Napoleon Bonaparte is about to become a boss fight, and honestly, that single sentence tells you most of what you need to know about Valor Mortis.
What Changed This Week
The wait is almost over. Valor Mortis, the first-person Soulslike from One More Level — the studio behind the fast, bloody Ghostrunner — launches worldwide on October 13, 2026, at 10:00 AM PT / 1:00 PM ET / 5:00 PM UTC. The studio marked the countdown with a launch trailer on October 6, 2026, paired with behind-the-scenes interviews, and then followed up with the full voice cast reveal. That cast is the headline: Vincent Cassel plays Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, and Jennifer English plays The Shrike, a key figure in the resistance against his war. The protagonist, William Dowsett, is voiced by James Alexander.
As the developer put it in its own words:
"We are so happy that we got to work with Vincent Cassel as Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte and Jennifer English as The Shrike."
Cassel added a nice personal detail during the press rounds — he recounted that his Auntie would call Napoleon "a cousin of the family," which is either a delightful coincidence or the best bit of casting trivia you'll read this month.
What It Means If You're Picking This Up
If you've never touched a Soulslike before, here's the short version: expect tough combat, a grim world, and death as a teacher rather than a punishment. Valor Mortis takes that formula and bends it through an alternate history lens — occupied Eastern Europe, Napoleon's campaign gone unnatural, and William Dowsett fighting through what the dossier calls "nephtogoblin amalgamations" using an arsenal of weapons and Transmutations, left-hand powers that tear through enemies and the environment alike. That's a genuinely unusual setting for the genre, which tends to lean on generic dark fantasy rather than warped Napoleonic history.
Where you buy it matters too, so here's the breakdown players actually need:
| Edition | Price | What You Get |
|---|---|---|
| Base Game | $39.99 / €39.99 / 149.99 PLN | Full game at launch |
| Deluxe Edition | $59.99 / €59.99 / 199.99 PLN | Major Story DLC (next year) plus several cosmetic packs releasing before then |
Platform-wise, it's available on PC via Steam, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S — and notably, it's a day-one release on Xbox Game Pass, which means subscribers don't have to decide upfront whether they trust a new Soulslike enough to pay full price.
The Voices Behind the Masks
Beyond Cassel and English, the supporting cast reads like a mix of acting and music-scene crossover: Adam "Nergal" Darski (yes, the Behemoth frontman) voices Captain Raphael, Mars Lipowski plays Lucjan Skawiński, Will de Renzy-Martin voices James Stewart, and Yvan Chamoiseau plays Louis Moreau. English herself has talked about preparing to play The Shrike as a figure central to the resistance narrative, which suggests her role carries real narrative weight rather than being a one-scene cameo.
What to Watch Before and After Launch
- Whether the New Game+ mode, planned for Q4 2026, delivers on its promise of tougher enemies and new challenges while letting you keep your loot and progression — a staple Soulslike feature, but one worth confirming works smoothly on day one rather than patched in later.
- How much actual content sits inside the Major Story DLC bundled with the Deluxe Edition, since the dossier only confirms it's coming "next year" without specifics.
- Performance and optimization on Xbox Game Pass specifically, since day-one Game Pass releases can see uneven launch-week stability compared to paid purchases.
- Whether the alternate-history Napoleonic setting translates into genuinely different boss design, or whether it's dark-fantasy mechanics wearing a historical costume.
- Any word on multiplayer or co-op features post-launch, which remains an open question the studio hasn't addressed yet.
Sources :
Comments 0