Shift Up
Stellar Blade: A big step for the South Korean industry
This new property has everything to stand out and leave a good taste in your mouth.
As expected from the demo, Stellar Blade is coming to PlayStation 5 with a solid proposal from Shift Up studio, which is a big step for the South Korean video game industry.
The forgotten land
The plot is developed from the point of view of Eve, a member of the Seventh Airborne Squadron, whose mission is to save Earth from the Naytiba since the planet has been devastated after the human exodus to colonies in space. After fleeing a violent attack, her fleet is attacked by an alien but is rescued by Adam, a survivor of the city of Xion. Shortly after helping him on a mission, he takes her to an old man who possesses much of Earth’s knowledge and reveals how she can complete her mission to eliminate the Natyiba. This triggers a series of missions to find out who is behind it all.
A balanced gameplay proposal
Stellar Blade starts with a simple gameplay where you hit, jump, block, and dodge. As you progress, you will develop a skill tree that will allow you to confront the enemies, since the blocking system will have a counterattack system, the same as evasion and parry. The latter has indicators that, depending on the color of the weapon’s flash, is the suggested move.
Something we liked is that the game rewards both the skilled and the not-so-skilled, since the former will be able to earn a good amount of experience points and the latter, in case they get complicated, the system will help them keep their accumulated points regardless of whether they lose or not. It is important to point out that the consumables used will wear out when you lose and resurrect.
Another interesting additional feature is that there are accessories that can protect you, and increase the attack level and even the level of the consumables themselves, such as grenades, so depending on the type of game you play, you will have to use the accessories you should use.
Stellar Blade’s progression system allows you to evolve Eve to your liking, and this can go hand in hand with the style of play that suits you best.
The drone that accompanies us at the beginning of the game is a kind of scanner very similar to Death Stranding, although already advanced in the story, it evolves and can be used as a ranged weapon that you can combine with your attack style to create more spectacular combos.
As we mentioned in the demo preview, Stellar Blade rewards the curious, as there are many rewards for those who want to explore the map, either with beta cores to increase energy, accessories, and consumables.
As for the starting difficulty, we will have available the story mode or normal mode (the one we played) and we can say that there is a good amount of enemies, intermediate bosses, and the main ones. The latter emulate very well the “Souls” style games, although there are elements that also remind us of Bayonetta or Nier: Automata.
The save camps have a similar function to Dark Souls, as they allow you to recover all your energy, but this comes at a cost: all enemies will return to the same place, emphasizing that consumables will not. However, there are different types of camps, others where you can only buy consumables, use experience points, and rest, and the bigger ones allow you to upgrade accessories.
Another good thing is the different types of puzzles, which can range from finding a password, to guessing it with mathematical calculations or puzzles of different types.
Graphics that adapt to your taste
One of the things we liked the most is that it has 3 graphics modes, one that prioritizes performance and therefore frames per second, the balanced mode, which seeks a balance between resolution and frames per second, and the resolution mode, which we played with HDR enabled. It is important to note that this is one of the few games that is very enjoyable in this mode, although the other two are highly recommended if you have a compatible TV.
Visually the game looks amazing with particle effects, textures, reflections and animations very consistent with the platform, although in some dialogues when it comes to feel a bit stiff characters, but overall well.
Accompanying soundtrack
The audio has a dedicated preset for speakers, another for headphones, and an automatic mode. A nice detail is the use of the controller’s speaker, something characteristic of PlayStation exclusives. The soundtrack is undoubtedly one that you will want to add to your favorite playlist.
Stellar Blade is more than just a game, it is the solid step of the South Korean video game industry that wants to show the world what their ideal video game is, one that many of us can find refuge in, because it was created with love for the genre, mixing the best of several proposals to deliver a very original one.