Blades of Fire review – forging a new style of hack-and-slash combat

Daily Mirror

20-05-2025

MercurySteam have created a deep and intriguing fantasy world where creative melee combat is unequivocally the main attraction.
Providing you don't mind getting turned around every so often, Blades of Fire delivers a worthy twist on the Soulslike template thanks to its unique combat and weapon-crafting system.
Don't be fooled by the protagonist's broad shoulders and burly beard. There's far more thought given to Blades of Fire than what its Xbox 360 era aesthetic and character designs may initially suggest. It's a third-person action-adventure about going on a quest to protect a fantasy kingdom from the forces of evil, yes, but beneath this relatively ho-hum premise is a new kind of combat system that quite literally puts out the more you put in – thanks to the ability to create and modify your own weapons.
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As such, taking on enemies is always stuffed with a lot more meaning and risk than you'd find in other typical hack-and-slash fare. And while the systems outside this core hook aren't quite as exciting, it's hard to deny the thrill that comes from repairing, recycling, and creating your own spin on the game's namesake whenever heading back to the forge.
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At the centre of this fiery tale is Aran De Lira, part-time reluctant hero and full-time master forger, who finds himself in the rather unique position of being one of very few still able to craft steel following Queen Nerea's spell that has since turned everyone else's weapons into stone. His determination to do something about this properly begins after being gifted with a magical hammer by a young squire, Adso, that inspires the pair to fight their way to the queen's royal palace.
It results in a road trip of sorts that challenges Aran to fight and forge through all kinds of interlocking dungeons and areas. From here Blades of Fire falls into a structure that is very Dark Souls in style, although in a way that reshapes your expectation due to the nature of weapons that will over time become blunt and degrade.
Knowing that the weapons you've hammered into shape and spent time gathering better materials to make will eventually wear might sound disheartening. And yet, it's a core part of the Blades of Fire experience, one that forced me to think better about my actions both in and outside of combat. See, specific weapons are more and less susceptible to different enemy types, to the extent that, say, a polearm won't do as much damage to someone in full body armour.
From here you can either switch weapons from the four Aran can carry at any one time, or you have two other options: change the stance with your equipped weapon or try to target a part of the enemy's body that is vulnerable to a certain directional swipe.
As you can probably already tell, developer MercurySteam has placed a lot of depth into the way you not only can – but should – approach combat scenarios; a fact that quickly prevents you from being able to just continually button mash your way through crowded areas. The god of war Aran De Lira is not, and therefore it always pays to seek out the green outline on enemy limbs, being the best way of quickly telling whether your crafted weapon will deal out the most damage it's capable of.
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From Twin Axes to Greatswords to Spears, there are seven different weapon types you craft at the forge in total. The better you hammer the metal into each one's shape at the forge, the more damage they'll do when swung – not to mention the more times you'll be able to quickly repair it so as to avoid the need to start forging entirely from scratch.
Forged in fire
Once you get past how to swap weapons in and out on the fly and how to switch stances to slash, thrust, or otherwise, facing down goblins, spirit creatures, and bosses becomes a delicate dance of knowing not just when to attack, but how. The result is a genuinely unique and refreshing mode of third-person hack-and-slashing that is more meaningful than it is mindless, and something totally different to the usual combat language of 'attack, parry, block' that most modern action games can sometimes use as a crutch these days.
Outside of combat is where the light that usually burns bright within Blades of Fire tends to dim somewhat, since story-wise there's not a whole lot going on here surprisingly. I spent a good ten hours, for example, barrelling my way through zones before I was reminded about Aran and Adso's mission, and it's still a while longer before Queen Nerea makes a full appearance.
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Sure, this makes the extent of her evil and power all-encompassing. But in terms of actually having a tangible adversary present in the narrative? Meh, I personally would have enjoyed learning more about her whole deal much earlier on. Thankfully, there's a small but impactful cast of quirky characters that the central pair bump into, such as the magical witch Glinda and Melcart the old and forgetful spirit. As opposed to the villain, these personalities help coat Blades of Fire's world with some much-needed texture.
Speaking of which, the locations you visit throughout Blades of Fire could have absolutely been the stars of the show, were they not a tad irksome to navigate. The huge map being interconnected is one of the most effective ways MercurySteam sold me on Aran and Adso's adventure being a colossal road trip. However, it's when exploring each individual zone, fort, or dungeon that navigation can often be a real pain, where more than a few times me working out where to go next simply boiled down to guesswork.
There's a compass on screen at all times that points to the closest forge or previously dropped weapon, but they weren't enough to keep me set on the correct path. Thankfully, some areas like The Doyen Graves are better laid out than others. So often, however, did I find myself turned around due to some inconsistencies in layouts more than I'd like, which led to me being occasionally frustrated with traversal and exploration.
Shallow narrative hooks in the early game and the odd annoying biome aside, Blades of Fire excels in presenting an alluring and brand-new fantasy world I couldn't wait to dive into and chip away at further. Even in instances where I was bashing my head at a wall unable to find the next best route forward, I knew that persevering would be worth it since it meant getting to test out my newly forged, more powerful weapon at the next gaggle of enemy soldiers who lined up for slaughter.
I can't say I ever truly invested in Aran's personal plight, but I very much enjoyed the way he goes about resolving it, all thanks to one of the most unique and thoughtful melee combat systems I've experienced in the past few years. Blades of Fire borrows from the past, but when it comes to combat and creativity it also forges its own way forward.