Most Soulslike RPGs stick to FromSoftware’s progression system, realizing there’s no point in trying to fix what isn’t broken. However, exceptions exist to every rule, and a handful of developers have attempted to reinvent the wheel, to mixed results. Just because something is unique doesn’t automatically make it good, but we should respect games that break from the beaten path and try something new.
Throwing Dark Souls‘ “dump currency into stats at a checkpoint” system, the following Soulslike RPGs explore unique mechanical philosophies, occasionally taking inspiration from other genres. These progression systems aren’t necessarily better than the standard variant, but they provide a distinct reason to play.
- Nothing by FromSoftware. Let’s take them as ground zero.
- I will be strict with the definitions of both “Soulslike” and “RPG” to avoid borderline cases. No Souls-lite games.
- The game’s overall quality doesn’t matter.
Mortal Shell Dismisses Traditional Character Creation
A Soulslike RPG With Fixed Stats
- Unlock Shells with locked combat archetypes and clear trade-offs.
While the IP didn’t fully take off until the sequel, Mortal Shell had already laid a foundation that distinguished itself from Dark Souls. Although the gameplay is fairly typical FromSoftware, the original game offers a progression system that runs directly opposite the status quo: no free creation. Instead of investing points into stats and crafting your own build, you unlock Shells that act as archetypes:
- Harros, the Vassal – A mid-tier knight with moderate durability and stamina, built around cooldown reductions and high-frequency hardening windows.
- Tiel, the Acolyte – A quick rogue boasting a near-bottomless stamina bar and a multi-directional shadow dash, balanced by a microscopic health pool. Low durability and resolve.
- Eredrim, the Venerable – A tank capable of absorbing brutal punishment, crippled by a stamina pool that exhausts after a couple of heavy swings.
- Solomon, the Scholar – A specialized occultist designed around a massive Resolve gauge, letting you frequently trigger explosive weapon abilities and parry counters.
- Hadern, The Deliverer (“The Virtuous Cycle” DLC) – The tutorial boss turned into a Shell who can use a single ability from every other archetype.
All five Shells have fixed points in Durability, Stamina, and Resolve, as well as abilities/skills that can be unlocked. Using two different currencies, you speak to Sester Genessa and learn the warrior’s name and live through their memories, expanding their talent tree with passive perks in the process. Mortal Shell also includes a weapon upgrade system, and each Shell can equip any of them.
Mortal Shell 2 improves on this formula by introducing stat upgrades and more Shells, but its fundamental ideas are the same as the original game. Mortal Shell‘s progression system isn’t perfect, but it encourages you to pick the Shell that makes the most sense for any given scenario, removing FOMO and eliminating the need to constantly respec your stats.
Chronos: Before the Ashes Ties Progression To Death
You Die, You Age, You Change
- Age a year after a loss, gradually progressing your specialization.
- The forgotten prequel to Remnant: From the Ashes
Death is part of life; more specifically, it is part of the Dark Souls life. Most games don’t attempt to link the death-respawn cycle with progression, but Chronos: Before the Ashes isn’t most games. In a fascinating twist on the concept, death ages your character by a single year, allowing them to go from 18 to 80. Lore-wise, you are exploring a labyrinth that only opens once per year, so failure means having to wait.
Your age bracket directly determines your build, influencing stat requirements and unlocking traits.
- Youth (Ages 18–30s) – The character’s physical prime, enabling you to upgrade Strength and Agility easily. You hit fast and hard, and you can dodge like a boss. Magic isn’t really your thing, though.
- Middle Age (Ages 40–50s) – You finally awaken your Arcane abilities, allowing for Dragon Stone weapon enhancement and magic damage. However, you are past your physical peak, and upgrading those stats costs more.
- Old Age (Ages 60–80) – No point investing in Strength or Agility, but your Arcane skills are top-notch, and you become a deadly elemental glass cannon. At this point, magic scaling far outdoes physical.
Every 10 years, you unlock new perks that follow the same trajectory (physical to magical). Chronos: Before the Ashes entirely strips away meta planning, something so important to games like Elden Ring. If you get stuck on a brutal boss and lose 15 times in a row, your biological makeup irreversibly changes, forcing you to adapt accordingly.
Salt and Sanctuary Marries Dark Souls With Final Fantasy
A Soulslike RPG With A Glorious Skill Tree
- Invest in a branch to become your ultimate version.
OK, let’s get to the best game in this article: Salt and Sanctuary. As long as you don’t mind a shift in perspective, Ska Studios’ Soulslike RPG should be on your playlist, and not just because it flawlessly transforms the genre’s combat to a 2D perspective while using gorgeous hand-drawn sprites. Merging Dark Souls‘ stat dump with the progression systems of RPGs like Final Fantasy 10 and Path of Exile, Salt and Sanctuary lets you spend Black Pearls to unlock nodes on a vast skill tree.
Unlike Elden Ring, your starting class matters in Salt and Sanctuary, as it determines your initial skills and initial placement on the skill tree. Each node comes with a stat boost and paves the way to a class node required to equip higher weapons, punishing players who don’t think through their progression route or spread themselves too thin. Multi-classing comes at a pretty high cost, as a mage needs to waste so many Black Pearls to equip a two-handed greatsword.
While you need to really mess up to ruin a playthrough, your progression determines how frustrating a run can be, as you can end up with an inefficient build that needs to rely on weapon transmutation or farming.
The Surge Is About Managing Hardware, Not Stats
A Soulslike RPG Where You Power Up An Exoskeleton
- Target body parts for new loot.
- No standard stat upgrades; instead, unlock more implants and energy.
While The Surge 2 added a more traditional stat system, its predecessor omitted this standard mechanic, opting to completely commit to its exoskeleton-based progression. Flawed as the game might be, The Surge has one of the most interesting progression systems in the genre, and you only technically upgrade a single metric: Core Power.
At a Medbay, you spend Tech Scrap to increase your Core Power, granting you the necessary space to equip better armor and more implants. If you want to increase HP, you don’t invest in a health stat but rather install a Vital Boost implant, and the same for stuff like stamina and even UI upgrades. By the end of a standard playthrough, you’ll have 16 implant slots, meaning you need to use your resources wisely as you cannot rely on endless grinding.
More importantly, you unlock new gear by directly dismembering enemies. Yes, The Surge turns you into a butcher and scavenger, forcing you to plan your progression around combat.
Deathbound Is The Party-Based Soulslike RPG
The “We” Is Stronger Than The “I”
- Focus on progressing a party’s collective strength rather than maximizing an individual’s potential.
OK, Deathbound isn’t one of the most beloved or popular Soulslike games, serving as the poster child for “great ideas, mixed execution.” Its progression system is brilliant and should be revisited by Trialforge Studio or iterated on by another developer; basically, you swap between 4 Essences, aka heroes/classes, with a single button click.
Rather than creating and leveling up a knight, you play as a being that absorbs the souls of warriors, allowing them to develop an active party. Although similar in concept to Mortal Shell, Deathbound actively wants you to swap between the heroes in the middle of combat, taking advantage of their unique combat styles and strengths. Rather than leveling up each character, you progress through a shared health gauge and unlock universal upgrades.
Each Essence has unique talents with passive upgrades, too.
Rather than mastering one individual class, Deathbound wants you to focus on party chemistry, to the point of also including a synergy system based on a warrior’s faction allegiance. Your goal becomes creating a balanced, harmonious party. Unfortunately, the characters aren’t particularly well-balanced, so you might find yourself just sticking to two of them.
