Soulstice Reviews

Soulstice does itself no favours by borrowing heavily from Bayonetta, and then falls short of its inspiration in every area. At best this is a functional but uninspired character action game. At worst it's a poor appreciation of the genre's finer points, stacking up systems that detract from the purity of exhilarating combat.

Soulstice looks quite nice, with Briar and Lute standing out as the most visually appealing and interesting characters. The various enemy designs work for what they are, and the stages are of high quality despite the themes blending together and feeling like one long stage.

Soulstice Review

DMC meets Dark Souls in this grungy action adventure.

The pieces of an enjoyable experience are all here, but unfortunately, Soulstice save itself on the Deck just yet.

It’s a chaotic push and pull between ecstatic fun and dull annoyance that honestly drives Soulstice, but it’s nonetheless worth checking out.

I didn’t run into any bugs while playing the game on a Series X and utilizing the Quick Resume functionality on the system. Accessibility wise there are multiple difficulty options as well as various gameplay toggles to help out those who need it. There are multiple options for the in-game subtitles to make them easier to read, and a series of gameplay assists. You can have the game automate combat or field usage (the trigger abilities), toggle whether you have to hold down buttons for UI elements if activating the inventory pauses the game, and more. It was awesome to see, especially for such a new and seemingly small development team.

Soulstice does an exceptional job of keeping the player engaged throughout its entirety. The amount of content just within the combat is jaw-dropping, so much so that it feels like Reply Game Studios aren’t saving anything for a sequel. There’s a lot to discover (and a lot to master) as you slowly trek through its massive world and uncover one of the most enjoyable detective-style stories that I’ve come to experience.

Strong gameplay and an even stronger story come together to make Soulstice a good character action game, even if issues with weapons, level design, and the camera drag it down.

The action hack ‘n’ slash genre has provided some great experiences over the years, thanks to games like Devil May Cry 5. Currently, however, it feels like it’s been overshadowed by an endless stream of soulslikes. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, with games like SteelRising providing a great AA experience. Soulstice calls back the olden days of the action genre, whilst bringing in some interesting mechanics. Unfortunately, it also brings forward some of that baggage that should ha...

Soulstice is a new spectacle-filled action game by Reply Game Studios, filled with challenging encounters and intricate combat system. Drawing clear inspiration from the Devil May Cry and Bayonetta franchises, Soulstice stands up enough on the merits of its worldbuilding and combat to distinguish itself from those titles and is definitely worth playing for action game fans.

Its boss battles leave quite a bit to be desired, and the level design may be a bit too narrow at points, but Soulstice manages to make up for these shortcomings with an emotional story and a unique brand of observation-based gameplay that ensures its status as a confident addition to the genre.

Soulstice is a solid, albeit unnecessarily dragged out, hack-and-slash action role playing game that features a great cast of characters and an engaging narrative. There's a ton of replayability and a high skill ceiling to achieve, but the lack of variety in gameplay elements and wonky camera angles keep it from being truly amazing.

“Soulstice's terrible camera holds back an otherwise ambitious and inspired action game.”

All this is to say that Soulstice is enjoyable for the most part, even though it has its annoyances. Being available on next-gen consoles and PC only, it looks fantastic at times and has a great sense of scale. Its boss fights are exhilarating too, and there are some other hair-raising scenes that try to provide a little variety. Factor in multiple difficulty levels and many secret challenges to be found, and you have an action adventure game that you can really sink your teeth into.

Full of style and substance, Soulstice is a joy to play, with tight, fast-paced combat and slick controls that make this an easy recommendation to anyone interested in a new hack and slash title.

As a hardcore fan of action titles, Soulstice delivered on most of my expectations.

Soulstice's overwritten story and repetitive second half somewhat dull the catharsis of its glorious throwback hack-and-slash combat, but it's still great fun.

Soulstice's fast-paced combat is the star of the show, overshadowed by tropes and lack of variety in an experience heavily inspired by anime like Berserk.