Many games from the dawn of polygons, while great at the time, don't hold up now more than twenty years later. Even though gamers who had been around at the time can still enjoy them, they can be a hard sell for newer audiences. When people talk about which games from the original Playstation are still worth playing, I'm surprised that no one ever mentions the second Legacy of Kain game, Soul Reaver. It's still a fantastic adventure, and the Dreamcast version is an even better version of it.
-Slight Spoilers Ahead-
Soul Reaver picks up 1000 years after the bad ending of Blood Omen. After Kain refused to martyr himself to restore Nosgoth's balance, the world fell into decay, and he set himself as the god of the dying land. He created lieutenants to rule under him, one of which is the player character Raziel. When Raziel dared to grow wings before Kain, he was thrown into a whirlpool to die. He is resurrected as a soul-devouring wraith by an Elder God and sent on a mission to kill all of his former brothers and, finally, Kain himself. While the story beats seem almost like a carbon copy of Blood Omen, the details like vampire evolution keep things fresh. On top of that, the voicework is even better than the first game, especially from Simon Templeman returning as Kain and newcomers Michael Bell and Tony Jay as Raziel and the Elder God respectively. While one could tell from the low-polygon counts that this was a PS1 game first, the Dreamcast version improved the textures and locked the framerate at a perfect 60 fps.
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The exploration and combat are streamlined from Blood Omen, and the game is much better for it. As most of Raziel's foes are vampires, they can be dispatched by impaling with spears that are lying around. However, it's more fun using the environment to finish them like tossing them into bonfires or pools of water. The only issue comes from finding safe places to suck souls where the deceased's buddies can't attack. The boss fights are some of the best I've ever faced, mainly because they play like puzzles to solve rather than melees. Figuring out how to take out Melchiah without needing to look up a guide was awesome! Like Metroid or Zelda, each boss beaten provides a new power which opens up new areas of Nosgoth for exploration. There are even clever navigation puzzles that make use of Raziel's ability to shift between the Material and Spectral Realms, warping reality in the process. Though finding everything isn't necessary to finish the game, I had so much fun exploring that I wanted to find everything. Finally, while Blood Omen had way too many load screens everywhere, Soul Reaver has only one right at the start of the game. After that, there are no more pauses for loading at all, a drastic improvement.
There are a few niggles which keep the game from reaching an "A+". Even though you can save anywhere, a loaded save always starts you at the Elder God's chamber at the very start of the game. Teleport chambers are available to return to areas you've been, but there aren't that many of them. Expect a lot of backtracking. Also, cinematics can interrupt critical things like feeding on souls, especially at the beginning of the game. While the puzzles that revolve around pushing blocks are decent, there are a few too many. I found myself wanting a bit more variety in the puzzles beyond the boss fights. Occasional glitches come up. The most common involves spears falling through the floor after impaling an enemy, preventing them from being picked back up. Finally, the game ends on a cliffhanger which is always annoying.
As forgiving of retro games as I am, even I'm absolutely amazed at how well the first Soul Reaver has held up. The story is still fantastic, the gameplay is tight enough to make forgiving the low-polygon graphics easy, and the Dreamcast version is still glossy enough to choose over the already great PS1 version. Even if you couldn't stand Blood Omen's issues, Soul Reaver absolutely deserves resurrection.
