Pretty good game overall. Lots of little improvements on the Soulsborne formula, like the healing system, being directed towards side quests, elevators resetting upon death, etc.

However, there are a few core issues that keep me from liking it as much as a From game. You have to approach combat very defensively, and just block attacks then use the rally system to regain your health. To make things more exciting, you can go for 'perfect blocks' that stop chip damage and slowly build up the enemy stagger gauge. These are often way too hard to time correctly though, especially on the nonhuman enemies that have strange attack animations. It requires heavy memorization, which isn't really feasible on your first playthrough.

The builds in the game seem to be pretty varied, there are a lot of weapons and legion arms that were fun to experiment with that will make multiple playthroughs feel fresh. However, the leveling system has a pretty major issue which is that the attack stats don't seem to be very significant. This could be a problem for players, as it's not really emphasized that you should be prioritizing equipment load and health/stamina much more than in a Souls game. Because of this design choice, enemies don't really seem to scale throughout the game. You mostly fight the same sets of enemies for 75% of the areas, and I wasn't able to one-shot most early game enemies even when I was right at the end.

The story of the game was pretty good, and I appreciate how they attempt to tie everything together thematically through the lying system. Basically, all of the side character stories are there to give you the chance to prove your humanity by acting empathetically or emotionally. Usually these moments worked for me, but a few of the choices are too absolute and seem antithetical with the idea that they're meant as a test of 'humanity'. For example, to finish one questline 'appropriately' you have to murder a criminal, even though understanding his motive or forgiving him should be seen as human too. A few questlines do seem to give you humanity points for either option, but overall I don't like how your humanity can be determined by a series of binary choices.

I was disappointed that I apparently didn't choose enough correct answers to get the true ending, despite understanding the point of the story by the end. The From approach to storytelling works so well because you naturally discover the stories themes through moments with side characters or item descriptions, then get the chance to prove your understanding with an end decision. Here, it's almost the opposite approach: you won't even be presented with the option for best ending unless you managed to reach an arbitrary number of literal 'good boy points'. All the plot/lore of Lies of P is serviceable and has some interesting mysteries, but they don't get resolved as satisfactorily as in Bloodborne or Elden Ring.