Blade & Sorcery: The Sorcery Update (VR)

I posted a review of Blade & Sorcery back in January, but the game recently received a pretty substantial – and impressive – update. Update 8 – AKA The Sorcery Update – adds two new spells – fire and gravity. It updates the existing NPC models and adds a new amour tier system into the game – cloth, leather and plate. It also adds a new map, some new weapons and some welcome improvements to weapon penetration.

Let’s begin by talking about the new spells. Fire lets you toss fireballs from your hand which – in VR – is an absolute blast. At range, they can be tricky to control, but you can direct them to a degree once released. You can also ‘charge’ weapons with fire, increasing their level of penetration. A regular dagger can’t penetrate plate armour, for example, but a dagger charged by fire can.

You can also – although this is still a work in progress – charge a stave with fire and use it to ‘shoot’ fireballs. It’s a little wonky but, combined with the other spells, really makes you feel like the ultimate wizard badass.

 

Gravity is the most ‘complete’ spell yet released. You can release a gravity blast from a single hand, staggering a foe, or a double blast from both hands to really send them flying. Charging both hands creates a localised anti-gravity field around the player, and merging the gravity spheres generated in each hand creates a powerful anti-gravity ‘bubble’ in which everything not you will fly into the air.

Like with fire and electricity you can also charge weapons with gravity and even use it to ‘grab’ npcs at range in a telekinetic force choke. Using both hands you can even rip the arms and legs from your foes. It’s probably a little too powerful, to be honest, but it’s up to you how much you want to abuse it.

Fire and gravity really change up the way you play and give you more creative tools to work with. They also, unfortunately, kind of make the electricity spell at little pointless – it can still be useful for stunning an opponent, but why would I bother when I can punch a double fireball into their face?

 

The new armour system also changes the way you play. Cloth armour is easy to deal with, and even leather to a degree – a strong thrust can still penetrate leather. But plate armour is more tricky, and this is where the spells (particularly fire) come into play. If you don’t want to use the spells though, there are other options.

Blunt weapons are suddenly more than just a fun novelty – they’re exceptionally useful against plate. You can’t pierce a plate chest but you can smash a war hammer into it, knocking your foe to the ground. Weapon precision also becomes far more important. Your foes aren’t totally protected by armour – arms, legs and faces are all weak areas to target.

And this is why the improvements to weapon penetration are so important. Previously, trying to stab a particular body part like an arm or leg would see a blade ‘bounce’ or ‘slide’ away from it. But now, every strike lands perfectly and every blade penetrates at the point of impact. This improvement really is key to also making the new armour system work because its primary weakness (ignoring spells) is precision attacks.

 

Since I picked up Blade & Sorcery it’s one of the few VR games I keep jumping back into for short burst sessions – and this excellent update will undoubtedly see that continue. Yes, there’s still not much of a ‘game’ here – it’s still just a combat sandbox in which you simply fight various waves of enemies on a handful of different maps. But the combat is so damn fun and – with this latest update in particular – gives you so much creative freedom that you never really get tired of it.

It’s the best VR combat I’ve played and, as I said in my review, it’s the standard by which other VR games should be judged. I guess the question is – where does Blade & Sorcery go from here? Improving the existing spells (fire and electricity) and perhaps adding a couple of more would be great. More enemy / armour variety and an expanded character creation tool. More weapons.

There’s a lot it can do, and that’s before we even consider the possible inclusion of some kind of campaign. I’m not expecting much, but I can totally see some kind of randomised ‘dungeon’ mode in which you progress, level up and earn loot to buy new weapons or abilities. Something like that though, if it even happens, is a long way off. But in the meantime, I’m going to keep playing and enjoying Blade & Sorcery for what it already offers.