Lancelot's back...
Wild Blood is a Hack and Slash action game made by Gameloft, using gameplay mechanics lifted wholesale from the Dark Souls series, but with an Arthurian Legend setting.
In the kingdom of Albion (wait, not Camelot?), an affair between the Round Table's greatest knight, Lancelot, and the Queen, Guinevere, has been uncovered by King Arthur himself. An enraged King Arthur immediately seeks his handmaiden, Morgana, into casting a spell to have Lancelot eliminated - only for Morgana, who secretly seeks the kingdom for herself, to corrupt King Arthur's mind and unleash her legions of monsters into Albion.
Lancelot, returning from a quest, discovers Albion in ruins, the countryside ravaged by monsters and undead, and after battling Morgana who assumes the guise of a dragon, Lancelot realize what his little affair with Guinevere has caused for the entire kingdom. That King Arthur is now a tyrant and Guinevere is now imprisoned in Morgana's prison stronghold. And thus Lancelot rallies the remaining Knights of the Round Table on a quest to save the kingdom.
The Fate of Albion now Rests in Lancelot's Hands...
- Action Bomb: There's a mook-grade enemy with a bulbous head whose sole attack is self-destructing itself when near Lancelot. It can be taken out from a distance by the bow.
- Airborne Mooks: Among the undead, there are demonic, avian monsters larger than a man whose heads are oversized skulls. These enemies tends to stay out of range before swooping to attack Lancelot.
- Animated Armor: Many of Morgana's mooks are animated armors with Medieval Great Helm for heads. They're among the only enemies that doesn't bleed when hacked, and falls apart after their life is spent.
- Annoying Arrows: Played ridiculously straight on both fronts. Arrows from enemy archers does tiny damage to Lancelot's health compared to axes and swords, and when Lancelot gets a bow and arrow from Gawain, it turns out his arrows deal Scratch Damage to every single enemy.
- Attack Its Weak Point: The bosses and giant-sized enemies are only vulnerable when targeting certain spots. Which the game will throw a helpful red crosshair on their weak point which Lancelot need to shoot or slash at.
- Battle in the Rain: Most of the second stage is in a rain-drenched courtyard infested with all kinds of enemies.
- BFS: Lancelot's default weapon right in the first stage is a claymore as tall as himself.
- Big Bad: While the insane King Arthur is presented as the game's main villain, as the game goes on the actual main villain is made clear to be Morgana, who's pulling the strings behind plunging Albion into chaos after taking advantage of Arthur's state of mind.
- Big Good: Merlin serves as the only member among the forces of good still in control in preventing Albion from being wiped out by Morgana's forces. Saving him from Morgana is a key turning point in the entire game.
- Brutish Character, Brutish Weapon: Giant ogres tends to wield either maces or clubs as weapons. As does the Cyclops who carries an enormous hammer.
- Cyclops: A frost cyclops shows up as a powerful boss mid-game.
- Distressed Dude: Merlin has been captured by Morgana and imprisoned in the Hanging Gardens, and it's up to Lancelot to rescue him by defeating the Archangel assigned to guard Merlin.
- Dramatic Thunder: used constantly in the opening FMV. As the narration tells the backstory of Lancelot's forbidden affair with Guinevere, over an animated clip of the castle drenched in rain, thunder cracks periodically when the narration talks about how their romance have screwed Albion over.
- Excalibur: Well, a work based on Arthurian Legends won't be complete without Excalibur in it. King Arthur uses this weapon during his boss battle, and after defeating Arthur Lancelot may claim Excalibur for himself. It's an Infinity +1 Sword for slicing apart Morgana's ranks with ease.
- Floating Continent: The Hanging Gardens, unlike the one from history, is reimagined in the game as a literal mid-air garden, built on suspended platforms in the clouds. Most of the time Lancelot need to traverse from one area to another either by jumping or activating bridges.
- Garden of Evil: Morgana's lair is her personal garden, and it is infested with all sorts of Plant Mooks. Besides her usual forces and sentient armors.
- Giant Mook: Morgana's forces has giant ogres wielding meat cleavers larger than Lancelot who tanks plenty of damage before going down. There's also giant armors, enlarged versions of the already-difficult Animated Armor enemies.
- Giant Woman: The Archangel boss is a giant winged angel who attacks Lancelot at the exit of the Hanging Gardens.
- Gotta Rescue Them All: Well, not exactly "all", but Lancelot can frequently come across civilians and captives in cages, imprisoned by Morgana's forces. Destroying those cages and releasing the captives will reward Lancelot with experience points.
- Hobbling the Giant: Ogres and the Cyclops boss can be subdued momentarily by slashing or shooting their legs and knees, causing them to kneel over momentarily allowing Lancelot to slash them before they recover.
- The Horde: Morgana's army of monsters ranges from beast-people to the undead to ogres and gargoyles. You name it, it's in there somewhere.
- Jousting Lance: Undead knights armed with lances shows up as another enemy, where upon seeing Lancelot they charge at him with a Dash Attack with the lance pointed forward. They deal some serious damage, though Lancelot can jump over their lances.
- Left Stuck After Attack: One of the preferred strategies if Lancelot is fighting ogres - dodge their swinging clubs and trick them into hitting the floor. This causes their weapons to be embedded into the ground, and for Lancelot to hit them back while the ogres tries pulling their weapon out.
- Multi-Melee Master: Lancelot can use anything as weapons - swords of all sizes, sabres, daggers, axes, bows, you name it. The game offers a wide variety of assorted arms Lancelot can purchase in the inventory.
- My God, What Have I Done?: King Arthur, upon being freed of Morgana's control and realizing his thirst for vengeance has plunged Albion into chaos. In the final cutscene after Lancelot defeats Morgana and freed Guinevere via Excalibur, Arthur then relinquishes his queen to Lancelot, performing a Heroic Sacrifice to destroy Morgana for good.
- Our Gargoyles Rock: Gargoyles are one of the many monsters serving Morgana. Most of the time (including their Mook Debut Cutscene in the Hanging Gardens) they tend to remain motionless as scary-looking statues, only to come to life and ambush when Lancelot approaches.
- Our Ghosts Are Different: In order to obtain the first keystone to close Morgana's Hellgate, Lancelot need to battle The Council - a group of ghosts consisting of former members of the Round Table. Who performs a Fusion Dance into a giant ghost in an inevitable boss fight. Said ghost boss can be hurt only by magic weapons, and upon defeat reverts back to a group of ghosts before granting Lancelot's request and disappearing.
- Plot-Inciting Infidelity: In the backstory, the forbidden affair between Lancelot and Guinevere, and King Arthur's discovery of the incident, is what led to Arthur seeking his evil sister, Morgana, to eliminate Lancelot. But Morgana betrays Arthur by putting the King under her control before unleashing her monsters all over the populace leading to the game's major events.
- Recurring Boss: Morgana needs to be fought multiple times, showing up as early as the first boss. She uses the same Shockwave Stomp using her claws each time; the first battle ends with her pulling a Villain: Exit, Stage Left before coming back later.
- Scaled Up: Whenever Morgana is forced to confront Lancelot directly without relying on her magic, she then turns into a massive dragon to battle.
- Siege Engines: The courtyard and Hanging Gardens have platforms containing gigantic ballista, where enemies can use to fire upon Lancelot. Then again Lancelot can hijack a few ballista for himself to target enemies.
- Spin Attack: Lancelot can perform a tornado move when armed with dual axes, which dishes heavyu damage to surrounding enemies.
- Sword of Plot Advancement: Excalibur, as usual, since it's the only weapon that can harm Morgana. Lancelot needs to obtain this weapon by defeating it's original wielder, King Arthur, in a fierce boss fight.
- Tin Tyrant: This game's version of King Arthur is re-imagined as a ruthless tyrant clad in armor 24-7, save for his face, and a powerful boss enemy when fought halfway through.
- Unexpected Shmup Level: Lancelot spends most of the game hacking his way through monsters with melee weapons, and occasionally gets to use arrows. But then there's a couple of areas where he gets a ballistae, where the game turns into a Light Gun Game where he must shoot everything from a first-person perspective until there's nothing to shoot at. Notably when battling the Archangel in the Hanging Gardens or swapping shots with skeleton archers.
- You Can't Thwart Stage One: The first boss fight is an easy battle against a dragon which ends with... the dragon automatically stomping Lancelot to the ground with her claws in the following cutscene. Because said dragon is actually Morgana who's "testing" Lancelot's skills, and being immune all weapons except Excalibur, The Battle Didn't Count. Sir Gawain's intervention prevents Morgana from killing Lancelot outright, leading to the next stage.
