I never got around to playing the original Mortal Shell. At the time, I was content as a Souls-like fan with the games I already had access to, and with the then recent release of Elden Ring I just didn’t have the need for any alternate takes on the form. In 2026, though, it’s been quite some time since FromSoftware has put a single-player game out, and we’ve begun to see more promising alternatives emerge as they dabble with multiplayer. I was already itching for a punishing action-adventure of any kind to sink my teeth into, so it felt like the perfect time to dive into one with Mortal Shell II.
Before starting the game up, I had heard more than a few people describe Mortal Shell II as “Dark Souls with a shotgun.” I thought that was the coolest thing ever, but then quickly remembered that they had kind of already made Dark Souls with a shotgun, and they called it Bloodborne. In Bloodborne, the use a gun is woven smoothly into the gameplay loop as a parry-enabling alternative to a shield. It creates this elegant dance between player and foe where your bullets are used to create openings for melee strikes or brief moments of vulnerability in your foes defenses. In Mortal Shell II, your gun is not elegant. This is a world of daggers and hammers and bladed beasts, and you brought a gun to the knife fight. Tapping the gun button to fire a pound of projectiles into the face of my unsuspecting foes never gets old.
You dance a different sort of dance with the shotgun in Mortal Shell II – or the crossbow, or the minigun, or the medieval rocket launcher, as you explore and collect new weaponry. These projectile weapons don’t use ammo, but instead feed on your Resolve meter. When it runs low, you refill it by landing melee attacks, and can then expend it on special attacks and defensive abilities. You’re encouraged to keep a steady flow of melee momentum going to ensure you have enough Resolve, or you’re forced to dodge and weave to slowly rebuild it, or double-down on aggressive melee to speed up its recharge. I love the sort of Doom Eternal loop of attack options this creates – melee fuels gun, gun creates openings for melee, and you’re naturally weaving between the two in every encounter.
In addition to the variety of guns and melee weapons, you also have Shells, and these are the most important loadout choice in the game. Your default player character is a weak, naked Xenomorph-like husk of a humanoid, but you can discover and inhabit eight different characters called Shells. Each one has a unique appearance, backstory, and their own abilities and skill trees that majorly shake up your gameplay.
Tiel the Acolyte is focused on nimble dash attacks that build up enough meter to let him go invisible and dish out a stealthy back-stab. Proxima the Broodseeker has a grapple-hook attack that can pull her towards enemies, or enemies toward her. I’m usually a sucker for collectible cosmetic gear and equipment in these games, and not having that is usually a big negative for me. With Mortal Shell II though, framing everything around these Shells makes it feel less like I’m lacking customisation options and more like I have eight totally different characters to play as in an action game, which I love.
So, eight shells, eight melee weapons, eight ranged weapons. There are also three different Seal items which alter your defensive ability into either a block, a parry, or a Hardening state where you briefly turn into a damage-absorbing statue. On paper, it isn’t a vast quantity of equipment, but each combination you can choose drastically changes the way that you play.
There’s a bit of finicky build variety tagged on top thanks to the Shell skill upgrades. You can refund and re-invest your upgrade points whenever you want, making it easy to switch up your loadout when you hit a wall with a tough boss or tricky zone. There are also dozens of Tarstones to collect – these are upgrades you can infuse into specific weapons and Shells to add additional stat and ability modifiers onto your loadout.
My main complaint is that I don’t feel like the world isn’t all that satisfying or interesting. Mortal Shell II takes place in a vague fantasy realm where a mysterious giant alien structure has crashed into the planet. The structure is a woman, the woman has mysterious glowing eggs, and at the same time that this giant alien mother-structure has begun spreading a corrupting chaos through the realm. You’re tasked with collecting the crystalline eggs before more nefarious powers reach them. It’s vague, but interesting world-building. I love a blend of sci-fi and dark fantasy, and the narrative hook of a mother’s body being exploited and scavenged and spreading vengeful plague is really badass and cool.
Visually, though, the game just doesn’t live up to that premise. Environments are all sort of a dull grey, a dusky green or ramshackle brown, and while the game is very high-fidelity, it almost feels packed full of detailed vines and roots and rocks simply for the sake of it. Nothing stands out, it’s simply there and there’s a lot of it.
Enemies and bosses really don’t have any kind of memorable or distinct looks to them, either. They’re certainly detailed, and the bosses have particularly strange and alien and grotesque designs, but they’re just so… grey. It’s a game devoid of color, in the same way people would make fun of Xbox 360 and PS3 era shooters for being nothing but shades of brown. The major thing that makes Souls-like titles from From Software stand out, more than just their difficulty and their gameplay loop, is their gorgeous, inventive, and varied art direction. Mortal Shell II drops the ball on this, and it really brings the whole game down a lot for me as a result.
hbjnlIf you’re just looking for a fun and engaging game to play, there aren’t many major flaws on that front with Mortal Shell II. It has satisfying combat, loads of build varieties, and a steady and satisfying sense of exploration. There can be some random difficulty spikes and pretty unfair checkpoint placement, but it’s a very rewarding action adventure overall. I just wish the game had the visual style and variety to match it’s satisfying gameplay.
