Review

Mistfall Hunter review

Interesting variant of fantasy extraction action

Number uno on the list of demos I played — a co-op third-person PvPvE action fantasy extraction game (good lord, what a mouthful!) — “Mistfall Hunter”. Not much is known about the developer, but the trail leads to China. The legal entity is called Hongkong Duga Holdings Limited, which, if you dig deeper, is linked to ByteDance — the company behind TikTok… Why do you need this information? Hell if I know, but “I did a thing!”🤗

Let’s go! The core gameplay loop is the usual for this genre: drop into a map, kill mobs, elites, and even bosses. Fill your pockets, stash the most valuable stuff up your a… in a special pouch for your valuables. Reach an extraction point and get out with everything you’ve gathered. Other players are, of course, there to get in your way. Die, and you lose everything except what you stashed up your a… in your valuables pouch. Including all the gear you were wearing. A quick word on co-op: “Solo” and “Trio” modes were available. There were two of us, so we got matched with a random third player every game.

Between runs, you hang out in the local hub, which you can “upgrade” using the resources you’ve collected (the useful stuff I found included stash size, the number and quality of your “Estus” — the heals available during a raid — and a magic cauldron that gives a permanent buff to your chosen stats).

As the genre demands, there’s an auction house where you can sell gear and resources from raids for some shiny gold. Or buy stuff. How that’ll be balanced at release — no idea. The economy in the demo was a mess. Just buy whatever you need at the auction house and don’t worry about it.

Now, onto what makes this game tick: The demo had a decent selection of classes, each with its own abilities and progression. I mostly played a tanky fighter. My friend went with the local rogue. There’s also a mage, a cleric, an archer, and a fighter with a two-handed sword. Each class has 2 weapons you can switch between, completely changing your moveset and abilities.

You sort of have two skills/abilities. But in practice, you get more, because some can be combined or change depending on things like holding the button down.

There’s a talent system that adds to and modifies/improves your chosen abilities. Basically, you can put together different builds for the same class. Plenty to tinker with😊 Classes and talents could be switched and reset fairly freely, by the way. I tried a few other classes, but settled on the dude (well, lady, actually😁) with a sword and shield + a massive hammer.

Gear

You’ve got the familiar “colour-coded trousers” system — white/green/blue/purple gear. The gap between tiers is huge. Taking down someone in purples while you’re wearing greens is practically impossible.

There were 2 maps available, which we christened “the noob zone” and “maybe let’s not?”

The first map gets boring pretty quickly, while the second has hardcore players constantly kicking your teeth in😅

Graphics

Unreal Engine. That’s about all there is to say. I’m tired of it, because everything looks so painfully default. It’s easy enough on the eyes, nothing wrong with it. But it looks exactly like every other fantasy game on UE (hello, Lords of the Fallen!).

Gameplay

Punchy! Strong soulslike vibes all around. The familiar dodging, parrying, blocking, and stamina mechanics. Your character doesn’t feel like a stiff wooden dummy, and the controls are responsive. Different weapons and classes actually feel different, and the hits have weight!

Verdict

We put in about 10 hours and checked out all the content on offer. Overall — I liked it! But a lot depends on the price. If it lands around $15–20 and you have someone to play with, I’d definitely recommend it. Even as a duo, you can have a good time. Solo is a lot more questionable — I didn’t really enjoy it. If you’re an extraction fan, though, you’ve definitely got to give it a go!

Action RPGEarly AccessExtractionCoop