Legacy of Kain™ Soul Reaver 1&2 Remastered Review Summary

Compelling story, excellent voice-acting: The game features a compelling and well-written story, enhanced by outstanding voice acting and character development. The narrative's depth and quality are consistently praised, making it a standout aspect of the remastered experience.

Improved graphics, toggleable originals: The remaster significantly improves graphics with updated textures, models, and lighting, enhancing the visual experience while retaining the original art style. A key feature is the ability to switch between remastered and original graphics, appealing to both nostalgic players and newcomers.

Includes extensive bonus content: The remaster includes a wealth of bonus content, such as lost levels, concept art, and behind-the-scenes footage. This enriches the experience for long-time fans and provides new players with additional insights into the game's development.

Runs well on modern systems: The remaster ensures the game runs smoothly on modern systems, addressing compatibility issues and improving controls. This allows players to enjoy the classic experience without the technical difficulties of the original PC releases.

High-quality, faithful remaster: The remaster is praised for its high quality and faithfulness to the original, evoking nostalgia and satisfying long-time fans. Many reviewers express excitement and gratitude for the opportunity to revisit a beloved classic.

Underwhelming graphical enhancements overall: Both remasters suffer from minimal graphical improvements beyond character models, with many textures being simple upscales or AI-interpreted, leading to a lack of detail and visual inconsistencies. Lighting is often poor, draw distances are short, and many original texture errors remain, making the remasters feel more like enhanced editions than true overhauls. Some reviewers noted that the original textures look better than the new ones.

Dated, clunky controls and gameplay: The core gameplay and controls remain largely unchanged, retaining the clunkiness and dated feel of the original PS1/PS2 games. This includes stiff movement, unresponsive actions, and frustrating platforming, which may not appeal to modern players. The camera system also contributes to these issues, making navigation and combat more difficult.

Soul Reaver 2: Poor combat: Soul Reaver 2 receives significant criticism for its combat system, which is often described as clunky, uninspired, and tedious. Enemies are often damage sponges, and the lack of rewards for defeating them discourages engagement. The game's linearity, repetitive environments, and lack of boss fights further detract from the experience.

Numerous bugs and crashes: Both games are plagued by numerous bugs, including game-breaking issues, crashes, disappearing textures, and corrupted save files. The lack of an autosave feature exacerbates these problems, leading to significant progress loss and frustration. Some bugs are new to the remasters, while others persist from the original releases.

Problematic camera system: The camera system in both games is frequently criticized for being clunky, erratic, and difficult to control, especially during combat and platforming sections. It often auto-rotates at inopportune moments, obscures the player's view, and contributes to motion sickness in some players. The camera issues are largely unchanged from the original games.

SR1: Exploration; SR2: Linear, Combat: The first Soul Reaver game emphasizes metroidvania-style exploration, puzzle-solving, and platforming, with a large, interconnected world and optional upgrades. In contrast, Soul Reaver 2 is more linear and story-driven, with a smaller world and a greater focus on combat. SR2 also streamlines puzzle design and reduces the importance of realm-shifting.

Core gameplay: puzzles and exploration: Both Soul Reaver games feature a blend of action, platforming, and puzzle elements, with puzzles often involving block manipulation and environmental interaction. The games require players to explore, solve puzzles, and navigate using abilities gained by defeating bosses, but do not offer much guidance.

SR2: Clunky, forced combat: Soul Reaver 2's combat is often criticized as clunky, difficult, and forced, leading some players to avoid it altogether. While SR2 attempts to deepen combat with blocking and dodging mechanics, it is generally considered worse than the first game's combat.

Realm-shifting enables puzzle-solving: The ability to shift between the material and spectral realms is a core mechanic, changing the environment and opening new paths. However, some reviewers found the spectral realm underutilized in SR2, or the mechanic as a whole to be a time-wasting element.

New day/night cycle is flawed: The remaster of Soul Reaver 1 introduces an optional day/night cycle that was not present in the original game. However, the implementation is criticized for making some areas, especially those lit by torches, too dark and hindering visibility.

Good Steam Deck performance/battery: The game generally runs well on Steam Deck, with good performance and battery life. Some players have reported that the game crops the sides of the screen at the native resolution, but this can be fixed by adjusting the resolution.

Locked 60 FPS, ultra-wide support: The game is locked at 60 FPS, with no options for higher refresh rates. Some players recommend locking the FPS at 60 to avoid script or bug issues. The game supports ultra-wide resolutions.

Nonexistent load times: Load times are nonexistent, which is a staple of the series.

Works on Linux: The game works on Linux without issues using Proton and natively launches on Linux.

Excellent remaster; play it!: The remaster is highly recommended for both new players and fans of the original games. Reviewers praise the improved visuals, audio, and quality-of-life upgrades, making it the definitive way to experience these classics. Many suggest it's worth the full price, a must-buy, and a great entry point to the series.

Hoping for series revival/continuation: Many reviewers express hope that the success of this remaster will lead to remakes, remasters, or new installments in the Legacy of Kain series. They encourage players to support the game to show developers there is interest in reviving the franchise. Some specifically request remasters of Blood Omen and Defiance.

Soul Reaver 1 is superior: While both games are included in the remaster, Soul Reaver 1 is generally considered superior to Soul Reaver 2. Some reviewers suggest that Soul Reaver 2 has not aged as well or received as much polish in the remaster. Some recommend playing the original versions of Soul Reaver 2 instead.

Technical issues; wait for patches: Several reviewers report technical issues, such as game-breaking bugs, crashes, lighting problems, and save corruption. They advise waiting for patches before purchasing or playing the game. Some reviewers are withholding positive recommendations until these issues are resolved.

Requesting remasters of other games: Many reviewers express a desire for remasters or remakes of other games in the Legacy of Kain series, particularly Blood Omen and Defiance. They believe these games deserve the same treatment as Soul Reaver 1 & 2. Some suggest that Defiance needs a remake more than a remaster.

Extensive bonus content included: The remaster includes a wealth of bonus content, such as concept art, soundtracks, fan art, behind-the-scenes videos, and even playable cut levels. This additional content provides insights into the development process and expands the lore for fans of the series. The bonus content is accessible through the game launcher.

Complex, multi-game narrative: The games tell a complex story about Raziel's quest for revenge against Kain in the world of Nosgoth. The narrative spans multiple games, creating a convoluted plot that may require familiarity with the entire Legacy of Kain series to fully understand. Some reviewers suggest playing SR1, SR2 and Defiance in succession.

Convoluted story: The story across the games is convoluted and difficult to fully understand, despite the impressive dialogue. Parts of the story are missing, with the game being the middle part of a 5-game series.

Classic gameplay; dated mechanics: Reviewers acknowledge that the games are old and retain elements of classic game design, such as restrictive combat, camera controls, and limited save points. Nostalgia plays a significant role in enjoying the game, and players unfamiliar with the series should manage their expectations accordingly. The first game was the first title that did not have loading screens on the PS1.

Original issues not addressed: The remaster didn't address the original games' issues as expected. The remastered versions' credits are missing the original art, despite adding new creators to the credits.