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Phantom Blade Zero reviews are in: 88 on Metacritic, 91 on OpenCritic, and critics say the combat is all-time great

By PPRGaming · October 26, 2026

Official Phantom Blade Zero key art of Soul seen from behind in a wide straw hat with a long white ponytail, raising a blade against a dark temple, with the Chinese title calligraphy beside him
Image: S-GAME

The reviews are in, and they’re great. Phantom Blade Zero sits at 88 on Metacritic on both PS5 and PC and a 91 Top Critic Average on OpenCritic, where 100% of 36 critics recommend it. That puts S-GAME’s console debut above this year’s Onimusha: Way of the Sword (85) and Nioh 3 (86), TheGamer notes. It launches digitally on PS5 and PC on October 28 at 10 PM ET, which we covered in our launch trailer story.

Some of the scores (per Game Beacon and VICE):

  • TheGamer: 5/5, calling it “a genuine Game of the Year contender”
  • DualShockers: 9.5/10, “hands down the best action RPG this year”
  • IGN, Push Square, GamingBolt, TheSixthAxis: 9/10
  • GameSpot: 8/10
  • VGC: 4/5
  • Eurogamer: 3/5
  • Polygon: unscored

What critics love. Almost every review singles out the combat. IGN’s reviewer played 50 hours on the hardest difficulty and called it “one of the best action games I’ve played in a long time.” Weapon variety comes up constantly too. IGN points out that swapping weapons is also how you restore posture, so the game pushes you to learn several movesets, and bosses don’t make you replay phases you’ve already beaten.

What holds it back. The story is the most common complaint. IGN calls it convoluted, and GameSpot’s headline says the combat is so good “you won’t care the story makes no sense.” IGN also flags invisible walls and geometry snags, plus one map that still ran badly even though performance was much steadier than in the preview build. Eurogamer is the low outlier, praising the street fights but saying boss battles feel like “waiting your turn to get hits in with a wooden sword.” Polygon loved the Wuxia-movie look but felt the game doesn’t trust players enough to pull off those moves themselves.

PPR take: An 88 for a studio’s first big console release is a huge result, and the combat praise is close to unanimous. If you’re on PC, keep an eye out for a day-one patch given the performance notes. Pre-loading is open now.

Sources