Immortal Unchained gameplay Preview – A Sci-Fi Dark Souls Game in the Making

Take a look at some exclusive, Immortal Unchained gameplay from our hands-on with Toadman Interactive’s impressive sci-fi Dark Souls style game in the making. Coming to PC, Xbox One and PS4 from September 7th 2018.

From developers Toadman Interactive who previously developed Bloodsports TV back in 2015, presents a new sci-fi themed hardcore action role playing game Immortal Unchained. The story is written by a talented team including Anne Toole who has worked on The Witcher and Adrian Vershinin who has previously worked on Killzone: Shadow Fall and Battlefield 1 games. To cut to the chase, you take on the role of a living super weapon who has been unleashed onto the world to save it from impending doom from a cataclysmic event threatening to end all worlds. No easy task then as you are initially thrust into a tutorial mission set within your dark chambers where you have been chained since forever.

To begin, players can select a male or female character, with some basic customization options available to suit your tastes. If you’re after big boobs and pretty, or devilishly handsome and ripped, then forget it, as these ultimate weapon characters look as tough as nails and not someone you might want to jump into bed with once all the apocalyptic action is over. Players can choose from a selection of three main classes depending on how you wish to play with long ranged attacker, all rounder or heavy grunt on offer.

Aside from the rather cool looking sci-fi themed visuals, the game tutorial eases players into the basics of lock-on shooting, melee combat and of course grabbing loot from various crates and dropped orbs. From the offset, it has to be mentioned there is a very Dark Souls feel to the game in terms of its design, right up to the point where if you lose “bits” (the game’s leveling up currency) when you are killed, you need to go back and retrieve them otherwise they are lost forever. You can also only level-up, change weapons and upgrade at specific obelisks reminiscent of the bonfires in the Dark Souls series. Enemies will respawn each time you activate the obelisks. You can get the point.

Going back to the combat, players can opt to tailor their character to suit their play-style, but it has to be said, at this juncture, ranged attacking is far more tactical and less punishing on one’s health. The melee combat right now needs to be tweaked otherwise it will remain a fairly redundant means of survival. At present, the enemies will chomp away at your health far more than the damage you inflict upon them making melee very much a last resort should you run out of ammo. Hopefully, Toadman will tweak the damage points to make it a more viable option. That said, for the highly skilled, you can dodge and roll out of the way of attacks and get sneaky hits on the enemy weakpoints which is the better form of melee combat rather than going head to head.

The shooting is where the game shines and to be honest, gives the game its own identity. It just works really well and feels much more natural in this sci-fi setting. You can still roll and dodge in and outside of locking-on to the enemy and as mentioned hit the weak points if being tactical. There is a reasonable range of usual suspects weapons to choose from such as shotgun, pistol, various auto rifle guns and sub macs , and with the option to upgrade and carry more weapons means the design takes the ultimate weapon moniker pretty seriously. That said, the game is pretty tough as nails and aside from falling to your doom due to a badly timed roll, or stepping into a watery abyss to your death because it’s not so clear where the edges are – (ahem, sort that out please devs), the enemies can and will overwhelm. So, you do have to think about your encounters and learn where the enemy is coming at you from by remembering past mistakes.

Looking at the character progression and as with (that other game) it pays-off to do leveling-up runs to boost your stats once you become familiar with the lye of the land. This is a good tactic rather than risking bits and having to retrieve them for venturing too far with a large build-up of points. It’s this risk and reward approach that keeps players hooked, and works just as well here. Players can pump their gained bits into several key areas relating to weapon damage, critical attacks, health, evasion and stamina which obviously are dictated by your choice at the start of the experience. Do you pump points into a few key areas already boosted by your starting choice or make a more balanced character? These are the trials players have to face.

So far, Immortal Unchained is looking like a really neat action role playing game to sink your teeth into when it launches on September 7th on PC, Xbox One and PS4. The combat is great aside from a few niggles with the melee, but the cool shooting kind of makes up for that. Hopefully the melee side of things will be tweaked a little before launch. The lore seems to be quite in-depth as well which is good and the visuals are great looking making for a pleasant world to explore. In terms of performance, there are no issues running the game at 4K resolution using maximum settings with a GTX 1080 Ti which is encouraging, and playing the game with a gamepad feels natural as well. So, all looking good so far and certainly another game to keep an eye on when it rolls out in the coming weeks. If you like your games with a more hardcore slant, then Immortal Unchained has your name on it.

Written by: Rob Cram

Rob Cram has hundreds of video game reviews, thousands of articles under his belt with years of experience in gaming and tech. He aims to remain fair and free from publisher/developer influence. With his extensive knowledge, feels his gaming opinions are valid and worth sharing. Agreement with his views are entirely optional. He might have a bias towards cyberpunk.