Half Sword

[Pascal's Wagie]

Physics-based medieval combat made on UE5. The current playtest is on Steam and is auto-accepted when you request access. The only gamemode right now is an Arena with a couple sub-modes such as single, free-for-all, and team combat. The selection of arms and armor is separated between 8 divisions ranging from fistfights in underwear, fencing in light clothing, to knights and men-at-arms. Blood and gore were re-added recently, as well.

There's also the UE5 camera mode which lets you get some good shots if you're quick enough:

Runs decently enough on the High preset, but the blood and gore effects can really tank the game on the group combat rounds. Thankfully you can adjust those, or even get rid of them. Render resolution scaling is tied to the presets and there's some .ini tweaks you can do but I haven't nailed them down yet. I think the relfections for the armor are screenspace and reflection mapped, but it would be interesting to see if they ever do ray-traced reflections for it. For the mess that it is, Unreal does do reflections pretty well.

 

[Daddy's Angry Juice]

There's potential here, but it has to overcome the immediate satisfaction of me just bashing someones head in in Chivalry 2 without it looking like we both have cerebral palsy.

 

[Blue Screen of Death]

Blood and gore were re-added recently, as well.

All I needed to hear.
I've been turned away from playing recently due to the fact they had NO blood enabled at all for the updated playtest, but this is enough to get me to try it again.

 

[Maniacal Foreigner]

made on UE5

What a shame.

 

[Checkerboard Hero]

I'm confused on the timeline for development, when I first heard about Half-Sword they had the demo with the black fog and you went around slicing and dicing dudes with blood and gore but then later on they had another demo or release that had the fighting pens and they were talking about adding blood and gore into the game.

 

[winterfag]

Any game where you can beat a man to death with his own severed arm is a 10/10 in my book

 

[Blue Screen of Death]

I'm confused on the timeline for development, when I first heard about Half-Sword they had the demo with the black fog and you went around slicing and dicing dudes with blood and gore but then later on they had another demo or release that had the fighting pens and they were talking about adding blood and gore into the game.

The demo you're thinking of came first, then they released the playtest with the fighting pens w/o blood because it was made to be shown at Tokyo Game Show.
Not 100% sure why it was delayed for so long to bring it back, but it seems to now have adjustable levels of gore too, so maybe they were reworking things.

 

[Pascal's Wagie]

The dev's 2025 timeline:

Christmas promo:

Spoiler: Some more camera mode screenshots

 

[TrainWreckWatcher]

The demo you're thinking of came first, then they released the playtest with the fighting pens w/o blood because it was made to be shown at Tokyo Game Show.
Not 100% sure why it was delayed for so long to bring it back, but it seems to now have adjustable levels of gore too, so maybe they were reworking things.

I honestly found the playtest more disappointing than the demo.

It felt like they were going backwards in terms of fun.
Less gore, less exploration and gear pickup, just kind of throw into single fights or clusterfucks where 2 NPCS rush you first ALWAYS. And that's it.
The demo felt more flushed out. i hope they do a 180 and go back towards that or this is just going to be a boring game you spend maybe 2 hours playing and then go "okay that was neat."

 

[Blue Screen of Death]

I honestly found the playtest more disappointing than the demo.

It felt like they were going backwards in terms of fun.
Less gore, less exploration and gear pickup, just kind of throw into single fights or clusterfucks where 2 NPCS rush you first ALWAYS. And that's it.
The demo felt more flushed out. i hope they do a 180 and go back towards that or this is just going to be a boring game you spend maybe 2 hours playing and then go "okay that was neat."

I wholeheartedly agree, I liked the demo's gameplay loop better.
I assumed the playtest is mostly to allow you to select between the various different kinds of gear that'll be in the game, as the demo dripfed you better weapons as you went on. I can't imagine they won't have something more engaging than just infinite back-to-back fights in the full game.

As for the gore, the playtest now has a selectable gore amount upon launching it. The third option (don't remember the name off the top of my head) seems to be the way the game was in the demo to my recollection.

 

[TrainWreckWatcher]

seems to be the way the game was in the demo to my recollection.

Naww its way less. In the demo you could explode a guy's head and pull out his intestines.

 

[TheArtilleryman]

I managed to beat the demo today, the abyss wandering one. The key was to just keep the scythe from the first boss and slice everyone in half with it. The right-click half sword wielding style works best with it, you still outrange everyone this way but it's much easier to swing with it, akin to how one would really use a scythe for mowing. The biggest issue is if you lose the scythe via being launched away by physics, which is common. Then it becomes very difficult again.

Scythe is incredibly OP. I don't believe it's even in the playtest, probably for this reason? You don't even need to think, just slice left to right from like 7 feet away and 9 times out of 10 you literally cut them in half (or at least take a limb)

 

[RetardRising88]

The game received an update over April Fool's which adds a new progression system called the Gauntlet. The update also added a challenge mode, and merged the demo (the Abyss) and the playtest (the fighting pen). The playtest version is now defunct. Promo from their Twitter:

The Gauntlet mode, or the new progression system, builds off of the playtest primarily. You start with nothing but your fists, and unlock higher tier weapons and armor by winning a certain number of fights, then beating a boss enemy. If you die your progress in the mode will be lost unless you can defeat the bosses you've killed again, this time in the Abyss mode from the demo. To replace the playtest, they added a free play mode, but you need to unlock the tiers in the Gauntlet before you can use them in free play.

There's also a challenge mode if you complete all the tiers of the Gauntlet, which is a sort of combo of the Gauntlet and Abyss. You start with nothing and fight waves of increasing enemies, scavenging gear off of corpses to kill a boss enemy at the end. You can supposedly unlock some shiny golden armor if you beat the boss, but if you die during the challenge you'll lose all your Gauntlet progress and have to work back up to it (unless you survive the Abyss).

Spoiler: Opinions

From my couple hours of playing it's been pretty fun, but not without issues. The challenge mode is fun, but I'm not a fan of being at risk of losing Gauntlet progress. I wish they'd add a freeplay version of the mode without the reward, at least. A lot of small stuff has changed too, like the physics and blood. Performance generally seems worse, and I'm assuming the cause is updates to blood and the AI.

The Gauntlet can be frustrating and rewarding, but it isn't that interesting as a progression system. It's basically just the playtest with a little bit of extra structure to it. I was personally imagining they'd have something more like Exanima's arena mode (which I think the lead devs even mentioned during an interview at some point? not sure), where you win fights to get money and maintain your company of fighters. Overall, the progression isn't that deep and I'm hoping this isn't the devs vision for the final game, because as it is this update seems pretty lackluster.

 

[TrainWreckWatcher]

Good, glad that's back I hope the over the top gore is too.

 

[Pascal's Wagie]

The challenge mode is fun, but I'm not a fan of being at risk of losing Gauntlet progress.

They pushed an April 2nd update and made Free Mode have all tiers available except the new one for beating the ultimate challenge boss. Along with a couple tweaks to the new physics.

 

[TheArtilleryman]

I like the F for slow motion feature, but I think it drains your stamina too much. One swing in slow motion will have your fighter gasping for air and moving sluggish for a couple seconds after, it's annoying.

I've tried the faction that gives "Faster dodging" but it almost did more harm than good, it felt like my guy had bad balance because of it. Sometimes he would just fall over if I strafed sideways too fast. I think the faster stamina recharge faction are the GOAT so far, but I have yet to try the reduced damage faction. Faster kicks I got little use of.

How do others here feel about the lock-on? I swear I found the perfect lock on setting before the update. The changes to the controls have fucked it and now I'm still messing around with the setting. It's hard to get the right intensity, where it locks on enough to keep you facing your opponent, but not so much that all your swings are directed at their midsection.

 

[TheArtilleryman]

PSA: Turns out the key to controlling your swings well is to focus on holding your mouse at a 12 o clock orientation at all times and minimise wrist movement. Resting your wrist and rotating the mouse like you do naturally in almost every other game fucks you up in Half Sword.

 

[RetardRising88]

I've tried the faction that gives "Faster dodging" but it almost did more harm than good, it felt like my guy had bad balance because of it. Sometimes he would just fall over if I strafed sideways too fast.

The balance definitely changed a lot, in the playtest you would be leaning over at like a 30 degree angle from the ground without falling over, which doesn't seem to happen anymore. I think it's ultimately for the better, but there has to be more actions available to the player (or NPCs) when on the ground, otherwise falling over is just infuriating. Unless my guy got knocked upside the head, he shouldn't instantly turn into an unresponsive vegetable when he hits the ground.

How do others here feel about the lock-on? I swear I found the perfect lock on setting before the update. The changes to the controls have fucked it and now I'm still messing around with the setting. It's hard to get the right intensity, where it locks on enough to keep you facing your opponent, but not so much that all your swings are directed at their midsection.

I haven't messed with it at all in my time playing. I'm pretty sure the lock-on option only affects group fights, though. The lock-on will switch to an enemy who's coming at you even if there's someone closer to you, so I believe the option is to adjust how sensitive the lock-on is to enemy movement. Maybe try lowering your mouse sensitivity a lot, if you haven't already?

PSA: Turns out the key to controlling your swings well is to focus on holding your mouse at a 12 o clock orientation at all times and minimise wrist movement. Resting your wrist and rotating the mouse like you do naturally in almost every other game fucks you up in Half Sword.

How did you find out about this? I'm curious because I can't seem to replicate it at all. I always assumed the speed of your swing is what impacts edge alignment--a steady swing with a controlled, consistent speed would be better than frantic whaling on someone.

Spoiler: Sperging

On a semi-related note, one thing I really dislike about the game is how the devs are treating its development right now. I'm in their Discord and they actively refuse to give any information out about the things they changed or how the game works. It makes it difficult to give concrete criticism on what needs changing or adjusting, and no one seems to truly comprehend the full breadth of the mechanics yet. I would understand this behavior more if it was a finished game, but the ostensible purpose of a playtest/early access game is to gather feedback from a wide audience that you can use to improve your game. Not giving the players any info hinders our ability as testers to give actionable feedback beyond "this thing feels bad/good, change it".

TL;DR I think the devs are handicapping themselves by not providing enough information about their game and its updates.

 

[TheArtilleryman]

How did you find out about this? I'm curious because I can't seem to replicate it at all. I always assumed the speed of your swing is what impacts edge alignment--a steady swing with a controlled, consistent speed would be better than frantic whaling on someone.

Spent some time trying to find out why I could never connect an overhead swing. Slower swings and moving your whole arm with the mouse instead of levering on your wrist were the 2 main observations I kept seeing. Its most notable in downward overhead swings. Your mouse being rotated will register the downward motion as a down-and-slightly-to-the-side swing. Applying this to horizontal swings then means readying the weapon behind you, then raising or lowering it to the target height before doing a straight horizontal swipe across. Here again, I find the mouse rotation causes what I mean to be a horizontal swing instead being a little more diagonal than I wanted.

The way I do it is to set my chair height so that my hand rests comfortably upon the mouse when my elbow is bent 90 degrees at my ribs, but without letting my wrist touch the desk. Try to keep the elbow near the ribs and avoid flaring it out. This also means moving both the keyboard and mouse a little to the left of where I normally have them. From there I try to keep the mouse at 12 o clock, minimise wrist movement and derive all motion from my shoulder, keeping the rest of the arm relaxed. I've been controlling it much better this way.

Decreasing mouse sensitivity also was needed. I played on very high sensitivity and my guys entire range of motion with his weapon was covered by minimal hand movements, levered on the wrist, witch exacerbated the effect of the mouse rotation greatly.

 

[TheArtilleryman]

I've unlocked the baron challenge and have put a couple of hours in to trying to beat it now. This game needs some form of multiple lives or a healing mechanic because right now it's way too punishing, especially when stupid fucking deaths are so pervasive. I can't tell you how many times I've died to an axe wielder simply moving his weapon in to my body as he writhes in pain after he's already essentially dead. If they didn't introduce the ability to restart the baron challenge itself rather than having to beat the gauntlet beforehand with every attempt, I wouldn't bother.

By the way, the strat to beating the gauntlet is picking the spiked stick in tier 4 and sticking with that for the rest of the game. It's the best weapon, the points bonus you get from reusing such a low tier when you get to the higher tiers results in much less fights in total, you don't really need armour when you have such good range (so long as you are very mindful about it), you will outspeed the armoured opponents and you can rely on bonk damage to the head to knock down and submit the heaviily armoured opponents in the last 2 tiers. Make liberal use of that submission mechanic, where you can hold your weapon to the throat of a downed opponent for a couple of seconds and they will automatically surrender. The meta for the last boss is just to knock him down and submit him this way. He has so much health and armour that anything else is needless suffering for the player.