If you’ve marion-yet to play the fantastic, Pinocchio-inspired soulslike Lies of P, then its first DLC expansion, Overture, is filled with finely polished reasons to do so. Though it's whittled from the same timber and sticks very closely to the original stage directions, this 12-hour encore has plenty of new (and still deeply depressing) areas to explore, some additional tools to carve baddies into kindling with, and more impressively menacing bosses to drop the curtain on. Plus, it does a great job fleshing out an already awesome story by tugging on a few strings that were left dangling in the base game and landing some surprising ventrilo-twists, renewing my appreciation for just how well this fib-filled tale made me care about its characters. I was happy to put my elongated nose back to the hack-and-slash grindstone of this top-puppet-tier soulslike, which left me more excited than ever for a proper sequel.If you’re just joining us after the intermission, Lies of P is one of the better soulslikes to take the stage in a very crowded genre. Aside from its unique weapon-crafting system, it didn’t introduce many new ideas to shine a spotlight on, but the stuff it borrowed is all done extremely well. Overture doesn’t try to fix what isn’t broken, adding a dozen hours of daunting challenges in the form of a time-traveling prequel that throws you back to the events preceding the main story. At roughly a third of the size of the original game, Overture feels pretty massive, following a similar (albeit at a much more modest scale) model as Elden Ring’s Shadow of the Erdtree DLC by greatly expanding the amount of areas, bosses, and loot to collect. It does that while introducing an interesting second act to the story to boot, so there is enough meat on these wooden bones for me to remember how much I adored this devious adventure in the first place.With a mostly new cast of characters, Overture could almost be enjoyed as a standalone adventure, were it not only accessible once you’re most of the way through the main story – plus it leans pretty heavily into existing lore, where a lot of the payoff requires you to know how it all ends. But still, as someone who hasn’t revisited Lies of P since launch, I didn’t feel at all lost, and Overture does a great job reintroducing you to the calamitous city of mechanical puppets and diseased creatures that is Krat. This new tall tale is every bit as heartbreaking and bleak as I’ve come to expect, with some interesting twists and turns that fill in existing gaps in unexpected ways and offer some very satisfying answers to questions I was left pondering over a year ago. It’s also got some of the most epic (and sometimes stomach-churning) moments I’ve seen in a game in a long time. I kinda forgot how full-anime this thing really goes at times, and that’s definitely a good thing in my book.The main attractions in Overture, though, are the super weird new places you’ll visit and the evil monsters you’ll murder along the way. During one early section, you’ll walk through a zoo and get attacked by all manner of deranged animal, from apes to elephants to a giant alligator, while in another section you’ll run across a perilous lake of ice that falls apart under your feet while pirate-like puppets operate a cannon nearby in an attempt you to send you plunging into Davey Jones’ locker. There’s quite a bit of variety to this sandbox, and it’s especially cool to see the number of new enemies that have been added to the mix, like undead fish that leap out of the water and try to gobble you up while flopping about (this DLC really wants you to kill animals, if you couldn’t tell). That said, interesting new areas are also offset somewhat by curiously retread ground, including a carnival section that feels awfully familiar to the parade-themed spaces and enemies we’ve already seen before. There’s also plenty of rehashed enemies, like your standard psychotic humanoid puppets and undead dogs that have way more teeth than I’m comfortable with.What We Said About Lies of P (2023)Lies of P might not branch out particularly far from its soulslike inspiration, but like a marionette controlled by a skilled puppet master, it plays the part extremely well in a wonderfully dark fantasy world. It must be said that its uneven difficulty didn’t always make me feel like an underdog, especially when playing as a brawny, overpowered version of Pinocchio with a massive weapon, and combat pigeonholed me into a specific playstyle while the levels are less open and twisting than most. But with an awesome weapon crafting system, some really memorable boss fights, and one of the better stories we’ve seen in this genre, I can enthusiastically recommend you spend your time hanging out with Gepetto and friends. If you’ve been waiting for a Bloodborne remaster or sequel that may never come, Lies of P is the next best thing. – Travis Northup, September 13, 2023Score: 8Read the full Lies of P reviewOne of the standout parts of Overture is its new bosses, which are extremely original, mostly challenging, and serve as exciting climaxes after the slower lead-ups of slashing through chump minions and reading private documents you find lying around, you nosey little mannequin. I’ll avoid spoiling as many as I can, but there’s a good mix of absolutely massive, ugly monsters wielding such enormous weapons that it’s completely insane you can parry them with your tiny sword, and fast-moving humanoid enemies who dodge around and cross blades with you in a contest of reflexes and pattern recognition. The final boss in particular, who has some of the most hilariously convoluted attacks Lies of P has ever concocted, is especially fun to learn, and provided a satisfying conclusion and final skill check that made me feel like I’d really earned that ending. None of these encounters were as difficult as I remember some of the hardest fights in the base game being, but that’s partially because they were better balanced in general, so I had more fun dying and learning their ins and outs with better consistency. It’s also possible I’ve just gotten better at soulslikes since I’ve reviewed about 50 of them in the past few years, from Lords of the Fallen to Another Crab’s Treasure, but I definitely enjoyed what felt like a more predictable level of challenge all around. Though there’s plenty of cool new sights to see and things to kill in Overture, not much at all has changed with the actual moment-to-moment gameplay. There are at least a handful of interesting new weapons to use, like some deadly hand claws that are a great option for dexterity-focused builds, as well as some new amulets to augment your build with, but nothing that’s outside of what you’d expect to find in the base game. And when it comes to things like actual combat strategy or exploration, this add-on is largely just more Lies of P – that’s definitely a good thing, but it does mean I still have all the same criticisms as before. The sections that lead up to each boss fight are still significantly easier than those eventual encounters, and the stiff combat system locks you into a pretty specific Bloodborne-like playstyle compared to the RPG-inspired nature of other soulslikes that give you more freedom. It’s not a huge deal that these issues haven’t really been ironed out, but what is a little disappointing is how Overture plays it fairly safe when it comes to new mechanics. It only introduces one in the form of a fresh upgrade tree system that lets you further improve and customize passive benefits, some of which increase the damage you deal or make you more likely to survive a barrage of attacks from a boss. This system is certainly neat, but it mostly feels like an extension of the existing upgrade system that just adds more runway to leveling up, and there aren’t any major shakeups to the sorts of things you’ll be doing as you butcher your way through Krat, so it’s a good thing doing so is as fun as ever.