I've already put 10 hours into this upcoming RPG's demo because it has the best combat I've seen outside a FromSoft game

I had to stop playing 1v1 PvP in Armored Core 6 because it was a detriment to my health: The knife's edge, million miles an hour duels filled me with so much adrenaline I'd have trouble sleeping if I played too late in the evening. Other games⁠—and for a few minutes right after playing, real life⁠—would feel so slow I had trouble adjusting.

The new demo for indie RPG Sword Hero made me feel the same exhilaration and "nothing can compare" spoiling, but in singleplayer. Videogame combat so good, it might be a problem.

To my editor reading this: I promise I got work done yesterday, but when I sat down for Sword Hero's updated Tournament demo for "just a few rounds to see what's new," it became the rest of my work day and much of my evening. I broke just in time for a thing with friends, then decided I needed "just a few more rounds" before playing for two unbroken hours that felt like one. This morning, after way too little sleep? Well I had to get clips for the write-up, didn't I?

I was already onboard for Sword Hero after its first demo at the end of last year, a sequence of four fights that also showed glimpses of its story and world-building (rad medieval sci-fi on a Halo ring world) and non-combat gameplay (significant and varied). This new update is all combat, though: 35 fights with set numbers and general tiers of enemies, but randomized gear in a selection of three or four different arenas.

Each level of the tournament has three to seven fights to get through, you unlock better gear as you rank up, and if you die on a tier, you get kicked to the next one down for remedial Sword Heroing. It mimics a multiplayer ranked system in that way, and the roguelike progression is part of what had me saying "one more run" over and over.

Divekick

The other part is some of the best melee combat from someone not named "FromSoftware" I've seen in I don't know how long⁠—maybe ever. The core of it is a hybrid of the lightsaber duel GOAT, Jedi Academy/Outsider⁠—movement, aiming, and overall feel closer to an FPS and locked behind your shoulders⁠—with FromSoft's signature weightiness, consequences (a single hit can be fatal), and the best-feeling Sekiro perfect block parry I've experienced since Sekiro.

There's a lot of methodical circling, lunging out to test an opponents defenses, trying to bait out a strike you can meet with the earthshattering KA-CLANG of a parry. It feels incredible every time it happens. Instead of quick attack mashing, Sword Hero has four attacks tied to which direction you're moving⁠—similar to power attacks in The Elder Scrolls⁠—and each one has a brief cooldown, requiring you to string together deliberate combos when presented with an opening.

That'd be enough on its own, but what really sets the combat in Sword Hero over the top is its shenanigans. It embraces the emergent hijinks of great immersive sim games like Dark Messiah, Prey, or Baldur's Gate 3. Your only mana-based special ability in the demo is a backflip-dropkick that sends enemies flying, and ample spiked walls allow for easy one-hit kills with the right positioning. Elsewhere in this demo and the first, I've seen:

• Open flames that burn characters who walk through them, and can be detonated into combo-explosions with the right spell.
• Instant death pressure plate spike traps that have both ended and saved runs for me.
• Explosive mines you can set off with attacks, like the one I accidentally sent rocketing straight up, looking around like Wile E. Coyote before it landed and demolished me.

The demo also shows more of Sword Hero's simulated dismemberment system: Depleting a torso or head's health bar is an instant kill, but limbs can be chopped off, allowing you or your enemies to go on fighting one-handed, or just crawl around legless. In the final game, this is planned to figure into a full robo-prosthetic upgrade system, similar to cult freak pick Kenshi.

I wasn't able to keep myself from the demo until I finally beat it after 9.6 hours of game time, according to Steam, which is a pretty good value for "free." This combat is so good, it could easily carry a much simpler, even fully linear game, which is why it's all the more impressive that developer ForestWare built it as a single component of a complex, systemic RPG.

My only slight concern is whether ForestWare can conjure alternate play styles (rogue, mage) anywhere near as satisfying, or if this is a game where you'll always want to at least be some hybrid of melee fighter. The limited magic in the demo is promising, but just can't compare to that kick yet. The archery, meanwhile, feels good, but is just way too plinky to compete with melee, especially in the small arenas featured so far. But this is still very much a work in progress, and even if melee fighter is the way to experience Sword Hero, I've loved RPGs with far worse sins, and it's a more than stable foundation to build a game on.

Sword Hero has nearly quadrupled its initial funding goal on Kickstarter with 26 days left to go, and has the tantalizing final stretch goal of an extra island added to the open world if it reaches $400,000. I've seen indies with enormous potential fizzle and stall before reaching the finish line, but ForestWare has been working at a blistering pace and promises to continue doing so.

Development appears to have started in earnest at the end of 2024, and we're already at the stage of these promising demos, with the full Alpha (complete with roadmap) seemingly slated to start this April. The Kickstarter page predicts a release window of December 2027. In addition to the Kickstarter, you can check out Sword Hero's demo for yourself and wishlist it on Steam.