#Solar ash rei full

One or two hits will see you sent back to a checkpoint and with the slippery movement it's hard to avoid incoming attacks. Despite the simplicity, it's terribly unforgiving in the early portion of the game. Speaking of fighting, combat is certainly an oddity. Why doesn't she tell us about home? Give us an impression of what she's fighting for? Hack 'n' Skate There's a small complication that enters the mix due to the aforementioned twist but it only does a little to elevate Rei as a character.

Our plucky heroine is so by the numbers too.

Several encounters that circle the same threadbare plot assure us of that. A malevolent entity or uncaring god? Instead, thanks to the dialogue, we know exactly who they are and what they want. The giant figure who tries to crush Rei throughout could be mysterious. Visually it's so rich and its imagery sometimes truly striking, that it feels a waste to slap explanations on it all. It's all expository or functional, with the character archetypes so broad they're left paper thin. The dialogue of Solar Ash just isn't very good. It's possible to enhance a world's mysteries with the right words, having characters imply meaning or depths that we ourselves might not glean from visuals alone. I do smile at Rei’s little chuckles on pulling off a successful trick, so there are definitely some gains from the inclusion of voice acting.ĭialogue doesn't have to be antithetical to evocative storytelling. It has characters chatting, its world is littered with lengthy audio logs and the story is so dreadfully straightforward I imagine most will see its singular twist coming from the start, making the eventual reveal feel a little tiresome. I can tell you what I felt and imagined as I explored, how poignant the melancholy was in a protagonist struggling to fight for their world in the face of a fatal illness. Even now I couldn't strictly tell you what the exact plot of that game was. It deprives the game of the blank spaces necessary to get me speculating.

#Solar ash rei full

Solar Ash's story is like navigating its world sometimes full of dead ends As soon as a city enters my view Rei has already identified the architecture and spoken about its creators. Every new vista or item found has Rei deliver an explanation before you can even ask the question. However, right from the moment it begins the characters won't stop talking, stop explaining. There's a message at the start designed to convey the premise-which felt clumsy, but I was willing to roll with it on the assumption this was just a little kick to get us started. My biggest problem with the game stems from the addition of voice acting. Instead Solar Ash's story is like navigating its world sometimes full of dead ends. Anyone who's done any skating in real life, especially on ice, will appreciate how much it captures that particular exhilaration, even if it's far more easily earned.Ĭoming from Hyper Light Drifter I expected a setting equally absorbing. In those moments Solar Ash captures a roller coaster energy, letting you barrel across alien landscapes with confidence. Picking up speed to throw yourself over the crest of a hill or round a corner, lashing out at enemies on the go, lets the game come alive. Chain the skates with rail grinds and eventually you can build some serious momentum. If the world feels 'wet' then so too does movement, with inertia carrying you through slips and slides as you skate. It's a palpable mood, enhanced by sheer scale and verticality, a world of massive planetoids suspended in space, clinging to each other via clouds or thin rails.

The world feels ephemeral, doomed to be washed away. Even the collectibles, plasma, are rendered as blobs of liquid. It's delightfully tactile, Rei landing in candy floss-like hills and pulling sticky mass behind her as she jumps. Inside this black hole is a dreamlike landscape rendered in soft clouds and goopy surfaces, all of it in bold colours. You play as Rei, a voidrunner who plunges herself into a blackhole to activate a macguffin-the Starseed-which we're told can save her planet, currently caught in the singularity's grasp.