Is Phantom Blade Zero a Soulslike? I Scored It Against Five Soulslike Rules, and the Answer Is Not Quite

I keep thinking about the opening of this game, and I haven't even played it. Two friends train together, the lesson ends, and then they fight for real until each one has put a blade through the other's heart. A doctor offers a choice: live without your emotions, or keep them and get 66 days. Soul picks the days. That's the first few minutes of Phantom Blade Zero, according to a hands-on preview published on Friday, and I'll admit it's the most committed opening pitch I've read about all year.

Here's the plain version of where I'm coming from. I haven't played it, and no review scores exist yet, so this is not a review. It's a guide built from the studio's own details and the previews that went up this week, and it's organized around the question people keep typing into search boxes: is Phantom Blade Zero a Soulslike? I built a little five-rule test to answer it, and I think the result is more interesting than a yes or no.

Where the game stands today

This is a long-awaited one. It first showed up at the PlayStation Showcase in May 2023, and early trailers drew comparisons to Black Myth: Wukong as another big action game out of China with a real shot at a global audience. The road since then has been steady, with one delay along the way.

• Dec 2025A release date of September 9, 2026 is announced at The Game Awards.
• June 2026During Sony's State of Play, S-GAME moves the launch by roughly 50 days to October 29, explaining that it wanted the strongest possible version on day one.
• Early Aug 2026Development is declared complete. Pre-orders open on August 11 with an 11-minute trailer, and a longer gameplay broadcast follows on August 17.
• Oct 8-9, 2026Final hands-on previews go live, including a three-hour impression from GamesRadar+ and a four-hour one from TheSixthAxis.
• Thu, Oct 29, 2026Launch on PlayStation 5 and PC (Steam and the Epic Games Store).

The studio also says the game is finished, which matters. A team that wraps development months early and then ships a few weeks into a crowded October is telling you it wants a clean launch, and I like that instinct even if a promise on a store page is only a promise.

My five-rule Soulslike test

The studio has stressed that this is not a Soulslike. One preview, meanwhile, put the label right in its headline. Both can be true, because "Soulslike" has become a fuzzy word. So I wrote down five habits people usually mean by it and checked each against what the studio and the previewers describe. The scoring is mine, built from their reports, and it only covers the opening hours they were allowed to show.

• YESRULE 1
  Bosses with multiple phasesBoth previews describe phased fights. One writer fought a flame-wielding Lion Dance Grandmaster that turns into a faster, more human opponent in phase two. The other was beaten repeatedly by a boss whose second phase was the real exam.
• YESRULE 2
  Bell checkpoints for restingBells let you rest and fast travel, and one writer called them bonfire-esque. One preview adds that resting at a Crane Bell can advance the time of day, which fits a game about a ticking clock.
• NORULE 3
  One difficulty, take it or leave itPhantom Blade Zero has four difficulty modes. That alone is a big break from the famous names in the genre.
• HALFRULE 4
  Stamina-driven combatEverything runs on Sha-Chi, one shared meter that acts as stamina, posture and skill gauge for you and for enemies. It's closer to a posture fight than a classic stamina bar, and running it dry breaks you the way it breaks them.
• HALFRULE 5
  Punishing by defaultOne previewer found normal difficulty fairly forgiving, with long parry windows, while warning that bigger foes punish carelessness. Another said a boss's second phase killed him a lot, though dying there did not force him to redo phase one.

That's two yes, two half and one no. If you want a number, call it a 3 out of 5 on the Soulslike scale, and I'd bet most people reading this would have guessed higher after watching the trailers. What I take from the exercise is that the studio's description holds up. This reads like a martial-arts action RPG that learned from FromSoftware's school without copying the grading policy.

What the combat actually asks of you

Strip away the genre argument and the combat comes down to a few ideas, all of them described by the studio or confirmed in previews.

• Color-coded threats. Enemy attacks are marked so you know whether you can block, parry or dodge. Brutal Moves drain Sha-Chi hard if you block them, and Killer Moves can't be blocked or parried at all.
• The Ghoststep. Parry a Brutal Move or dodge a Killer Move at the last instant and Soul repositions behind the enemy for a counter. That's the skill-expression moment the whole system builds toward.
• Weapon swapping as a resource. Soul carries two main Blades and two secondary Phantom Edges, and switching the primary weapon mid-fight restores Sha-Chi, on a cooldown. The game has more than 30 primary weapons and 25 Phantom Edges.
• Weapons as keys. Phantom Edges double as exploration tools. One previewer beat a boss, took his Dread Axe and used it to open areas that had been sealed.
• Respect for your time. Weapon upgrades can be refunded, so changing your build doesn't mean throwing away materials.

The refund system is the detail I'm happiest about, and it's a small one. Every action RPG with a big weapon list eventually punishes you for experimenting, and this one apparently decided not to. Add the wild loadouts the previews mention, like a blade that lets Soul drink mid-fight for a drunken ranged style, and it sounds like a game that wants you to play with it, not just survive it. That's my read, not the studio's, and a few hours of preview time can't prove it.

The 66-day clock and the four difficulty modes

The premise is the hook: Soul is an elite assassin who's been framed for murdering his master and has 66 days to live. The game offers four difficulty modes named Wayfarer, Pathbreaker, Hellwalker and 66 Days. S-GAME describes the last one as the purest expression of the game, and a previewer called it particularly brutal, built so that death carries more weight. The PS5 Platinum trophy can be earned in a single run.

My opinion is that this is the smartest thing the game does, and it's why the Soulslike question matters less than people think. A genre that's famous for locking out anyone who bounces off its difficulty now has a martial-arts game saying, politely, pick your own pain. If you've tried the genre and walked away, this is the version I'd give a second chance. If you love the genre, 66 Days is clearly there for you. I haven't seen how Wayfarer, Pathbreaker and Hellwalker differ in practice, because the coverage I read doesn't break them down.

Price, editions and the physical-copy question

Everything below is the U.S. pricing reported by Wccftech, and storefronts can differ.

Now the awkward part. Playasia customer service told a Reddit user that the PS5 listing was removed because no physical edition will be available, and Wccftech notes the game isn't listed at retailers like Amazon either. S-GAME hasn't confirmed a digital-only launch on PS5 or PC. I'd treat it as likely digital and wait for the studio to say so. If you're a disc collector, that's disappointing, but I agree with Wccftech's writer that skipping a game solely over this would be a shame.

PC requirements, stacked by tier

The baseline is unusually forgiving, reaching back to mainstream graphics cards from 2019. Every target below assumes upscaling is switched on.

NVIDIA DLSS 4.5 Super Resolution and Multi Frame Generation are confirmed. The studio hasn't said anything about AMD FSR or Intel XeSS, the PC version uses Denuvo, and the install size hasn't been announced. PS5 Pro enhancements are confirmed but not detailed. The director also said earlier this year that the game wouldn't include AI features that alter the artists' intent, a statement widely read as a reference to DLSS 5.

What nobody can tell you yet

Here's my honest list of open questions, because the best thing a guide can do is say where the guide ends.

• How the game holds up past the first few hours. Both previews covered early sections, and one writer said he'd barely scratched the surface.
• What the Digital Deluxe Edition adds.
• Whether there will be a physical release, and whether Xbox ever gets a version. S-GAME hasn't commented on the reported exclusivity window.
• How the PC version performs on the day. Requirements are not benchmarks.

My verdict: who should pre-order

These are opinions, built from the studio's details and early previews, not from playing the game.

• If you love Sekiro-style parry fightsPre-order Standard.

  The Sha-Chi system and the Ghoststep sound like they were made for you. At $59.99, the price is easy to defend.

• If you bounced off Soulslikes beforeWait for launch-week reactions, then try it.

  Four difficulty modes and a forgiving normal setting are the best reasons I've seen to give the genre another shot.

• If you only play on XboxNothing to buy yet.

  No Xbox version has been announced, and any exclusivity claims are unconfirmed.

• If you want a boxed copyDon't count on it.

  The only signal so far is a retailer's customer-service reply, but the listings are gone.

• If your PC is a few years oldYou're probably fine.

  A GTX 1660 clears the minimum. Save the RTX 5080 talk for path tracing.

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