Summary
In 2009, Hidetaka Miyazaki simultaneously blessed and cursed the gaming world when he releasedDemon’s Soulsto the masses. It seemed like your usual third-person action-adventure game at a glance, albeit with a bleaker tone.
We went through the motions until an unclear scripted death would take us to a state where we lost half our health bar and would have to fight tooth and nail through gauntlets and bosses to get it back. It created a complex and challenging game genre that still turns heads, but what about before? Let’s look at some older titles that gave us the challenge and rage of a Soulslike before Soulslike was even a thing.
The main Soulslike factors considered for the entries on this list are the following:
9Ghosts ‘N Goblins
The Worst Armor Ever
Even if you’ve never owned an NES, you’ve undoubtedly heard of the infamousGhosts ‘N Goblins. At first, it sounds like a fun platformer about fighting supernatural enemies and monsters while going on an adventure. The story is simple: You’re a knight named Sir Arthur, and suddenly, the Devil kidnaps the Princess, and you must save her.
Even though this game only has around six levels, each one is broken into two parts, meaning you only get one checkpoint per level. The two halves are gauntlets filled with enemies that move quickly and erratically, appear suddenly, chase you, or swarm the area. Sir Arthur only has two hits at max, while the pitfalls are instant-death. With each death, you’re set back, everything respawns, and you’re not guaranteed the same loot.
8Ninja Gaiden
Among The First Gaming Ninja
Thanks to games likeNinja Gaiden, our understanding of ninjas has been forever changed from clandestine spies to unstoppable warriors. You play as the young Shinobi Ryu, who goes on a quest to stop a demon takeover and hopefully save those closest to him.
While Ryu is a skilled ninja with a variety of tools at his disposal and a sizable health bar, enemies are relentless. It’s worth it to slay them for loot and power-ups, but it’s also perilous, as enemies are formidable and frequently attack in groups, allowing Ryu to get hit back-to-back. Checkpoints and lives are scarce, pitfalls are plentiful, so every death feels like a massive pushback.
7Castlevania
Short And Full Of Struggle
An argument for why some of the first games were so difficult is that they needed to last long enough to justify their price.Castlevaniawas one such game, following the journey of Simon Belmont as he makes his way through Dracula’s castle to slay the vampire lord himself.
As he journeys, he’ll fight all manner of monsters and supernatural bosses with nothing but his whip and whatever weapons he can find to help him. However, everything is made to be tricky so that Simon can’t just blaze through the obstacles.
Similar to Ghosts ‘N Goblins, there are only a handful of levels with mid-level checkpoints in each. However, though Simon has more health than Arthur, every enemy hits hard and tends to knock him into death pits or other instant death-traps. Healing is infrequent and inconsistent, and with Simon’s slow and deliberate movements, you need to plan your path if you hope to make it to the demanding boss fight in one piece without losing your power-ups.
6I Wanna Be The Guy
Be Happy And Fail
For a few years,rage gameshave increased in popularity, which, as the name implies, are designed to make you rage and want to break your PC until it’s unrecognizable.
One game that pioneered that odd trend is I Wanna Be The Guy, which looks deceptively harmless. It’s about a kid who wants to be a hero, wearing a cape, has a blaster, and always sporting a massive grin. Little does he know that he is stepping into a world of pain and torture that will haunt you for days to come. The kid gets killed in one hit, and almost everything can kill him, from enemies to projectiles to hazards to falls.
The only light of hope is the few precious checkpoints that you can always see at the far end of specific screens, teasing you by seeming within reach. But, until you shoot it, it remains your current goal, and each death sends you back to the last one or to the start of the world. There aren’t any collectibles to lose, but you’ll lose plenty of time and patience as this game traps you with its simple appearance.
5Digimon World
The System Has Crashed
Despite the ongoing debate about whetherDigimonis trying to bePokemon, there’s no denying the property’s popularity. It led to the creation of one of the most popular anime series ever and laid the foundation for several games, starting with Digimon World.
The game looks straightforward and friendly enough as you play a kid sent to the Digital World to bring stray Digimon back to the city with the help of your own Digimon partner. What makes the game challenging and fairly strict is that every choice you make in raising your Digimon can digivolve it into something you don’t want or even something monstrously weak.
All the Digimon battles are with visible enemies that respawn every time you reset the area, and you never know how tough they are until your Digimon has lost most of its health. Running is an option, but it depends on how fast your Digimon is and whether it likes listening to you. Each loss costs your Digimon a precious life, sending you back to the last safe zone, and if you lose them all, your Digimon and all of its stats are set back to the lowest scores.
4King’s Field
Difficulty Inspires Difficulty
Like many game companies, FromSoftware used to develop games for the tried-and-true PlayStation, with one of them beingKing’s Field. Just looking at it might make it hard to believe that these were the same people who would go on to make the Soulsborne games.
As far as the plot goes, it’s more on the straightforward side: there’s a fantasy kingdom and a dark power that the evil leader wants to use to take over the world. You play the chosen hero who must descend the depths of a dark and dangerous labyrinth to stop the leader and eliminate the dark power.
The first-person perspective may throw you off, but this could be considered the original Soulslike. There are long stretches of dungeon filled with tons of enemies that will relentlessly attack you. You have weapons and magic to defend yourself, but both are dependent on stamina, which will leave you defenseless if it runs out. When you die, you reset to the last place you were able to save, meaning anything you’ve accomplished since then is gone.
3Shin Megami Tensei/Persona
Make Friends, Lose Progress
While theShin Megami TenseiandPersonaseries have gone their separate ways, they will always be intimately connected. Looking back at the first entries of each, they had you playing as an JRPG protagonist with the ability to recruit enemies of all sorts to their side through various methods.
This leads to a lot of variety in building teams, especially when other party members are introduced, and results in many different strategies. The issue is that new games still have what the old games started: Gauntlets.
There are a decent number of save points, but you never know how far it is until the next one or what will happen between now and then. Maybe you’ll get trapped in a series of unskippable cutscenes followed by back-to-back monster fights, followed by a boss fight with multiple phases, with no chance to recover. Hopefully, you packed for the trip. Otherwise, you could lose an hour or more of progress in an instant and anything you gained on the way.
2Meat Boy
Served Rare With Lots Of Blood
Before we all got to experience and appreciate the wonder of the refinedSuper Meat Boy, we traveled to New Grounds, where we met the original cube of meat. He wasn’t super yet, but the original Meat Boy had a lot of potential and plenty to offer.
In the traditional platforming story structure, Meat Boy is hanging out with his girlfriend, Bandage Girl, when the evil Dr Fetus appears using science and kidnaps her just because. This forces Meat Boy to run and jump to get across the world and save her.
There are a lot of levels, but each one is pretty short, and you may almost always see the end in sight, and that’s the trick. Because you can see the end, you think you can do it, and it doesn’t matter that everything kills Meat Boy in one hit and sends him back to the start. Resets are quick, movement is fast, and the next thing you know, you’ve lost several hours to the same jump and have nothing to show for it.
1Rogue
No Retries
BeforeSoulslikeand beforeRoguelike, there was Rogue. This 1980s game had you playing as an adventurer seeking a powerful amulet in the depths of a dangerous dungeon. All you have to do is make it down each floor and slay every monster in your way.
There will be plenty of gear and items to collect to help you out, and a turn-based grid system to give you time to make your decisions. But, as you already guessed, it’s all over if you make the wrong decision.
Every time you delve into the dungeon, you’re not guaranteed the same loot or the same enemy behavior. What might have worked previously could fail this time, and if you relied on a specific build or equipment before, you won’t have the same chance of getting it again. You have to adapt, play smart, and use every bit of progress to learn more about the dangers so that you can keep your current (and likely future) run alive.
