Blade and Sorcery: Nomad is one of the most famed medieval fantasy titles in the virtual reality, or VR, gaming community. It was created by WarpFrog, a small company of software engineers and developers, who also created the PCVR version, Blade and Sorcery. It was released for early access on the Meta store on November 4, 2021.
Five months later after the full release of Blade and Sorcery, which was also in early access, they announced the full release for Blade and Sorcery: Nomad on October 28, 2024.
Both games are incredibly similar, with the only difference being the name, and the VR platforms they’re designed for- one for PCVR, and one for Quest.
Like many other Blade and Sorcery players, I was able to purchase the game and play it while it was in early access.
When the full game was released in The End Update, a variety of bug fixes and map retextures were included. However, what caught my eye the most was the long-awaited Crystal Hunt game mode, which is designed like a classic dungeon crawler.
After grinding Crystal Hunt and messing around in Sandbox, a game mode that lets the player do virtually whatever they want, I have a few things to say about the overall game.
To start, the combat is phenomenal. The AI-controlled enemies behave like humans on a basic level and will quickly adapt to their combat situations, making the game more immersive. The player can defeat these enemies using their available magic abilities, weapons, and armor.
Second, the maps.
There are two types of map layouts. The first follows a layout like an arena- certain boundaries that the player can’t cross surrounding an area- and a dungeon-like layout, where there are connected rooms of various sizes that eventually ends with a reward for the player.
Regardless of map layout, the maps are highly detailed and look gorgeous.
Two other highlights of the game are the character customization and the lore.
The first provides a wide variety of hair, eye, and skin colors for the player, and the available armor, clothing, and weapons can be mixed and matched to suit the player’s stylistic and combat preferences.
The latter uses notes scattered around the dungeon-like maps to build the lore. These notes include diary entries and letters to military officials, among others. Combined, the amount of letters put together would take roughly an hour to explain the history of Byeth, the world where Blade and Sorcery takes place.
Now, for the downsides. Thankfully, there’s not many, and they’re very minor issues.
First, sometimes I find that something I’ve been using is stuck in the ground and isn’t retrievable.
Second, arrows are very easy to lose and sometimes despawn before your eyes, which can be frustrating.
Despite these flaws, at the end of every dungeon, when the player respawn at home, everything lost during their excursion is back in their inventory.
Overall, I’d highly recommend Blade and Sorcery: Nomad to anyone who has a Quest 1, 2, 3, or 3S. Even if medieval fantasy isn’t a part of your taste in video games, get it, and play it. It’s absolutely worth it.
