire manages to strike a chord, it won't be for its narrative, nor its world, but its violence.

MercurySteam's latest project holds a lot of promise, but death by a thousand cuts holds it back from true greatness.