Who needs proper names, when 'Annihilator' gets the point across? These titans and their lesser cohorts have no other purpose than to kill. Consider the titles of the bosses you fight. You may begin your adventure in a holy sanctuary, but this place seeks to murder you. Instead, it's better to let the frozen walkways and giant braziers speak for themselves. In time, the story begins to make sense, but this cliched tale of the balance between good and evil isn't the reason to press on. Unwisely, the game insists on trying to weave a coherent story into these spaces, with each of Harkyn's cohorts and various audio logs tossing up a word salad that does little to get you invested. This is Lords of the Fallen: ponderous and unwelcoming. Two colossal soldiers are carved into the mountain on either side of the entrance, warning you of the blood that will soon be spilled. The massive chains that connect your destination to the bridge must have taken hundreds of hours to forge. Ahead of you lies the gaping maw of a demonic temple hungry for your flesh.

The view from this bridge says more about this world than words can convey. Lords of the Fallen means to choke you with smoke and poison, and to crush you between the stone slabs that line its monumental suspended bridge. Snowy peaks may rise in the distance, but you will not be breathing in their refreshing air. Lords of the Fallen's dramatic citadel and hushed monastery are suffering from the invasion of otherworldly flesh-monsters and armored behemoths.

'World' might be too generous a word, actually: You spend most of your time in corridors and combat arenas, not gazing onto spacious landscapes. Harkyn himself is not easy to love, but ultimately, he doesn't matter as much as the world he serves and the hammers he swings. Harkyn may not be delighted by the adventure he's been thrust into, but I can claim no such apathy: Lords of the Fallen is a dark-fantasy pleasure, cut from the same cloth as Dark Souls, yet distinct enough to earn its own spotlight and, perhaps, to earn your affection as well. He exits conversation not with a goodbye, but with a gruff 'I don't care,' as if he can barely be bothered to embark on the quest at hand.

Lords of the fallen champion