Enotria: The Last Song Review

It’s been a good few years for soulslikes. Both P’s lies AND Black Myth of Wukong continue to show how far you can push the formula, adding shrewd novel ideas but taking the foundation to a completely novel setting and mood. Honestly, that’s what I love most about the genre; how you can take this framework that players understand and apply it as a means to explore a novel setting or mythology.

In the case of Lies of P, it was a gloomy and atmospheric adaptation of Pinocchio, an 18th century children’s tale, while in the case of Black Myth Wukong, it was Journey to the West, an even older 16th century Chinese novel. I’m not sure what it is about the Soulslike genre that allows game developers to adapt such diverse source material, but I think it’s the perfect combination of something familiar and something unfamiliar—a familiar set of mechanics in a fresh, unfamiliar place.

For that reason, I was particularly excited about Enotria: The Last Song, a soulslike rooted in Italian folklore. It’s something I know very little about, but much like Black Myth Wukong, I was excited to learn while killing bosses and exploring sunlit regions inspired by the Mediterranean, albeit full of dogs, traps, and all the usual soulslike goodies.

Sunny shores

The first thing you can say about Enotria is that despite its flaws, it’s a very pretty game. Whether it’s the decorative masks and carnival costumes you wear as the Maskless One – that’s your character’s name – or the sandy beaches and rustic towns you blast through in the levels, it’s a completely unique feel that I haven’t seen in a Souls-like before. I found it a bit lacking on the NPC side for its genre, and the map design seems fairly linear for the most part, but each region has its own special flavor.

I was pleasantly surprised when, in the second region, I found myself exploring age-old Greek ruins and fighting an army of cannon-wielding conquistadors. Even if the regular bosses can sometimes seem a bit samey, the main bosses at the end of each region are fun and thematic in their visual design. The setting is definitely Enotria’s strongest element, and if you’re particularly interested in Italian folklore, you’re in for a treat.

The game’s biggest visual flaw is its awful motion blur. Thankfully, the developers recently added (since the demo) an option to turn it off, so I suggest you apply it if you’re particularly susceptible to it.

Combat misfortunes

It wouldn’t be fair to compare Enotria to Lies of P or Black Myth Wukong, considering the game was developed by a relatively compact studio, but it’s not all that much cheaper than either of those. It’s vital to know what you’re getting, so I’ll be candid – Enotria is pretty clunky in terms of gameplay. It lacks the necessary flow of combat that’s so vital to a Souls-like game to make you feel like you can master the system and become proficient at it.

First, the combat is too focused on parrying. Much like in Sekiro, you build up a stagger meter on an enemy or boss by parrying their attacks and landing a critical hit when it’s full. Unless you specialize heavily in the game’s skill system, 90% of the combat involves standing in front of an enemy and parrying them, or maybe throwing in the occasional punch if you’re swift enough with your weapon.

Picture 1 With 5

Weapon combos are simplistic, and enemy attacks don’t feel balanced against the game’s weapons. If you equip a polearm or ultra-greatsword, for example, you won’t even have time to hit most enemies in the middle of a combo, meaning all you can do is sit there and parry the same attacks over and over again — enemies and bosses have very few attacks — until they’re stunned.

Another delicate aspect of combat is the almost Pokémon-like elemental system. As you travel, you’ll encounter enemies or bosses of a specific element, Vis, Fatuo, Gratia, Malanno, and you’ll do significantly less damage to them unless you apply a weapon or mask line to imbue your weapon with the appropriate element. The game gives you three sets of weapons to switch between at will, and two weapons for each to deal with, but the system seems pointless to me.

Creating your own build is a huge part of the Soulslike experience, so being forced to cover enemy elemental weaknesses with your weapon kind of breaks that freedom, especially when it’s an arbitrary system that doesn’t really add much to enemy experience or difficulty beyond just tankiness. The build should be about playstyle, not just covering a specific damage type.

Playing your role

The other difficulty with Enotria is that it’s very massive on systems and mechanics, throwing them all together at the very beginning of the game and then leaving you to laboriously apply them in practice. You have the classic soul leveling system, but you also have Path of the Innovators: a tree of unlockable passive skills that you can equip six of. These allow you to specialize in combat, mask lines, and weapon infusions that you get by casting mask lines into specific slots.

There are also aspects—similar to the Great Runes from Elden Ring—that change stat distribution and grant a passive ability. And last but not least, you have masks. You get them by defeating bosses or collecting mask fragments from specific enemies. For the most part, these systems won’t significantly affect your playstyle—even masks grant mostly passive ability. Mask lines are the most vital.

Picture 1 With 5

You have four Mask Line slots to equip these abilities in, and you’ll find more as you explore the game. My main issue with them is that they take a long time to charge up by attacking enemies – although you can speed this up in the skill tree – and you’re very easily stunned by them during the casting animation, which drains the apply. This means that if you’re going to apply Mask Lines at all, you need to develop a very precise understanding of how long they take to cast, otherwise they’ll leave you more vulnerable to attacks than just parrying.

Once I realized I could easily get stunned outside of my mask lines even by basic attacks, I stopped using them entirely and found that it made the experience smoother than trying to remember the exact timing of casting abilities. Honestly, it would be a much more functional system if you gained some level of anti-interrupt or hyper armor while using them.

Lowering the curtain

Enotria is clearly a labor of love in terms of setting, but that’s what makes it frustrating when the experience doesn’t quite match up. It feels like the game would benefit from Early Access or more time for player feedback and development, because it’s so close to being something so much better. Tweaks to weapon balance, mask lines, enemy attack animations, hyper armor, and health would go a long way.

As it is, Enotria doesn’t have that factor I feel when playing a shrewd Souls-like, coming across some minor innovation or mechanic that suddenly makes me think “Wow, that’s really clever!” or sometimes even mechanics that I wish FromSoft would include again in their games. The combat will certainly get you through it if you’re invested in the setting, but the endless parrying, elemental system, mask line stun and how hard it is to apply slower weapons will probably grate on you. To me at least, combat in a Souls-like should feel like a second skin, and Enotria doesn’t achieve that.