The Pathless Sets A New Standard For Bow-Based Action

The Pathless is a game about traversal, and isn’t afraid to capitalize on it. In today’s State of Play they showed off how the game focuses on movement, rather than action.

The game’s player character, the Hunter, can shoot talismans to fill her dash meter. Keeping her dash meter filled allows her to traverse the game’s world much faster, which is a necessary feature. To keep the rhythm up, the game has you soft-locking on to the talismans automatically. This way, keeping your meter up becomes a matter of timing, not accuracy.

On top of that, The Hunter’s eagle can be interacted with to fly over obstacles. She can transition into flight mode from a run, allowing players to once again keep the motion going. The eagle is more than just a flight power-up, though, and you’ll need to stroke it to keep it performing well.

On top of that, various secrets in the world provide resources to upgrade your eagle as well.

Aside from the game’s beautiful open worlds, The Pathless also contains indoor segments with puzzles. These puzzles use many of the same mechanics of shooting and cooperating with your eagle, and even indoors use positioning rather than aim.

Rather than having a map full of markers, The Pathless has a spirit vision ability where The Hunter can see points of interest lit up. This is all from the perspective of her current position, however, so players will want to make use of vantage points to see as much as possible.

Pathless But Not Without Threats

Despite being all about traversal and exploration, The Pathless is not without its dangers. Cursed Spirits will try to separate you from your eagle, and unexpected encounters with them will force you to slow down and think about getting out of their line of sight.

They’re not indestructible, however, and The Hunter must light obelisks in the world to weaken the Cursed Spirits before engaging them in a boss fight.

The Pathless dashes its way on to the PS5 Holidays 2020.

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