Phantom Blade Zero Review: The Best Parry Since Sekiro, Wrapped in a Messy Story

Phantom Blade Zero has been the poster child for Chinese action games for years - every trailer looked too good to be true, and then it slipped from September to October. It finally landed on October 29 on PS5 and PC (the evening of October 28 in the Americas), at 59.99 euros for the standard edition and 69.99 for the Digital Deluxe. No Xbox version this year. So, was the hype honest?

What it is

You play Soul, an elite killer of a secret Order who ends up stabbed through the heart and kept alive by an enchanted replacement that gives him 66 days to live. With that clock in the background you cut your way across a corrupted wuxia world that S-GAME calls "kungfupunk" - silk robes, mechanical prosthetics and an electric-guitar soundtrack. It sounds like a mood board, and somehow it works.

How it plays

This is where the game earns its reputation. The combat revolves around Sha-Chi, a stamina-like resource: blocking drains yours, perfect parries drain the enemy's. Nail a parry or dodge at the right frame and you get a Shadow Step, a punishing counter that costs a chunk of Sha-Chi but turns a fight around. Attacks, heavies, deflections and finishers chain with almost no dead frames - it's the first game since Sekiro where I parried because it felt good, not because I had to.

There are more than 30 primary weapons and over 20 Phantom Edges (special secondary arts), and they actually change how you play rather than just your damage numbers. Bosses are the highlight: multi-phase, theatrical, hard but readable, and a death doesn't always send you back to phase one. That's a mercy more soulslikes should copy.

The lows

The story wants to be cryptic in the FromSoftware way, but it ends up murky rather than mysterious - characters drop names you have no reason to care about yet, and the 66-day hook barely creates tension. Levels are big and seamlessly connected but fundamentally linear, and since rest points don't respawn enemies, there's oddly little reason to go back and practise on regular mobs. On PC the install is a hefty 145 GB on an SSD, and launch week brought Steam reports of crashes and driver trouble - check the latest patch before you buy if your rig is mid-range.

Who it's for

If you love Sekiro, Nioh or Devil May Cry and want a single-player action game where mastering a system is the whole point - buy it. If you need a coherent story to keep going, you'll be skimming cutscenes by the midpoint. For players here: the interface and subtitles include German, but there's no Croatian, so plan on English or German.

Verdict

Phantom Blade Zero isn't the flawless masterpiece some launch reviews made it out to be, but its combat is the real deal and its bosses are among the best of the year. A storytelling rewrite away from greatness.

Score: 8/10

Image: Gary Todd / CC0, source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Warring_States_Bronze_Jian_(Sword).jpg