Retro Review - Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver

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Undoubtedly, the old but very dear PlayStation 1 left us a great list of excellent games that today are very remembered and loved by many people, many of those games are representative of a generation and the same PlayStation 1 itself. That's why today I bring a new review of an old generation classic.

And that classic is Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver.

The first time I played Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver I had no idea that it was a sequel and that the first game of this great saga (which has several games) was very different from this one, with respect to its playability, the first game of this saga has by name: Legacy Of Kain: Blood Omen (I haven't played it yet) and it tells the story of Kain, many years before the events of "Soul Reaver", in addition to its gameplay is completely different because "Blood Omen" is Action/RPG genre.

As for the story of Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver, it tells the story of Raziel, a vampire who works under the orders of Kain, (protagonist of the previous game and now king of vampires), who thanks to his other vampire brothers were able to conquer the Kingdom of Nosgoth. This time Raziel is the protagonist of this new game and its story begins with a betrayal, because without any reason Raziel presents in him a mutation, or what could also be called an "evolution", because in his back are developed bat wings, being the first vampire to evolve in such a way, but the king of vampires, Kain, does not like this at all, since according to his logic, being the king of the vampires he must be the first to present such a change, therefore, in an act of envy towards his own warrior he is sentenced to die in the abyss, which is a bottomless lake, where he will fall for hundreds of years, but before that, Karin manages to pull the wings off Raziel, so that he cannot use them to escape from the abyss. After Raziel was thrown into the abyss, he is saved by a kind of god, who gives him the opportunity to live, but on the condition that he kills Kain. And since Raziel has a grudge against his former king for the damage he did to him, he will unhesitatingly complete his vengeance.

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Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver knows how to create a suitable setting for the argument that presents the game, with good details in its graphic section, Soul Reaver, despite not being the greatest exponent, in terms of graphic quality, of the entire list of excellent games that can be found in the old but beloved PlayStation 1, serves as a reference to demonstrate the ability of the old Sony console. This game brings us a dark world, full of gloom and darkness, a ghostly and gothic world, perfectly recreated to imply that the place where we are belongs to entities that transmit evil or darkness.

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The scenarios are very well drawn, with very good colors, in many cases, the color palette of these scenarios gives a lot to shine, creating an atmosphere that could easily be seen in any film of the genre of terror or suspense. If we talk about the animations and design of the characters, there is a great work behind the development of these, in Raziel, which is our main protagonist, he presents a fairly good design, which just seeing him gives the impression that he is not a villain, but neither is a totally good being, in addition to presenting a certain aura of mystery for his clothing. And with regard to the animations and movement of the characters, they are fluid and fast, given the gameplay of Soul Reaver, it is necessary to have a very good level of fluidity so that every fight feels satisfactory for the player.

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The melodies used in Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver are very accurate and complement very well with the plot and above all, with the scenarios and the world that this game has created. In Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver we can find melodies that we automatically associate with everything related to mystery, terror, gothic and suspense. It's a game that knows how to create a very balanced atmosphere between the stages and the soundtrack. Similarly, the work done on the voices of the characters is very credible and despite the fact that in many old games, the voices that were used on many occasions sounded overacted, in Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver, in my opinion, is very well acted.

Video Author Alex Masters

Certainly although I'm not a big fan of the Tomb Raider saga, since in my childhood I didn't play it much, when I played Soul Reaver I could see that they have certain similarities in the movement of the character and in many aspects of the gameplay itself (the old Tomb Raider saga), and this is something where many characters agree. As for the movement of our main protagonist, Raziel, is very smooth and easy to learn, is able to perform combos of attacks on enemies, and this is a very important aspect in the game, the use of combinations of attacks will help us defeat our enemies more efficiently and quickly.

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One aspect that I like very much about this game is that during our adventure we will be transported in 2 worlds: "the material world" and "the spectral world", where in these two worlds certain actions can be performed that in the other not, in such a way that doing some action in the "material world" will have repercussions in the "spectral world".

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In this game we can find several types of enemies and some of them must be defeated in different ways, for example: humans can be defeated using the typical weapons provided by the game or with the weapons of our protagonist, however, the vampires must be defeated otherwise, because after leaving them with few points of life they must be impaled, exposed to the light or burned without any mercy in the fire, and it is of great importance to defeat the enemies because they, after their deaths provide us with souls, with which Raziel can recover points of life.

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Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver is one of those games that over the years has positioned it as a cult game among fans and this is a merit that has very well deserved. A game highly recommended for all those who want to experience a game that is excellent even today.

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