I’m going to start this review with something that probably won’t come as much of a surprise to anyone who has read my reviews before.
I bloody hate Soulslike games.
Well, that’s perhaps a little harsh.
I don’t actually hate them. I hate what they do to me.
I hate spending twenty minutes fighting my way through an area only to get absolutely annihilated by something that looks like it should be guarding a garden shed. I hate losing all my progress. I hate repeatedly telling myself, “I know exactly what I did wrong that time”, before doing precisely the same bloody thing again.
And yet, for some reason, I keep going back. That’s why Mortal Shell 2 surprised me so much.
This is a Soulslike, make no mistake about it. It has the dark fantasy world, brutal enemies, challenging bosses, death penalties, mysterious lore and that wonderful little voice in your head telling you that you absolutely can beat the bastard that just killed you.
But this time around, Cold Symmetry has done something different. It has taken the Soulslike formula and started pulling bits of it apart. And bloody hell, it works.
A Soulslike That Doesn’t Feel Quite Like Every Other Soulslike
At first glance, Mortal Shell 2 looks like another game that has wandered out of the increasingly crowded Soulslike factory.
Dark fantasy? Check.
Ruined world? Check.
Horrible monsters? Oh, absolutely.
Bosses that are going to make you question your life choices? Obviously.
But once you actually start playing, Mortal Shell 2 begins to show what makes it different.
The biggest change is something that sounds almost sacrilegious for a Soulslike:
There is no stamina bar.
And I bloody love it.
Goodbye Stamina, Hello Aggression
Removing stamina fundamentally changes how Mortal Shell 2 feels.
You can attack, dodge, sprint and continue attacking without constantly staring at a little green bar wondering whether you’ve got enough energy left to do what you actually want to do.
It doesn’t make the game easy. Not even remotely.
You still have to understand enemy patterns. You still have to time attacks. You still have to dodge. You still have to learn when you can safely commit to an attack and when you’re about to get your face smashed in.
The difference is that the combat feels much more fluid.
You can be aggressive. You can stay on the enemy. You can dodge an incoming attack and immediately hit back rather than waiting for your stamina to recover. It’s a small change on paper. In practice, it makes a bloody enormous difference.
This has to be one of the sequel’s biggest improvements, removing the stamina creates a much more aggressive rhythm while still requiring you to commit carefully because attacks can’t simply be cancelled halfway through.
Combat Has Weight
One of the things I really appreciate about Mortal Shell 2 is that the combat doesn’t feel floaty. When you hit something, it feels like you’ve hit something. Weapons have weight. Attacks have commitment. Enemies react to what you’re doing.
There’s a brutality to the whole thing that suits the world perfectly. You aren’t gracefully dancing around the battlefield like some sort of fantasy ballerina. You’re fighting horrible creatures with weapons that look like they could remove several limbs in one swing.
And when you get it right, it feels fantastic. When you get it wrong, well… That’s probably your fault. Probably.
The Shell System Is Still the Star
The defining feature of Mortal Shell has always been its Shell system, and the sequel takes that idea considerably further.
You play as the Harbinger, a strange being capable of inhabiting the bodies of fallen warriors. These Shells aren’t simply different outfits or cosmetic character models. They fundamentally change how you approach combat.
Different Shells provide different abilities, strengths and upgrade paths, giving you plenty of room to experiment with your preferred playstyle.
And this is where Mortal Shell 2 really starts to feel like its own thing.
Rather than simply picking a class at the beginning and sticking with it, you’re encouraged to experiment.
Want to be more aggressive? There’s a Shell for that.
Want more survivability? There’s a Shell for that.
Want to experiment with something completely bloody ridiculous? Go for it.
There are eight Shells to discover, alongside a sizeable selection of weapons, creating considerably more build variety than the original game.
Exploration Is a Massive Step Forward
The original Mortal Shell was relatively compact. Mortal Shell 2 isn’t. The sequel opens things up considerably, giving you interconnected areas that encourage exploration and experimentation. And I really like that. Not because I particularly enjoy getting lost — I bloody don’t — but because the world feels like somewhere you’re actually exploring rather than simply moving between boss arenas. There are secrets, hidden areas, items and encounters tucked away throughout the world. Sometimes you’ll find something because you deliberately went looking for it.
Other times you’ll stumble across something and think:
“Oh, I definitely wasn’t supposed to find this yet.”
Those are some of my favourite moments in games like this.
And Yes, It Is Still Bloody Hard
Let’s not pretend removing stamina has somehow turned Mortal Shell 2 into a relaxing Sunday afternoon. nIt hasn’t. This is still a Soulslike. Enemies can absolutely destroy you if you get careless, and bosses will happily remind you that confidence and competence are two very different things. The difference is that I rarely felt the difficulty was there simply to piss me off. When I died, I generally knew why. I attacked too early. I got greedy. I didn’t recognise the attack pattern. I thought I could squeeze in one more hit.
That last one is almost always the reason.
And that is the sort of difficulty I can live with.
The Bosses Are Properly Mental
Boss design is another area where Mortal Shell 2 shines. There are some wonderfully bizarre creatures waiting for you, and the fights aren’t simply about hitting a massive health bar until something eventually falls over. Bosses have patterns, attacks and phases that force you to pay attention. Some will frustrate the living shit out of you. Others will have you grinning when you finally work out how to beat them. And then there’s that moment when you finally kill a boss that has destroyed you repeatedly. That feeling is precisely why people play Soulslikes. I may hate the process, but I’ll never deny that bloody satisfaction when it finally clicks.
It’s Surprisingly Funny
One of the things I wasn’t expecting from Mortal Shell 2 was humour. This is a grim, dark fantasy game filled with death, monsters and generally unpleasant things. Yet every now and then, it does something wonderfully weird. There are bizarre characters, strange situations and moments that feel almost deliberately out of place. That helps prevent the whole experience from becoming relentlessly miserable.
The World Looks Fantastic
Mortal Shell 2 is a bloody good-looking game.
The dark fantasy aesthetic works incredibly well, with ruined landscapes, strange architecture, grotesque creatures and some wonderfully atmospheric environments. There is a real sense of place here. You’re not just moving through a collection of grey corridors. The world has variety, and some of the locations genuinely make you want to stop and look around. There are also some striking visual ideas that Cold Symmetry has used to give the game its own identity. It isn’t simply trying to copy Dark Souls visually. It has its own flavour.
But It Isn’t Perfect
As much as I’m enjoying Mortal Shell 2, there are some rough edges. The camera can occasionally become a complete bastard, particularly in tighter environments where enemies are trying to get around you. There are also some technical issues and moments where hit detection doesn’t feel quite as clean as you’d expect.
Several reviews have also pointed towards balance issues and some unevenness later in the game. GamesRadar, for example, praised the combat and creativity while noting camera problems and moments where generous power-ups can actually reduce the intended challenge.
There are also areas where the world can feel a little confusing to navigate. That won’t bother everyone. But if you’re the sort of person who likes a clear objective and a nice big arrow telling you where the hell you’re supposed to go, Mortal Shell 2 might occasionally test your patience.
The Story Is Still Doing That Soulslike Thing
The story isn’t exactly going to sit you down and explain everything over a cup of tea. It’s mysterious. It’s cryptic. You’ll find pieces of information through characters, environments and collectibles and gradually start piecing together what the hell is actually happening. That’s pretty standard Soulslike territory.
Thankfully, Mortal Shell 2 does make the narrative somewhat easier to follow than some of the genre’s more deliberately obscure offerings, while still leaving plenty for players to discover. Personally, I quite like that. Give me enough information to keep me interested, then let me work some of the rest out for myself.
Cold Symmetry Has Learned From the First Game
This is perhaps the most impressive thing about Mortal Shell 2. It feels like the developers genuinely listened to what worked in the original and, more importantly, what didn’t. The first Mortal Shell had some fantastic ideas but was relatively limited in scope. The sequel takes those ideas and actually gives them room to breathe.
The Shell system is deeper.
The combat is faster.
The world is bigger.
There’s considerably more exploration.
There’s more build experimentation.
And the whole experience feels more confident.
So Why Do I Actually Like This Soulslike?
That’s the question I kept asking myself. I’m usually the person playing a Soulslike while simultaneously complaining about how bloody unfair everything is. I’ll die to the same boss ten times and swear I’m never playing another game like this again. Then I’ll come back five minutes later.
Mortal Shell 2 has somehow managed to reduce the parts of the genre that normally annoy me while keeping the parts that make it addictive. The combat is aggressive without being mindless. The difficulty is punishing without constantly feeling cheap. The Shell system gives you genuine choices. The world rewards exploration. And when you finally defeat something that’s been kicking your arse for the last hour, the satisfaction is enormous. That is what a Soulslike should be.
Final Verdict
Mortal Shell II is bloody brilliant.
I genuinely didn’t expect to enjoy this as much as I have. It’s still a Soulslike, which means it is still going to make me angry, still going to kill me repeatedly and still going to make me question why I’m voluntarily doing this to myself. But unlike some Soulslikes, I actually want to keep going.
Cold Symmetry has taken the original Mortal Shell’s best idea — the Shell system — and built an entire game around it. The result is a much larger, more confident and considerably more enjoyable experience.
The removal of stamina is a fantastic decision. Combat feels faster and more aggressive while retaining the weight and punishment that make the genre so satisfying.
The world is atmospheric and packed with things to discover. The Shells provide meaningful build variety. The bosses are suitably horrible. The visual design is fantastic and those occasional moments of weird humour stop the game becoming one long miserable march through darkness.
There are issues.
The camera can be a pain in the arse. Navigation isn’t always perfect. There are some technical rough edges and a few encounters where the difficulty or balance doesn’t quite feel right. But none of that changes how much fun I’ve had with it. And that’s the biggest compliment I can give Mortal Shell 2.
I love to hate Soulslikes.
But this one?
This one is bloody sweet.
If you’ve previously bounced off Mortal Shell or you’re simply tired of Soulslikes that feel like they’re following the same bloody blueprint, I’d absolutely give Mortal Shell 2 a chance.
It doesn’t reinvent the entire genre.
It doesn’t need to.
It takes the formula, removes some of the things that make it unnecessarily frustrating, adds its own ideas and delivers one hell of a sequel.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, there’s a boss waiting to kick my arse again.
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Written by myself then edited and formed by my partner..
