In a sea of dark fantasy or historical fantasy inspired difficult action RPGs inspired by FromSoftware’s Dark Souls series and its derivatives, it can certainly be difficult to stand out. Especially given that very few of these titles have actually managed to live up to the legendary pioneering games that inspired all of them – we have the Nioh games, we have Lies of P, and more recently we have Black Myth: Wukong. And that’s pretty much it. While all the other games of this ilk have their own merits, they all also come with their own sets of caveats and jank that keep them from achieving the sort of greatness that the best examples of this game style can deliver on.
So The First Berserker: Khazan admittedly did (and still does) have a bit of an uphill climb. After all, with so many games like this being made and released these days, what sets this one apart?
That is, ultimately, a very superficial and surface level assessment of the game, however. Nexon and Neople first formally unveiled The First Berserker: Khazan to the world at The Game Awards in 2023, and right off the bat, the action RPG stood out. It certainly hit all the bullet point items you’d expect to find on the back of the box of a game of this sort – Souls style combat, grueling difficulty, brutal action, dark fantasy setting.
But then there were the things about it that weren’t like other similar games, things that have only become more clear with each subsequent showing that the game has had – its absolutely gorgeous art style, which makes it look like a graphic novel in motion and makes it pop, and which instantly stood out And of course, there is the emphasis on storytelling, with the premise being a flashy, revenge filled story, which, when combined with the brutality of the action on display, almost recalls the classic God of War titles, which were similarly brutal revenge plot driven action titles. The First Berserker: Khazan’s commitment to its strong storytelling is clear in the more cinematic bent the game clearly seems to imbibe, and increasingly, it seems like the story and storytelling side of the game may be strong enough to be a selling point all on its own.
But ultimately what makes a game like this sink or swim will be the gameplay – the prettiest art style or greatest story in the world will not be able to compensate for clumsy controls or poorly designed encounters, after all. And on this front, too The First Berserker: Khazan has distinguished itself, more and more with each showing.
That first trailer showed off a lot of what you expect from a new dark fantasy action RPG – gigantic bosses, stamina management in combat, and deliberate combat where the animations and wind up all matter. It’s the showings since then that have really fleshed things out, though – particularly when it has been clear exactly how much like Souls games The First Berserker: Khazan will not be. Don’t misunderstand – you will still be saving and levelling up at bonfire style checkpoints, you will still be using currency to level up attributes, enemies will respawn every time you rest, if you die, you will have to go and collect all your lost experience and currency, and enemies will hit hard and will punish you for playing carelessly. That’s all very Souls.
But, for example, you have a whole skill tree. Actually, you have multiple skill trees, one for your character, and then one for each of the three weapon wields in the game, allowing a whole new dimension of build variation and diversity. But The First Berserker: Khazan doesn’t stop there either, as it layers another progression and customization system on top, a gear based one that, combined with the attribute based levelling up and the skill trees, potentially promises a lot more player expression with its systems and mechanics than even veterans of this genre and game style might expect.
In and of itself, all of that is enough to put the game on a lot of people’s radars. What can really sell everyone else on the game, however, and bring them on board, is once they get to play it and they realize how much the game appeals to them. Games such as Lies of P and Black Myth: Wukong are titles where the strong player sentiment and word of mouth was certainly crucial in driving their success, not just initially, but well after launch, when the games still continued to perform strongly and add to their sales totals.
The First Berserker: Khazan has given itself a leg up here too. A demo for the game was released in January 2025, and it has become clear to anyone who has played it that Neople and Nexon are on to something here – the controls are incredibly responsible and tight, and the combat has a stylistic and exaggerated flair (owing to the stylized aesthetic) that greatly elevates the flow and pacing of encounters. The visual style really does help here, intrinsically elevating the game feel thanks to the way the animations make each action flow into each other, from walking, running, jumping, lunging, slashing, dodging, rolling, and more – and all while maintaining that distinctive stylistic flair we mentioned earlier.
The demo has also made it clear that the narrative focus isn’t just marketing – at least based on the demo, it is something that the game is taking seriously, and hopefully we can get a satisfying story out of this game that can be understood without having to look up online wikis and fan theory videos on YouTube. Even lore and their hunters may have a lot to chew on, however, since the game is actually set in Nexon’s DNF universe, so it theoretically has a lot of lore and narrative context to draw from and frame itself against.
Thanks to promising pre-launch showings and strong reception from those who have got a taste of the game courtesy of its demo release in January, many have high expectations from the game. And yet in spite of that, it feels like The First Berserker: Khazan is curiously under the radar right now. While in the games industry you can never look at any game as an absolute sure bet, based on everything that we’ve seen of it so far, it does look like The First Berserker: Khazan is taking promising shape, and may very well end up delivering a solid, core action RPG experience. Whether or not it can stick the landing remains to be seen. Nexon, after all, has not published a single player game on this scale previously, so it would be understandable, if crushingly disappointing, if they fumble the landing on some or many of the checks they are writing and the promises they are making.
But at least for now, they have our attention. Let’s see if the final game ends up substantiating it. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, what we have seen in the lead up to the final release gives reason to be optimistic, to say the very least.
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