Awakening these titans is the first step, which involves destroying giant eyeballs connected to them scattered across the landscapes. With dire stakes and Hail Mary solutions, Rei’s solo mission is worth seeing through to its surprising conclusion in this impressive high-speed action platformer.Īctivating the Starseed requires slaying six Remnants, humongous beasts that hold dominion over the Ultravoid’s handful of biomes. But her allies have vanished, and the Ultravoid has native defenses in the form of ink-like monsters. Time is of the essence Rei was sent into the Void as part of a team to activate the Starseed, a device designed to collapse the black hole and save her planet. Unfortunately, the Ultravoid is an exceptionally massive black hole with Rei’s home planet ensnared in its vacuum. She’s a voidrunner, meaning she explores black holes with the help of advanced technology. When these escalate in difficulty in the game’s final areas, Solar Ash’s generous checkpoint system and ample supply of health boxes keeps frustration at bay – so even when you’re sent plummeting from the back of a boss it doesn’t take long to regain momentum for another attempt.Rei awakens, dazed and confused within the Ultravoid. You have to time speed boosts, jumps, grapples, and your slice attack in a dance that’s both thrillingly cinematic and highly satisfying to execute. There’s a learning curve to mastering the movement and controls which keeps these battles engaging throughout. ![]() ![]() Once attached, a platforming sequence designed around one of the creature’s three weak spots begins, as you slide, jump, and slice at consecutive points in a timely manner, in what feels like a rhythm assault course around a gigantic monster. When the giant boss creature awakens and starts roaming the area you have to find an opening on to latch onto it (usually by using a targeted grapple mechanic which briefly slows time), much like Shadow Of The Colossus. These are essentially platforming tests to build up to the main event. These pits, usually hidden at the end of separate platforming segments, are destroyed by slicing a series of attack points in quick succession, before planting a stab inside a creepy red eye at its centre. There’s a forgiving floatiness to the movement too, so jumping between grind rails feels fluid and less fussy in comparison to actual skating sims.īefore you take on each monstrous anomaly, you have to track down and eliminate black goo pits dotted around each area, to wake up the main beast. While you can simply run around at a slower pace, you’ll spend most of your time skating by holding the left trigger, which gives you greater momentum across jumps and grants better manoeuvrability in combat. Solar Ash is primarily a platformer, where you skate around areas, bound across chasms, and solve traversal puzzles. The movement mechanics are equally well realised. Her connection to an ally AI called Cyd is a recurring highlight, but there’s a surprising amount of humour in the game’s handful of side quests – adding a darkly comic edge and personality to its world, which could have easily coasted on surface-level prettiness. As a protagonist, Rei is charming, understated and just as bewildered by some of the strange characters you’ll meet as you are. It’s all grounded by some great writing and voicework. The bright, luscious landscapes are offset by a subtle, foreboding soundtrack, which captures a calm-before-the-storm dread that keeps the apocalyptic stakes at the forefront of your mind. ![]() ![]() Each area presents a new visual marvel for screenshot addicts, from desecrated tower blocks nestled within a sea of blue clouds to ominous caves beneath neon-lit gardens. The narrative intrigue works because the presentation is consistently stunning. Like Hyper Light Drifter, there’s a main narrative which provides a resolution of sorts, but it’s up to the player to interpret the environment and piece together details from journal entries to fully decipher what’s going on. Throughout the dreamscape black hole, you’ll discover what happened to previous voidrunners through collectible audio logs. However, Rei isn’t the first to be sent on this mission.
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