Mortal Shell: Every Platform Tested - A Dark Souls Competitor Emerges!

A debut project for developer Cold Symmetry with a clear Souls inspiration - blended with its own ideas in combat and world design. Mostly impressively, it lands on every console and PC- with 4K support reserved for Pro and X.

[rowanunderwood]

They missed "From's" biggest feature, uneven frame pacing!

[MKMadness]

These frame drops are nothing compared to From Soft games.

[Bones_]

I know some people have criticized this game for it's design choices but I actually love the map design, especially the main Fallgrim area. At first you certainly feel lost, but I love that sense of being in a new place to explore, and as you familiarize yourself with it you get that sense of accomplishment as you gain your bearings and start to notice the more nuanced design decisions. For example when you first run through you feel like you're running in circles, but just like there are the three distinct areas to go to from Fallgrim, the areas leading up t the entrances have distinct stylistic choices. The crypt area is preceded by gravestones and scattered ruins, the obelisk area is hinted at by scattered smaller stone pillars, and the fire temple in the mountains is encompassed by rocky canyon walls on all paths leading to it. Combat feels great, enemy design is fun, and while it's shorter than some games it's also only $30 dollars so the price for the experience is also well worth it and the shells and weapons are well designed enough to justify repeat varied playthroughs for those interested. Really hope this game does well and this team can have a good path forward to their next project, although I also wouldn't mind if they decided to do any kind of expansion to this either, I know I'd certainly put money down for that.

[andrewwight]

These are my favourite types of videos on Digital Foundry—one person, straight and to the point. Great video Thomas! This looks like a game I may want to try one day.

[Sandfries]

Were you able to get HDR and Resolution Scaling to work on PC at all? Or is it still broken as of the upload of this video?

[uselesstilxmas]

It never is like Dark Souls if it doesnt run like Dark Souls without DSfix

[SOTVT]

The game looks cool and plays relatively smooth on the x box one x. It's a shame that HDR still doesn't work, though.

[JulianCallan]

Really good game. The 4K patch has caused some more slowdown in the Eternal Narthex area.

[CastisV]

There was a patch a few days ago that added 60fps support for Xbox One X. Not sure about Pro. It's a game changer! Game plays and looks so much better at 60fps!

[rowanunderwood]

Big miss not bumping up to 60fps for the "indie" low res mode on consoles.

[kaikiske]

Huge Souls fan, bought this on release day. Not really feeling it tbh. It's admirable for sure what the small dev team did, no complaints graphics wise. The world layout is confusing however, and there are way too many mobs right away. I'll obviously give it more time, but I'm a bit disappointed. I'd love to see the team get a big budget for their next stab though.

[Floodsye]

This game should certainly receive a next-gen update/upgrade. Those machines have more than enough power to run this at 60+fps, a 1080p would easily reach 120fps judging by PC benchmarks, probably even 1440p 120fps could be achieved honestly due to the raw power of those devices. 4K60fps would be my go-to however. I love high refresh for multiplayer and hope it becomes a standard option for consoles as it has been always for PC. However, even my fairly powerful gaming PC is just slightly too old to deliver that 4K60 experience and the fidelity of a 4K output is truly stunning at 60fps and I truly want to experience that. I also have a soft spot for consoles, the concept of bringing PC-like power to them is...awesome.

[mondo]

Aside from the few titles that might perform a little better on the Pro, due to the much higher resolutions on the 1X, the vast majority of games look AND run better on the 1X. It's odd how people go around claiming that the Pro runs games better when there are very few that do. I mean there were even games that ran better on the og xbox one than they did on the og ps4. It happens.

[WodverWizard]

"We have HDR support too."

Why not mention that HDR had been broken from day one and never worked on any console version? The option was there but it was forced to 'off'.

In fact, the last patch removed any mention of HDR in the menus and they've said nothing about it in the patch notes. They haven't even said anything like "We're working on it" on any of their platforms. I don't think we'll ever see HDR support for this.

[zofrea]

Good vid, wish they mentioned the HDR mode which is currently broken on most/all platforms at this time

[MyNickNameIsNice]

What do you guys think about wukong, looking forward to a small feature

[morbillionaire]

All these types of games should take the same approach as Nioh on ps4, I rather play at 720p 60fps than 1800p at 30fps.. When will devs realise that in these types of games solid performance is soo much more important than a crispy clear picture?

[forzathonisback]

Xbox One X - Dynamic 1800p
PS4 Pro - 1440p
PS4 - Dynamic 900p
Xbox One/S - Dynamic 900p

All run at 30fps

Watch vid for distinctions

[phrozac]

Man, I love this game! So close to getting the plat. As a huge SoulsBorne fan, I’m happy to say Cold Symmetry know their shit. This is the best 3d Soulslike by far. It’s so evocative of the Souls formula it verges on outright robbery to be honest, but when it’s done this well, I don’t care. Hopefully they can make a bigger and even better sequel.

Been playing on PC and PS4 Pro. My 1080ti can run this well over 60fps at 1440p ultra. But it’s also pretty good at 4K/30 high settings.

[draketheman]

Is John going to cover Mortal Shell's development or art direction in a video? That would be awesome!