Mistfall Hunter turns Dark Souls into Escape From Tarkov, and it made me scream

Only one game made me scream in panic at Summer Game Fest, and that's Mistfall Hunter. Sure, during my time in LA, I squeaked a few times at tricky soulslike bosses, oohed at beautiful pixel art, and chortled with glee at some zombie mashing. But my most audible (and embarrassing) reaction was to Bellring Games' extraction soulslike RPG. Cornered by a shambling miniboss while extremely low on health, it takes a final lumbering swing at me. Knowing that this will be the end of my loot, a panicked yelp escapes me. While the majority of my 30 minutes with Mistfall Hunter was a lot less stressful, this moment shows how Bellring has managed to fuse the challenge of FromSoft-style combat with the high stakes of an extraction game.

Admittedly, this isn't totally new ground. Dark and Darker has already had a stab at turning a dark fantasy RPG into an extraction game, to mixed results. However, Mistfall Hunter leans more heavily into Dark Souls and Elden Ring with its third-person perspective and bleak fantasy aesthetic. There are, in its current state, five classes to choose from, each leaning into your typical action RPG fantasies. These act like five distinct characters that you level up individually, and each has bespoke items and pieces of gear to find. However, your stash of loot is shared between them all, so even if you find a desirable piece of gear for the Sorcerer while playing as a Seer, it's still worth holding onto and extracting with.

During my half-hour with the game, I messed around with the Black Arrow, the ranged archer class. The bow and arrow combat felt super rapid and satisfying and was handy for keeping a distance from enemies, but it saps your stamina extremely quickly - something I'm sure you could mitigate with some smart skill tree purchases. Movement isn't exactly what I'd call smooth and sophisticated, but the sprinting, dodging, and jumping are alle serviceable enough to allow for dynamic duels.

The world of Mistfall Hunter is arguably its biggest strength. Dark and dilapidated, but full of alleyways, doorways, ladders, and updrafts to lift you high into the air, its labyrinthine layout means that you can't see or plan very far ahead. In extraction shooters, you're typically in a more open world where there are opportunities to scout out areas and see enemies coming from a distance. From my experience, though, Mistfall revels in placing surprises and ambushes around every corner.

While in traditional soulslikes you can throw yourself into danger over and over with only your sanity being punished, Mistfall Hunter requires more caution. Loot is almost always on the line. Whether it be items you brought in from your stash for a run, or things you've found in chests or looted from enemies, death means that you'll drop and lose everything on your person. This is a PvPvE game, so other players can ruin your run as well. Although I was playing without matchmaking in this preview build, I came across a few bots imitating other human players who put up a tough fight. An ever-enclosing storm called the Gyldenmist will also gradually shrink the safe zone and squeeze players closer towards each other, so the chances of a PvP encounter increase as time goes on.

To guarantee your loot, you of course need to extract. While most extraction games take the approach of reaching a specific exfil point and waiting a short while before being safely returned to the menus, Mistfall Hunter takes a slightly different approach that I personally found refreshing.

In a sea of ghoulish, monstrous enemies, the adorable Returner Woodling is your key out. Resembling a small bell with legs, they're fairly easy to kill. Once slain, they drop a small bell that you can pick up and ring at any point to extract on the spot.

Having the option to leave the map whenever and wherever you want is, in a way, much kinder than having to travel to specific locations; however, it still requires you to explore as much as you can to ensure you find a Returner Woodling in the first place. There's potential for this extraction mechanic to cause frustration if you can't find any of these little guys, but spawn rates seemed fairly generous.

With lots of buildcrafting and several separate classes to level up, there's plenty for traditional RPG lovers to get stuck into, but Mistfall Hunter injects a high dosage of risk and competition into the mix. Even though its combat and movement don't get close to the quality bar of single-player soulslike games, it's still a scream-inducing blast and proves that exciting extraction experiences don't always require guns and ammo.