It has been more than five years since Code Vein and Mortal Shell first launched. The two games went back to the last generation of consoles, but their new parts will be given the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S treatment, along with a PC release.
The Summer Game Fest of 2025 just began and has already spilled so much cool game news and hints. This batch of trailers and news has been excellent for players looking for Soulslike games; so many are slated for release come 2025 and 2026.
With the stream go some new games: Code Vein 2 and Mortal Shell 2. These games are new installments and follow up on great games from the past generation. Both Code Vein 2 and Mortal Shell 2 refine the experience that was set up in their predecessors. Code Vein 2 offers a little time manipulation, and Mortal Shell 2 offers new deep weapon mechanics. Code Vein was developed by Bandai Namco. It was a beautiful, strange game with more than one ending and a dark, anime style. It was also in some way connected with Bandai Namco's God Eater game setting. Mortal Shell, on the other hand, by Cold Symmetry, has carved out a niche for itself with its own dark atmospheric style and combat mechanics, which were based on learning to use many "shells" and tools.
In this sense, Code Vein 2, with its sharp anime style, will be awesome, courtesy of some fine fans who remember a fantastic Code Vein character creator. Its trailer also suggests the arrival of a new guy named Lou, who has the power to manipulate time. The second game will hence also allow co-op play, making it a little less lonely than most of the titles in the genre. There might even be some cars you can hop into and terrorize around, and big bosses that will scare you to death.
Meanwhile, Mortal Shell 2 dives deeper into its dark, almost gray world. While the first game was like Dark Souls, the new one goes big on harsh kill moves and fast guns too, maybe to stand out from the games it looks up to. They say this game's fight style isn't held back by stamina, showing that the next game will move away more from Dark Souls' way when it comes out in 2026.
With a lot of Soulslikes on the way, fans of this type will have much to wait for. Yet, the growing number of games might lead to tougher fights among them.