Mortal Shell: The Virtuous Cycle

In the increasingly crowded Soulslike genre, a game's opening minutes need to do a lot of work. The good news for Mortal Shell 2 is its opening is superb, starting as well as it continues, and condensing the magic of its next 30-odd hours into a few minutes with aplomb. Read more

This sequel's expansion into a large scale action-RPG is mostly a successful one.

Developer Cold Symmetry continues to tinker with Mortal Shell 2, recently dropping a massive update that makes some substantial changes to its latest souls-like action-RPG. Alongside buffing certain weapons and fixing some glitches, the team has also addressed the game's greedy economy by making a few finite resources more plentiful around the world. Released on August 29, Mortal Shell 2's Week 1 Update makes some of the game's heaviest weapons stronger to compensate for their slowness. For example, the Obsidian Hammer hits way harder, and The Great Martyr's Blade had its damage output increas

The action RPG's developer says the response has been "incredible," and it has begun fixing bugs and "tightening the experience."

From awesome Tarstones to exceptional weapons, there are a lot of really good items to find in Mortal Shell 2. While you can miss them if you're not doing your due diligence while exploring, there's an early-game item that you really don't want to miss because of how it trivializes most fights. Unfortunately for me, I missed it and realized way too late, so let me regale you with my troubles in the hopes that you don't make the same mistake as I did. The first boss you fight happens in the prologue. After some light exploration and acquiring your first shell, Haros, you roll up on the Tar Gole