Phantom Blade Zero is a pleasing punishment action RPG
Blog Andrew Joseph 04 Oct , 2025 0
Typically, we attach a descriptor to fans of a particular game type. Someone might be a Sagittarius fanatic or a puzzle expert, maybe a sports enthusiast, and everyone will bring in some kind of image that we may be connected to a particular audience. Then there are the hard action game lovers, those of us who are happy with friction, revel in the struggle. Or we like to call ourselves, Sickos. In Tokyo Game Show 2025, this Sicko is playing hands with Phantom Blade 0, the highly anticipated action RPG for S-Game. With fierce weapons, cruel Terminator and barbaric enemies, it has a good time of bleeding. After an hour of uninterrupted battle, boss fights and multiple deaths, I asked the question: How long can I schedule my days of illness?
Exquisite swordsmanship
You play the soul, which is an assassin because he murdered his orders. Our journey with him in this demo begins at the bottom of the canyon. Just a few steps later, we encountered an enemy camp. When a pair of infantry costs, then a spear soldier riding on a horse, while the archers in the nearby tower aim at a pair of spear soldiers, so the battle will not be relaxed. If what they want is a battle, it will be the battle they will get because I stretched out my sword and started fighting for position.
Phantom Blade 0 is an action game, and most importantly. The fighters including you have a health bar and a sha-chi meter. The former does what you expect, while the latter is a mixture of endurance, skill, strength and energy for special attacks. In a strictly soul-like sense, this is not a battle based on endurance. You can do things like throwing away basic attacks or dodging without worrying about losing the ability to defend yourself. However, you do need it to attack more powerful Sha-Chi (aka heavy) and be consumed when blocked. If you or an enemy run out of Sha-Chi, you're destroyed, which breaks the stance and makes you very vulnerable until it's supplemented.
I took a few arrows for my troubles, but managed to get through the small separation. With the health of the enemy and the decline of Shaki, I was able to execute the Terminator, aka the dazzling azzo thriving, eliminating the enemy in a cruel and bloody way. As I pushed forward, I encountered a small bell hanging from a short wooden rack. Wave and play, revealing a part of the map. It's also a rebirth area and a quick trip point, similar to the bonfire of the Dark Souls.
Executing a block when the attack comes can make you put out the strikes, and I quickly learned that these are not only defensive choices; They can not only consume sha-chi's incoming damage, but also exhaust the attacker's damage. Of course, you might be able to violate an enemy with purely aggressiveness, but face a stronger enemy or group who all desire to start beating you right away, which won't cut it down. The best option is not necessarily to do sword-making like Ninja gaiden, or turn like Sekiro. It's almost like a middle ground where the elements of both come together, fighting has a very unique feel as you push forward, invite attacks, and then Parry and Ripst.
This is not to say there is no place to hide. The enemy launched special attacks, called cruel operations and killer operations; the former is to be eliminated, while the latter avoided them. Using the correct defense type will cause you to perform Ghostep, a very smooth teleport path that directly leads to counterattacks. This is convenient when I climb up the crumbling scaffolding on the cliff. I was invisible on the climb and killed a swordsman, but without getting a spear, he had to rely heavily on those ghosts as he and the three companions he called took turns trying to turn me into pincushion.
Death is just the beginning
My first death was about 15 minutes in the demo. After fighting on several isolated platforms, I fought against a pair of spear users. I quickly knocked down one, but ate too much shot in aggressiveness. I tried to take a more measured approach, though, but once I tried to create space, I was blown to death by some distant archers. My life is over, and a crimson “death” crawled on the screen.
After a moment, I woke up from the past. Unlike the Soul Game, visiting places of grace or equivalent places restores the fallen enemies to life, and everyone I was defeated died. There are no runes to collect, and there are no battles involved, but this does not mean that death is consequenceless. The soul has 66 days to complete his mission, and every death kills him. Now, it's unclear how strict the limit is, or whether we can go back for a few days, but I'll certainly feel the pressure of life, rather than wasting any potentially limited time to die if I could avoid it.
I decided it was time to switch my arms a little. Souls can equip common combat with two weapons, and the two Phantom Edges are limited-use items such as powerful bows or nails, a giant Hallbird that can crush enemies with a charged storm. Each weapon has a unique combination and has a special ability. Sanguine is your default longsword that launches quick tumbling attacks, which is perfect for chopping off enemies.
I've been relying on seamless death, a pair of chakra-like weapons that can be used to quickly and close combos, or to cause solid damage from a distance. Now, when I decided to return to the scene of death and retaliate against the remaining spear soldiers, I decided to give the great great sword, go. I had to run to avoid the incoming fires of Bowman going over the canyon and eventually found a route where I could use some platforms that I could use, thus making the excellent wall-mounted run quickly kill the swordsmen I encountered along the way, which was my pointless swordsmen.
I ring a bell here, build a new rebirth point, and jump to another pair of enemies equipped with bows and arrows. I landed above one, performed a throw-in combination to kill him in one breath, and then used the organizer to separate his partner's head and body to form a satisfying blood. Not long after, I was swung by a pair of daggers. Instead of defeating them with my blades, I called on one of my phantom edges to the flame mane. This took the form of burning the lion mask, quickly burning my two opponents, opening the way for me.
Intoxicated by struggle
Eventually, I reached a large open area at the bottom of the cliff. After fighting with several sets of enemies, it's time to take over my first boss. Enter Wan Jun “Coppermaul”, a towering figure built like Diablo's butcher, with a huge warhammer that perfectly matches his pure quality. I will soon learn that he fought dirty too, too, as he used his weapons to scatter dirt on my face, covering the screen to cover up my popularity. The mistake caught proved a fatal mistake that would make Carl Raleigh proud when he grabbed me, lined up at me and smashed me with his swing.
Discomfortably, I went back to another one. His wild swing was powerful, but I quickly reached most of his attack time, each combo took a big chunk from his Shia. Once he is destroyed, I will use the soft snake sword to attack and work hard, which is a flexible, almost whip-like blade that will quickly destroy. There were a few moments, but when I knocked down the giant, the excitement of victory was mine. This is a cool battle and a great example of the importance of learning the boss model in real time. I call Bashpole his weapon, as the Phantom Edge. I held it down and smashed it on the wooden floor to reach the new access and continued on.
The next boss was totally surprised. As I walked through some kind of village, I climbed onto the roof of a circular building. The Red Ghost stands sharply on a small spire in the center. Despite her smaller frame, it makes it a daunting entrance due to the total lack of cutscenes, doors or any other warning. She immediately pressed the attack with a long sword and some kind of throwing blade, but I managed to quickly break her guard. It seems like something happened, though – the battle seemed too easy, and it wasn't attracted by the attention of the soul, and he suggested we could let her go and escape. Curiosity made me better, I hurriedly retreated, abandoning the red ghost – this decision will come back to bother me.
After several skirmishes, I arrived at the last boss of the seven-star chief disciple demonstration. He led a team of six more fighters, and even as a veteran of many, many action games, I must admit that it was one of the most impressive boss fights in recent memory. Each fighter has his own health lawyer, including the chief disciple, the health lawyer with the boss, who seamlessly switch between independent action and strike. For one moment I isolated an enemy, snatched away toward their health, and then suddenly coordinated thrust attacks from all directions, as my fully timed Dodge allowed me to jump over their collective attacks and gracefully landed on the comprehensive tip of all weapons.
It was a gorgeous wonder, and every time I picked the health of the chief disciple in this complicated iron dance, his followers healed him, sacrificing his own health in the process. I kept challenging the group, and when I was in danger of being overwhelmed, I used Bashpole's jump to smash to fly everyone up. As their numbers dwindled, the chief disciple changed the tactics to give him health to ensure there were always at least three followers. This proves his stupidity, as I used his quick-decreasing power and was abandoned by seamless death.
However, the battle is not over yet. His three disciples scattered across three towers, throwing away similar threads. The boss now called the chief disciple’s fallen hope rose from the ground like the abhorrence of a puppet, and the battle began. This time was strictly 1v1, and his fierce attacks are now swaying with him as he attacked me with melee attacks and threw a screen filled barrage of his own threads. Even so, I thought I could handle it until I heard the voice calling, “Nothing can separate us, not even in death!” The Red Ghost is back, and both bosses’ anger is beyond my ability.
I'm dead. Then I died again. Say it again. Each rematch starts at the beginning of the puppet phase, but when the Red Ghost arrives, I fall over and over again and again, and I decide to bother me with the early days of kindness. But damn it, if I didn’t learn a little more every time, then it’s the last stage, with only more health per try. As I tried several attempts on what seemed impossible, I began to see the windows going to attack until at the end, my heart slammed in my chest, and I stood out from the seamless death, hitting the red ghost, from my seamless death, and suffered from the hope lost by the disciples, and suffered from my lost hope, and shouldered my shoulders, and the last circle swung my shoulders.
There are three difficult options, but even in the default settings I play, Phantom Blade 0 is hard and I like it very much. Never felt cheap; it was just a request for me. In just one hour of play, I was easily ten times as good as the player I started. This sense of accomplishment is reserved for the best action games on Earth. If the rest is something I've played with on TGS, then I think Phantom Blade 0 might be one of them.