RingoVideo games and sword fighting haven’t really gotten along well. There are a few standout successes like the classic fighting game series Soul Calibur but there are also some huge bombs like CLANG. Most games involving weapons don’t actually focus on weapon fighting, instead the weapon is just another version of damage dealing and there is little actual manipulation of the object. Simply use the right block for the right attack and it stops it. Block low for leg strikes just like blocking low for low kicks in street fighter. The ones that haven’t have been ugly for the most part, with hard to predict hit boxes, choppy animation, and just overall awkwardness in play. The largest problem, as with alot of fighting games whether sport, video game, table top, or something else, is that realism simulations can fuck with engaging and fun mechanics. For example the mechanic of not dying is very preferable in most sword sports and thus sharp swords are not a very good option. Real fights are simply hard to simulate well.
There is still a lot of demand for Sword games though, particularly those that actually make a sword FEEL like a sword. A variety of games recently have sprung up trying to address this, from the more over the top fantasy of For Honor to the attempted realism of Mordhau. It’s important I note here I have mostly stayed away from video games in the past 10 years only poking at things people recommended to me because they thought it was thematically appropriate. So I have only a limited number of hours into the two titles adobe and also other shittier games like Mount and Blade. My impressions may be due to a lack of expertise and not reflective of the game past a beginner level.
Mordhau allows for a lot the same motions of a sword fight and has some decent physics simulations of what happens for weapon on weapon contact or weapon on flesh/armor. However it feels super clunky and plays nothing like a fight. There are a host of options of attacks and defense but it’s still fairly similar to a standard Arcade fighter in that you need to use the right block to beat the right attack and there are limited alternatives to parrying. Often in a real fight just moving a blade through space will foul it enough, while it doesn’t quite work that way in Mordhau. Even intense exchanges in real life don’t feel quite as frantic as trying to guess how someone one will move based off of an only somewhat decently animated model.
In contrast For Honor is not realistic at all but by limiting options and allowing a few more hits, it feels more like an actual fight. It’s more about mastering a few basics and having a solid control of that and building a strategy off of that rather than trying to learn a variety of clever exploits, which is how Mordhau feels. 90% of real fighting in every form I’ve looked at seems to come down to being really good at the basics with some clever variations and For Honor feels much more in line with that by simplifying the combat system. This is also my experience in tabletop gaming or any simulation sport. The games that try to come up with mechanics to simulate “accuracy” in weapon damage or movement etc, the less it felt like a real fight. The ones that limited their attempts at being totally accurate simulations and just focused on being a cleaner version of the parts they wanted to highlight created both emotional and physical sensations much closer to real fighting.
Hellish Quart, a new arcade style fighting game, seems to give the best of both worlds. It is a game that attempts to create a physics system where the blades and bodies interact similar to how they would upon impacting in the real world. It also attempts to capture historical based fighting styles, similar to Mordhau or Kingdom Come. However it limits the number of attacks any particular character can do to a few simple angles of attacks, and then allows you to change or chain attacks together to come up with complexity. Characters move in ways that feel and look close to the fighting footwork I’ve seen. Blades simply being in line block oncoming attacks in that zone in a way that feels accurate and occasionally attacks slip by in the same manner.
One of the bits that most impressed me is that when an attack lacks power, whether being just out of range or partially warded, it will cut but not kill. There appears to be no health meter, attacks either kill or they don’t, which also feels accurate. Seeing that you got through but not enough is a really neat aspect that can both frustrate and amuse.
There are definitely issues. The game still occasionally has bugs in the physics. The grappling system is cool but extremely limited. It can be hard to tell why a cut or thrust did or did not garner a kill and after it lands the dead opponent simply dies, limited feedback on why. The online mode is not implemented and needs to be done though steam inviting someone to play on your copy.
Still I had a blast playing it and I can’t recommend it enough if you are interested in accuracy in swordplay games.