‘Code Vein’ Review

Sometimes a game is acutely aware of the audience it’s catering toward and holds absolutely nothing back when providing service to that clientele. I was definitely within the game’s target demographic. When the honeymooning was done after a few hours, Code Vein made it apparent that this relationship between the cold, punishing nature of Dark Souls, paired with the shamelessly perverse and whimsical nature of anime fan service may have been rushed into. Finding myself among the people that were salivating at the marriage of Dark Souls style of gameplay and the shameless anime aesthetic, I jumped in with endless enthusiasm. 

Before any gameplay or even any mention of the game’s world, I had to endure the gauntlet of Code Vein’s character creation. With perhaps the most dense creation mode I’ve seen since Soul Calibur VI (minus all the weaponized faux phalluses), Code Vein allows augments that range from something major like the character’s body size to something incredibly minor in a person’s iris. The character creation alone has spawned many a subreddit of people recreating their favorite anime or video game characters in Code Vein, which is every bit as ridiculous as it sounds, but fully welcome for a game such as this. Personally, I experienced a difficult time trying to grasp every one of the customizable options, so I wound up with a half-assed anime creation that reminds me too much of my original character from Jump Force. 

After spending almost half an hour making a mess in the character creator, the world of Code Vein finally exposed itself. In the game, almost everyone has been turned into vampires that are either Revenants, which are vampires that still maintain a sense of self and control, and the Lost, which used to be Revenants, who succumbed to the thirst for blood and mutated into these grotesque monsters that fill the role of common enemies. All of this lore is told in pure, nonsensical, brooding, anime style that is pretty vague until I met Louis, who shoves every answer I hoped for into a couple of easily skippable text boxes. Thankfully, Louis also brings you to the hub area of Code Vein called “Home Base.”

Home Base has pretty much everything I could ask for when prepping between areas, providing the usual services from an item and weapons vendor to some more obscure areas like a bar or a hot spring. Most of the hub area is full of places to sit or lie down at, whether they be couches set up next to a jukebox that only ever plays the same song on repeat (albeit a pretty good song if only for the first five listens), or a pair of beds in empty rooms that look more like afterthoughts than additions to the atmosphere. The cute part of Home Base is that when lounging about, my character would sometimes interact with some of the other NPCs by just sitting next to them, doing nothing or occasionally sharing passing glances. It’s an odd touch, but a cute one. 

The most curious and definitely the most shameless area of Home Base is the hot springs. It is exactly as sounds. When I entered for the first time, my character traded his leather laced jumpsuit for only a towel, and as I walked towards the springs, I saw that many of the other NPCs were in the same outfit (or lack thereof), just hanging out in the hot springs. In terms of function, it serves as a place that can help summarize each chapter of the game that has already been finished, and is a place where you can reclaim half of the Haze you’ve lost after dying. Haze is the main currency of Code Vein, which you use to both level up your stats as well as purchase items or upgrades. The hot springs serve as one of the most ridiculous parts of Code Vein, and I love that it’s included and actually holds a relevant function, because it’s a sequence that shows just how deep the game is playing into the “anime” aspect that it advertises. 

In terms of gameplay, Code Vein plays much like I expected a Souls-like would. Combat is mostly tied to attacks that are either a standard or heavy attack. There’s a dodge button, a parry mechanic that is influenced by the type of armor worn, and a running option. All of it is limited by the familiar stamina bar and healing is, of course, tied to a limited item that can be upgraded by items thrown around the game in areas that lead to headaches. Leveling up in Code Vein spreads out the stats in a set pattern, and what changes the stats are the different classes called “Blood Codes.” Each Blood Code has different abilities tied to the class. Finding more Blood Codes was possible in my playthrough, but I never felt encouraged by the game to seek them out other than maybe getting a trophy tied to them. 

Code Vein’s central gameplay mechanics never felt great. The combat felt much like Dark Souls, but unlike Dark Souls, I rarely wanted to explore the winding areas for any possible secrets because there was rarely anything worthwhile at the end. Almost every new area felt more and more similar to thick, branching hallways, poorly disguised as open fields, with intangible boxes or tendrils. And when they aren’t just that, the areas are actually just hallways with little-to-no barriers suspended high above countless pitfalls that never felt good. Most of my time playing Code Vein was spent searching for the right way to go rather than seeking out any secret items or paths, which wore on me quickly. The repeated trope of enemies falling from a ceiling that is just out of view, or when an enemy rises from behind a cliff when I approach an item became tiring and predictable, all compounds to cause the fun to stop. 

The first and biggest offense I met in Code Vein was “The Cathedral of the Sacred Blood.” When the area comes into view, it’s shamelessly obvious that the cathedral is an attempt at Code Vein’s own Anor Londo. The comparison doesn’t last very long, however, as I almost immediately found that this cathedral area was a labyrinth disguised as hopeful nostalgia. Everything I ended up hating in Code Vein was either introduced or compounded in The Cathedral of the Sacred Blood. Whether it be the constant hordes of enemies cornering me against the edge of a pitfall, or the crime of landscape never changing no matter how many turns or ladders were climbed, this was the area that caused my perspective of Code Vein to take a permanent shift for the worse. 

To whom I owe my ability to actually complete Code Vein are the NPC companions that the game adds as the story progresses. These companions function a lot like how the offline summons function in games like Dark Souls and Bloodborne. They have their own weapons and skills, as well as personal stakes to the plot, which is refreshing and welcome since there is rarely any other reason to care about these characters other than that they occasionally revived me when I made one too many swings at a boss that absolutely would not stagger. 

Another notable aspect that Code Vein provided were the boss designs I came across. There were a few too many boring boss fights, Among the worst were the game’s introductory boss, as well as the Argent Wolf Berserker. They were nothing more than damage sponges that barely looked any different than the rank-and-file enemies I already mowed through. Pretty much every other boss I fought was unique and really fun to watch in motion, and also very frustrating to fight. One of my favorites was the Invading Executioner, which was a great pairing of terribly salacious and the overwhelmingly aggressive behavior, a fair summarization of the nature of Code Vein. Fighting the bosses wasn’t very difficult because I almost always had a partner when I encountered them. It was pretty easy to make the boss distracted by the NPC and take advantage of that by just swinging my Zweihander until it staggered or died. My favorite partners were Yakumo and Io, mostly because they had the better damage and support abilities in my opinion and ultimately trivialized a lot of the arena fights.

Code Vein, at face value, is a perverse Souls-like that flashes anime cleavage more times than I fell off a cliff cursing for a pair of wings. There’s enjoyment to be found outside of the combat, especially with the ridiculous additions like the hot springs and the furniture I could lounge on. Outside of the bosses, combat in Code Vein didn’t feel like anything more than an excuse to gain the “Souls-like” tag. Paired with terrible architecture and nauseating level design, the most fun I had in Code Vein was finishing the game and hanging out at the Home Base.