Soulstice: Deluxe Edition (PS5)

Product Information

Each enemy has attacks that Lute can counter, putting up a button prompt for you to press so she can. In addition, you can also refund Lute’s skills to respec her, which helps as the attacks she uses during combat are based on her unlocked skills and her rapture ability depends on what skills she has. But by the time you’re sent on your mission – to investigate a supernatural storm corrupting all life it spreads across turning them into heinous beasts – you're the only one around to get the job done. Soulstice is a melting pot of things Devil May Cry does well and adds interesting demanding combat with two characters and situational countering. To hear me talk more about Soulstice , be sure to listen to Episode 418 of The Gaming Outsider Podcast around the 48:32 time stamp.

Because of these scored and defined encounter areas, instead of free-flowing scoring against any enemies ala Devil May Cry, Soulstice starts feeling incredibly scripted.You start out with a warhammer for your secondary weapon, but you do unlock five more that all have their pros and cons making them more helpful in certain situation. Aside from the two or three instances that it makes sense, I not only felt there were too many enemies being thrown at you, but enemies that require more attention and maintenance showing up together, making it more annoying and overwhelming than it should be. Despite being a new Chimera just barely out of training, Briar and Lute was sent to help reclaim Ilden.

The story of Ilden's veil torn above the sky is intriguing, with beautiful twists and a well-studied mythology, it is therefore a pity that the setting is not able to sustain this charm, despite the very good basic technique, trapped in a artistic direction that is often too generic and redundant.

Gets boring in the middle where the scenery and enemies are very repetitive with the game having you fight in the same town from start to finish.

That said, Soulstice is structured as a game that you really should play until you finish, it’s not one you can put down and pick up after a couple days. Feels a little bit like a PS2 game in some regards (not really a knock on it, its just if you played back in those days, games had great ideas and settings but couldn't overcome certain technical challenges). I was pretty concerned during that stage that there was no depth to the game or the combat, but then you get to an actual stage and tutorial and it is better.Soulstice is a near complete package of a game, but at times it can be overwhelming when you are controlling nearly 2 characters in some very heated moments of combat. Yes, there are still some camera angles that are just bad, enemy mobs could be put together better, and there are some other annoying aspects of the game; but the edginess of the game soon became endearing, the characters grew on me, I started caring and snapped back to pay attention to the story, and after I had more battles under my belt, I actually liked the combat. But training yourself to do a double tap of two different buttons when one is enough in most games is a little frustrating. Soulstice from Reply Game Studios brings a strong story, a good amount of action, and paints a perfectly drab world to tie it all together.

Wraiths corrupt their victims and can even possess their bodies, turning into unstoppable, vile beings that prey upon the living. The "Chimeras", hybrid warriors born of the union of two souls, are the only ones who can protect humankind. Yet the many of these locations are dull and unappealing, and with the exception the last few locations in the end game, barely look any different than one another.The tutorial isn’t quite clear on how high is high enough, which caused some confusion on my end for half of the game, but when it glows yellow, it’s time to do a long combo to activate a Synergy Attack at the end. I can’t tell whether enemies still attack off camera, as they still seem to do counter-able attacks though. Briar carries her sword, dubbed the Ashen Vindicator, and Lute uses magic to assist her sister in and out of battle.