Blighted Preview: Summer Game Fest 2025
Whether it’s AAA, indie, or anything in between, Drinkbox has always been the studio that’s impressed me the most. Outside of the occasional sequel here and there, Drinkbox consistently swings for the fences and tries something new. Breaching the walls of your comfort zone takes an immense amount of courage, but time and time again, it pays off for them with consistent bangers. Blighted is the latest case study that backs that up.
Drinkbox are no strangers to metroidvanias or top-down action games. The renowned Guacamelee series is one of the best in the genre, and Nobody Saves the World nailed the kind of feverish hook you want from a satisfying loop fueled by killer top-down combat. Blighted takes the best of both worlds and tosses in a zeitgeist genre—one we saw quite a bit throughout Summer Game Fest weekend: soulslike.
Blighted introduces a ritual where the dead are buried with a seed, which then blossoms into a tree passing down knowledge and tradition across generations through its fruit. Sorcisto, a not-so-friendly individual, ended the ritual by consuming the brains of the dead in exchange for power and knowledge. In doing so, he infected the world with a deadly Blight. It’s now up to you (and a friend in co-op, if you’d like) to stop Sorcisto and reclaim the memories of your people.
What stood out immediately in my demo was the signature Drinkbox style, but with a twist. Blighted breaks new ground for the team as their first 3D-rendered game. The neon-soaked, western-inspired world and its inhabitants are wholeheartedly Drinkbox: bold black outlines, saturated vibrant colors popping off dark tones, and otherworldly character designs that are instantly recognizable, but thanks to the new rendering techniques, look unlike anything they’ve done before. Blighted is a stunner, and best experienced beyond just the reveal trailer with a controller in hand.
Taking control of the protagonist and stepping into the lush surrounding lands felt familiar. While Drinkbox always tries something new with every game, you can feel how they’re continuously building off what they’ve done before. Blighted feels like the next logical step after Nobody Saves the World. Navigating the environment is familiar, with a few classic Souls elements such as satisfying shortcuts tossed in. The combat, too, feels rooted in Nobody. But with that added Souls-like flair, Blighted becomes its own beast.
The demo put me on course toward one of Sorcisto’s lackeys, with enemies along the path teaching classic Souls touchstones like shielding, dodging, and parrying preparing me for the inevitable big boss. Combat feels fluid and methodical, but anyone who played Nobody will feel the rhythm from the very first hit. Parrying feels fair, and the inclusion of a Bloodborne-style gun lets you keep enemies at bay from a distance. There's even a twist on Bloodborne's health-recovery system for aggressive players. Diabolical finishers are here as well, and put a satisfying period at the end of a fight when you break an enemy's stance.
Honestly, I would've been happy with just a solid Souls-like take from Drinkbox, but the Blight system adds their own flavor to the mix and addresses a long-standing conversation around the genre. As you defeat more enemies without dying, you build up a Blight meter. The higher it gets, the harder the game becomes. It’s a super interesting system that lets you build confidence at your own pace. If you die, you lose Blight—and if you lose enough, the game eases up a bit. I also noticed an option to cleanse Blight at the game’s version of a bonfire, though I didn’t get to explore it in the demo. Souls fans love to use the word “methodical” when describing combat (see paragraph above), but applying that same idea to difficulty scaling is kind of brilliant.
And like any good Soulslike, the real highlight is the bosses. Blighted does not disappoint. Take everything I said earlier about the style and jam it into a horrifyingly gorgeous monster factory. I fought two bosses in the demo, the first of which the devs referred to as the “horse-spider.” As awful of a word combination that is to type, it’s spot on. Each leg helps it launch into the air for a brutal AOE slam, and its way-too-long, stretchy neck lets it whip its head around with terrifying force. In true horse fashion, a sentence I never thought I’d write, it rears up on its hind legs and slams down in an attack that’s so satisfying to parry. A bunch of dodges, parries, and yee-haws later, I took down Horse-Spider (first try, solo, hold your applause please) and unlocked a big reward. A mana meter popped up, and I got access to its AOE ability—another mechanic that feels like a spiritual evolution from Nobody Saves the World.
The second boss was just as horrifying. Imagine if the Gaping Dragon from Dark Souls had a passionate affair with Elden Ring’s Godskin Apostles and you’d get a chunky lad with way too many teeth, spewing goop across the arena. First off, I’m sorry for the mental image of a hypothetical spicy encounter. But second, that’s what it looks like when one of Sorcisto’s allies eats the brain of one of your ancestors. The fight was intense—dodging jabs, weaving through toxic puddles, and looking for a window to land a few hits. Compared to Horse-Spider, who gave me more chances to go on the offensive, this boss kept me on my toes from start to finish. Still, despite all the chaos, we came out on top first try. The demo ends with a cutscene where you consume the boss’s brain and reclaim a memory, but not without consequence. Your body starts to shift and change, possibly teasing a new ability… and then it cuts to the title card.
Blighted was my first appointment for Summer Game Fest, and it stuck with me throughout the day. Even with Drinkbox telling me the combat has already improved internally since this SGF build, it already felt fluid and downright fun. This team continues to blow me away, and I’m humbled and honored to be the first person outside the studio to go hands-on with their new project. With Guacamelee, they cemented themselves as masters of metroidvanias. With Severed, they did the same for classic dungeon crawlers. And after just a half-hour with Blighted, I’m already confident that Drinkbox is about to go three-for-three, adding Soulslikes to their growing pedigree.