Vindictus: Defying Fate Preview | Smash Jump

With the exciting trailers leading up to the pre-alpha of Vindictus: Defying Fate, it wasn’t a demo to ignore for obvious reasons. With the first trailer, we were treated to beautiful visuals and then blessed with promising combat, which was shown off by the second trailer. The pre-alpha delivered on the promises of the trailers.

Vindictus: Defying Fate is a spinoff of Nexon’s long-running Vindictus game. While the original game is a more stylized action RPG MMO, Defying Fate feels like a weird combination of multiple genres. This is attributed to how uniquely different the characters in the game are.

Since it’s in pre-alpha, there is no narrative or cinematic available. But the sound design does have a chance to disappoint. Hopefully, as development continues, the weapons can gain weightier audio. The game also lacks music in between boss fights, which was expected but made the points in between boss battles feel bland. The music utilized within boss battles, while enjoyable, also left a lot to be desired. There was never a time I felt dread or even roused, convinced to keep fighting — the music just seemed to drone on and on. 

The pre-alpha features two playable characters, Lann and Fiona. Lann is a powerhouse with agility to match his use of dual swords, while Fiona is a stalwart defender wielding a sword and shield. 

Throughout my time in Defying Fate, I mainly played as Lann, transforming the combat into a mashup of Soulslike difficulty and gameplay that was akin to something like Devil May Cry. This may sound weird, but there is something refreshing about this. With so many different Soulslike releases recently, the combat has reinvigorated the genre for me. Lann also possesses the ability to perform some exciting combos, utilizing a dash he can perform to end certain combos or to be chained off of his active skills. 

Fiona, on the other hand, is the opposite of Lann — she is more of a tank, and from things like attacks to even movement, the game takes on a completely different feeling. With slower attacks and the traditional dodge roll, she is a character that anybody can play. She can block attacks and inflict more devastating attacks while also utilizing a parry. 

The strength of the current state of Vindictus: Defying Fate is that the game feels like two different games when you play as different characters. Lann turns the game into what can be best explained as a faster-paced Sekiro. While Fiona gives the game a more traditional Soulslike feeling, this felt the most notable and impressive when I first tried Fiona.

I immediately went to an area that was densely populated by enemies and lost every fight. Instead of just switching weapons, everything in the game seemed to switch, as I could no longer dodge attacks and play risky. Now I needed to wait for a perfect moment to strike, and I had to learn each boss’ moveset. 

With Nexon having recently launched the pre-alpha for Vindictus: Defying Fate, while it was quite fun, it left a lot of questions in the air. How multiplayer will affect the game is the top question for many potential players. While the end product could be any number of things, based on the game’s current state, our hopes are high.