Beast of Reincarnation is not a Soulslike. I need that on the record. I’ve put 30+ hours into this game, finished it, and reviewed it here at The Outerhaven, and I still don’t understand why people keep trying to jam it into a genre it doesn’t belong in.
What really gets me is that it’s not just casual social media takes. Major outlets; IGN, Polygon, sites that should absolutely know better; have used the term too. Even when the developer of the game has stated multiple times that the game isn’t a Soulslike. We’ve reached a point where any third-person action RPG with tough combat, dodging, parrying, and a big boss fight gets the “Soulslike” label slapped on it, deserved or not.
If I had to compare Beast of Reincarnation to something, I’d say it’s much closer to NieR: Automata or Sekiro, rather than Dark Souls or Elden Ring. Yes, you have to learn enemy attacks, dodge, parry, and figure out boss patterns. But that alone doesn’t make something a Soulslike. By that logic, half the action games released in the last decade would qualify.
Look at what actually defines the genre. When you die in a real Soulslike, you drop your currency and have to fight your way back to retrieve it, with a death penalty hanging over your head the whole time. That’s not the case here. When you die in Beast of Reincarnation, that currency and progress just… stays. Dying during a boss fight isn’t even that big of a deal, because the game lets you restart right at the boss and try again immediately. Does that sound like a Soulslike to you? The genre people constantly complain about because dying means a long trek back just to try again?
Then there’s the stamina system, or rather, the lack of one. You’re not carefully watching a bar, weighing whether you have enough left for one more swing or need to save some for a dodge. That constant risk-management tension, which is arguably the backbone of Soulslike combat, just isn’t present here. Instead, combat is much more focused on action, parrying, abilities, and the synergy between Emma and Koo. It plays and feels different, not just on paper, but in your hands.
And then there’s the difficulty system. If a boss is kicking your ass and you’re done dealing with it, you can lower the difficulty and keep going. You can’t do that in a Soulsike (well, not most of them) and that alone is a pretty significant departure from what people usually associate with Soulslikes, a genre that’s practically built its identity around unforgiving, non-negotiable difficulty.
Now, does Beast of Reincarnation borrow some ideas from Soulslikes? Sure. So does practically every modern action RPG at this point. FromSoftware’s influence is everywhere in the industry right now, and that’s fine. But borrowing a few ideas doesn’t suddenly make every action game with a dodge button and a tough boss a Soulslike.
Beast of Reincarnation is an action RPG, and that’s perfectly fine on its own merits. At some point, we need to stop using “Soulslike” as shorthand for every action game that occasionally puts up a fight, because honestly, it’s starting to frustrate me seeing the label slapped onto games that clearly don’t fit it.
