 STEAM DRUNK! You can make a solid argument that ActRazor is a top 20 game on the Super Nintendo. For those unfamiliar, ActRazor was a very early SNES title made by Quintet, and it was otherwise known as the goofy game that combined action platforming with town simulation stuff. The game got a sequel a few years later, ActRazor 2, and while it's definitely got some of the best graphics and art direction on the Super Nintendo, the game was a disappointment because Quintet decided to do away with the town simulation mode entirely. It's just a regular old action platformer and a dreadfully difficult one at that, and it's just not all that fun to play. Fast forward to 2019, and we get a trailer for a game called SoulSeraf, and the reaction was unanimous. Hey, look it's Modern ActRazor! It's a side-scroller with town sim stuff, only with more fleshed out real-time simulation mechanics. Yeah, I know I'm a bit late getting to this one, but my backlog is ridiculous right now, and I'm sorry I didn't get to it sooner, only so I could have been more timely when I tell people that this game is a total stay-away. Sure, it's nice to see that games like ActRazor haven't been forgotten, but SoulSeraf completely misses the point of what made ActRazor great. See, ActRazor was unique not just because of the gimmick of having two genres mesh together. It was the rhythm between the two gameplay modes that worked so well. The pacing was spot-on. SoulSeraf does not have anything close to a similar rhythm. The time you're in RTS mode goes on seemingly forever, and some of the quote-unquote stages in the side-scrolling mode are like 15 seconds long. And that's before I even get to what a mess these stages are. The first standard introductory level is whatever. It's pretty standard stuff, and it's clearly wearing its ActRazor influence on its sleeve with the same proportions and a similar layout, only with modern addendums like a double jump and a charged-up attack, as well as a ranged attack with your bow and arrow. But jeez, Louise, everything just comes across as thrown together, like all this side-scrolling stuff is just there for the sake of being there. I don't know, maybe I'm too far in my own head, but it really comes across like blatant pandering, like hey folks, remember ActRazor? If it were remade today, I think it'd look a little something like this. And that's the end of it, there's no actual substance here. The worst of it are these abrupt stages where enemies just materialized from nowhere. I mean, come on, really? There's plenty of stuff here that's frustrating for the wrong reasons, like these goblins that shoot you with arrows, the mere split second you appear on screen, just ridiculous. The enemy patterns in general here are just generic, and like I said, thrown together. The town simulation mode, or the real-time strategy mode, boils down to a simpler tower defense game. You set up your town structure, making sure you have enough food and wood to supply your army, and it's the same as about a gazillion other tower defense games, you just sit and wait out all the waves. Throw in some deity powers that are mostly cosmetic, and you go build a temple by the enemy spawn points, which activates the side-scrolling levels, and you've got something that can kinda sort of call back to ActRazor. But as you can see, the overall presentation here is really no different than a mobile game. The fact that they're charging $15 for a half-baked platformer combined with a simple tower defense game, you'd find for like a dollar on your phone, is pretty inexcusable. It all comes across as just being thrown together in a very short time, and as a result, I can't help but feel like this game is just pandering. I will say, I think the RTS stuff is fine for what it is, but again, it's like, why am I paying $15 for this? I think the most positive thing to glean from Sol Seraph is the lesson that games like ActRazor don't grow on trees, and there's a reason that they're more than the sum of their parts. It's because they get stuff like pacing and flow down correctly. Sol Seraph doesn't even come close to getting the individual elements correct, let alone big picture stuff like pacing. If you're hoping to find something close to a quote-unquote spiritual sequel to ActRazor that's actually worth playing, I think the best you'll find is one of the Dark Cloud games, because unfortunately, Sol Seraph is a stay away. Alright, I want to thank you for watching, and I hope you have a great rest of your day.