Dreamcast: Soul Reaver- Legacy of Kain Review

Soul Reaver: Legacy Of Kain - Developer: Cystal Dynamics - Publisher: Eidos
- Join Raziel in his quest to overthrow the evil vampire overlord Kain and bring glory back to his former clan. So grab your spear, eat some souls, and get ready to go on a journey into vampire lore.

Gameplay: 8.5/10
- You can take this game as two ways, either a fun Tomb Raider or a fun Shadowman. Either way, it is far better than those mentioned. It is similar to Tomb Raider in the sense of exploration and lever puzzles, and it is alike in terms of Shadowman by having two planes to that you can switch through one the dead/spectrel zone and the other the material plane. Aside from those likenesses, it is also presented in a behind the back 3rd person perspective view and with similar controls. However, that is where they end. You see, Soul Reaver manages to combine some damn good characters, fantastic storyline, great sounds, and some fantastic voice over. This game really comes together very nicely and is an exceptional title and is far beyond anything Acclaim or Core could have cooked up. The production value for this little gem is through the roof and it keeps you entertained and ready to play.
The negatives are, some of the puzzles just seem to be thrown in and kind of useless, while others make perfectly good sense. Also, in some rooms, you have to go into the spectral realm to figure out what to do but there is no mention of that so you could spend hours wondering around. Soul Reaver also suffers from bad camera angles, although not nearly apparent as in most other adventures but it does rear its ugly head here a few times. Finally, the game is so open ended and they hardly ever give you a slight hint at what to to do, so you spend your time roaming around and this can become frustrating. These small frustrastions never kept me from playing, though, due to the fantastic story and compelling characters.

Graphics: 8/10
Imagine if you will a computer game, at highest resolution you can think of, brilliant textures and affects, huge environments all while running smoothly. Well, unfortunately the game manages all that but the smoothly part because every now and then you will experience some slowdown. It can last for a few seconds, but does not really happen alot, which is surprising for all what the game does. The enemies are gruesome and rival some of the best movie designs, the game's architectures are amazing with vast run down chapels or a huge swirling pool of death, and other nice little touches. Taking a torch off the wall and walking with it leaves a small spark trail, enemies squirm as they melt in water, and thin neon blue lines travel up and down your body. The weapons have nice affects as well. The Soul Reaver sword is incredible along with just about every other aspect of the game.

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