2023 was considered a pretty phenomenal year for video games. The likes of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Resident Evil 4 remake, Baldur’s Gate 3 and Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 all duked it out for the majority of GOTY awards (Spidey ultimately won ours).
While I thoroughly enjoyed all of those titles, my personal pick for the best game of the year was Lies of P. And after all this time, I stand by it.
This action-Souls-like shamelessly cribs from the works of genre-originator FromSoftware, and feels a lot like the Bloodborne sequel we all want, but Sony frustratingly refuses to actually give us (Please, Sony, even a remaster will do).
I loved almost every moment of my 60 hours spent with Lies of P across two playthroughs (one on PS5, the other on Steam Deck OLED), and that playtime just increased thanks to its meaty new DLC expansion.
Called Lies of P: Overture, it offers you the chance to return to the gothic city of Krat and square off against a new range of tough bosses that will do their very best to cut you down.
In a nutshell, Overture is more of the brilliant Lies of P experience I love, but with the difficulty ramped up to 11.
Stepping back into Krat
In Lies of P: Overture, you once again play as Geppetto’s deadly puppet and are tasked with exploring the nightmare city of Krat. The wrinkle is that this time, you’ve stepped into the past to experience the striking location before the events of the base game. But it’s certainly no more welcoming in this period.
The Puppet Frenzy massacre, the aftermath of which you encounter in the base game, is currently ongoing, dropping you into the thick of a city in complete turmoil with chaotic scenes of violence and blue blood all around. So, where do you go first? The Zoo, of course.
Overture’s opening takes you to Krat Zoo, and it might just be my favorite level in all of Lies of P. Fighting back against deformed animals from aggressive ages, to a truly twisted type of kangaroo, sees the body-horror, which was already a strong theme in Lies of P, ramped up to new grotesque levels. And the first major boss fight, an oversized crocodile, is an absolutely doozy.
Later DLC locations like an underground facility and a cavernous mine are less visually dynamic, but the final two of Overture’s five chapters do occur in more visually distinctive settings (which I won’t spoil here). So, the DLC starts and ends strong, with a slightly mundane middle.
The core game’s fast-paced combat is maintained, which is a very good thing, because outside of the works of FromSoftware, Lies of P offers the best Soulslike gameplay I’ve ever played. Though, for the record, I still suck at parrying, so the dodge button remains my best friend.
Perhaps the DLC’s biggest addition is its numerous lore implications and revelations. I’m far from a Lies of P scholar, but I was constantly finding hidden notes that had me rethinking what I thought I knew about the Lies of P universe and the characters within it. If you enjoyed the well-told story of the base game, you’re going to love what you learn here.
Alongside the new levels to explore, there’s also a bunch of useful new weapons to pick up, new gear to wear and powerful legion arms, including my personal favorite, which lets you shoot spinning sawblades from your wrist.
Adding around 10-15 hours of new content, Lies of P: Overture is solid value for money at its $29 price. But fair warning, prepare for a tough time.
More like Lies of P: Overtuned
If I have one substantial criticism of Lies of P: Overture, it’s that developer Neowiz has gone a little too far in its efforts to make this DLC the hardest content in the game to date.
As part of the Soulslike subgenre, Lies of P was always a tough game by design. And that’s part of the reason I loved it so much. Few feelings are better in gaming than slaying a testing boss after dozens of attempts. And some of the base game bosses rank as my favorite ever in the genre.
In fact, it’s not Overture’s bosses where the overtuned difficulty can be felt. Aside from one late-game dud, these named DLC combatants are mostly brilliant. The last boss in particular gives Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree a run for its money. Finally bringing them down had me leaping from my chair in satisfaction after they had torn my face off for almost an hour.
The problem arises in the various open spaces, corridors and choke points between bosses. Regular enemy mobs have had their health pools and damage-dealing abilities seriously beefed up, and even my max-level weapons often felt like merely smacking a raging puppet with a pool noodle.
Overture also appears to have taken cues from the divisive Dark Souls 2, as not only are standard enemies extremely overpowered, they’re also thrown at you in sometimes ludicrous quantities. I’m taking crammed rooms that contain an enemy count in the double digits.
This leads to numerous sections that are a complete slog to play as you regularly find yourself swarmed by enemies that can send you to an early grave in just a few hits, and that take a practically silly amount of damage to be defeated. These moments see Lies of P: Overture fall on the wrong side of the fine line between frustration and fun.
To somewhat counteract this issue, Lies of P: Overture’s launch has coincided with a major free upgrade that adds two new difficulty options to the game. One is marked as essentially easy, the other very easy. Of course, for dedicated Souls players, dropping the difficulty is antithetical to why the genre appeals; the struggle is supposed to be part of the experience.
I should warn any new players hoping these new difficulty settings might allow them to breeze through the game, and enjoy the excellent world-building and rich lore, even on the simplest setting, Lies of P: Overture still puts up a real fight. You will need some skill, whatever level you play on.
Overall, Lies of P: Overture has given me the perfect excuse to return to one of my favorite games of this current gaming generation. It’s a largely well-crafted expansion with some intriguing new locations to explore, and some tough but tantalizing new bosses to overcome. I just wish the supposedly "regular" enemies didn’t always hit with the force of a turbocharged monster truck.
However, after rolling credits on Overture, my itch for more Lies of P remains burning, which is perhaps its biggest accomplishment. I was already desperate for the already-confirmed full sequel, and after experiencing Lies of P: Overture, that wait is going to feel just a little bit longer.
More from Tom's Guide
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.
