The turn of the New Year happened a few days ago, with most folks ringing in 2025's arrival with plenty of booze, resolutions they're planning to stick to, and copious amounts of fireworks. Personally, though, I spent the first hours of the year glued to my PC, playing what has rapidly become one of my favorite new games: Half Sword. First introduced with an early work-in-progress demo in October 2023, it recently got a significantly more polished and free-to-play playtest build in September I happened to stumble across over the holiday break.
Half Sword is best described as a physics-based medieval combat simulator with freeform controls; in other words, there are no dedicated inputs for attacking or blocking. Instead, your guards and strikes are performed entirely with directional mouse movements, with a few specific actions like thrusts and kicks assigned to buttons. This approach alone immediately makes the game far more realistic than other titles in the genre like Mordhau and Chivalry 2, and it's primarily what drew me to check Half Sword out when I learned of its playtest release.
Complementing the realism-forward controls are authentic depictions of and interactions between 15th Century weapons and armor, along with a maneuver that's extremely rare to see included in medieval games: half-swording. By holding down the right mouse button, you'll adjust your grip so that you hold the blade of your sword in your left hand (or simply choke up on the shaft, with other weapons), shortening your reach but giving you more leverage and control to lock up your opponent's weapon or cut and thrust at unprotected parts of their body. This technique gives you a more effective way to defend yourself against thrusts from lengthy weapons like spears as you attempt to close the distance, and is also ideal for grappling with a plate-armored opponents.
These mechanics harmoniously come together to create an extremely engaging combat sim, and while the goofy Totally Accurate Battle Simulator-esque shuffle-walking of the characters suggests otherwise at a glance, there's actually a ton of depth here to dig into. Every weapon matchup forces you to evaluate your advantages and disadvantages, and then act and react accordingly; when you've got a halberd and your opponent has a sword and shield, for example, it's typically wise to take advantage of your extra reach with thrusts or sweeping slashes. If they manage to get past the edge of your effective range, though, you'll need to be ready to choke up your hold on the polearm so that you can contend with their advantage in close quarters.
Armor adds another thing to consider, too, as you'll need to aim for exposed areas like the neck, legs, or armpits to end fights quickly. Strikes directly against plate are largely ineffective, though a strong hit to an enemy's helmet might knock them unconscious if you're using a blunt or heavy armament. Alternatively, you can attempt to wrestle with an armored opponent using kicks and a half-sworded weapon; if you manage to take out their footing and knock them to the ground, you can follow up with repeated strikes and kicks until they either yield or get struck somewhere their armor doesn't cover.
The primary game mode in Half Sword's playtest is a simple duel against an AI using a similar amount of armor as you, but randomized weapons. However, there are also a few other scenarios you can select as you play, including team-based, free-for-all, and one-versus-all group battles that give certain weapons and maneuvers contexts to shine in. Half-swording, for example, is extremely useful in the 1v4 "Brave Stand" mode, as the added leverage allows you to thrust and bash at enemies while simultaneously defending against strikes from their comrades. Blunt arms such as maces also excel in the 3v3 "Small Buhurt" rounds since you'll likely have several opportunities to strike an opponent's head while they're distracted by one of your allies.
Admittedly, the game isn't without problems or noteworthy drawbacks; a friend of mine into Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA) pointed out there are techniques you can't replicate with Half Sword's combat system, and the silliness of the movement makes your character's footwork feel rather unsteady at times. Also, I've noticed that the AI often fail to take range into account, and thus open themselves up to easy strikes or thrusts with spears and other polearms.
Even so, it's been a ton of fun to play, especially since I've always been fascinated by HEMA and have wanted a game like this for years. I should also note that Half Sword's presentation is excellent, with realistic blood sprays, spatters, and pools alongside gritty death sounds and other voice lines selling the brutality and spectacle of a medieval fight to the death. The fidelity of the visuals isn't amazing or anything, but for a budding indie title, it looks great.
Half Sword is slated to get a full release in 2025, though at the moment, it's unclear how specifically the developers plan to improve and refine it or if the game will get highly requested features like multiplayer PvP and character customization. I'd love to see it get those alongside a port to console — it already has controller support, after all — but even as is, it's one of the new best PC games. And hey, the opt-in playtest is free, and the game itself is easy to run and only takes up a few gigs. Why not try it out?
