Platforms: Xbox One (reviewed), PS4
Previously Released: PC
Developer: Wales Interactive
MSRP: $19.99
Introduction:
Soul Axiom is a game that legitimately attempts to try something new, at least from a narrative perspective. The game takes place in the world of Elysia, a digital afterlife where the souls of the dead are uploaded to exist for all eternity. As you traverse through the game, you pick up several distinct hand powers including Phase, Play, and Destruct and you use each of them to interact with a select number of context sensitive items in the environment.
Soul Axiom’s aesthetic is inspired by the likes of Tron and the Matrix, with bright neon colors and tall skyscrapers layering the game’s main hub. It’s clear that Wales Interactive intended for Soul Axiom to be their biggest game yet since it features a plethora of legitimately unique environments ranging from a Military Base to a Museum and even an Ice Palace to go along with over 30 hours of gameplay.
The problem is that while this all sounds great, the execution ranges from mixed bag to downright confusing at times. There are brief moments that hint at really cool interactions, but it feels like Wales Interactive didn’t have the budget to follow through on them.
Soul Axiom’s design can lead to a lot of wandering and leaves a lot to be desired.
Some of Soul Axiom’s environments are legitimately huge, the problem is that bigger does not always equal better. Two examples of this come from the game’s main Hub area and Military Base level. Both areas offer plenty of spaces to explore (both open and contained), but neither of which is particularly rewarding as you are often met with a whole lot of nothing. The hub is a sprawling space with a city skyline that evokes classic 80’s Sci-Fi narratives like Tron, but in between the important points of interaction is a lot (A LOT) of empty space, so the size doesn’t end up meaning anything.
The Military Base is one of the game’s early levels that you can teleport to via the game’s main hub, and it is perhaps the most emblematic example of Soul Axiom’s shortcomings. In it, there is a context puzzle that tasks the player with building a tank, which they need to blow open a door to a new area. Sounds cool, right?
The puzzle simply consists of the player locating the three separate (context sensitive) parts of the tank within the contained environment, and using their Play/Pause power which automatically lifts them into place. Once that happens, you simply use the same power to activate another context sensitive event which plays an animation of the tank moving forward and shooting down the door. Once that animation is done, the tank can no longer be interacted with.
You will see plenty of limitations in your powers during your journey as some wooden boards or locks will be able to be blown away with your destruct power that open new pathways, while others (that look exactly the same) are completely invulnerable and force you to backtrack.
It’s easy to forget what is even happening in the story.
I’ve had to look up details about Soul Axiom’s narrative online a lot over the course of my play time, because the story, while it oozes with intrigue, never seems to want to tell me what is going on or why I’m going to these different places. Frankly, I feel like I had to have a lot of prior knowledge going into the game, just to have a shot at understanding what was happening at the beginning.
The levels you traverse are so varied, that they pretty much have nothing to do with each other. I feel like I was exploring the jungle just because I could or navigating the halls of a university simply because that was what was presented to me. Soul Axiom has plenty of content, but it just kind of hands it to you and says “go.”
I felt like I solved a lot of the puzzles simply by guessing.
Soul Axiom offers a ton of unique levels, but many of them lack a cohesive flow. On many occasions if I simply wandered around enough, eventually I would get that “aha” moment, but not because I figured out what the puzzle was trying to tell me, but because I had missed some hidden crevice with the pathway forward or some small thing in the environment that I hadn’t highlighted with the right power.
In many cases, the solutions to the problems felt like they were stumbled upon rather than discovered, so their payoff was lacking.
Verdict:
It’s really tough to recommend Soul Axiom even at its budget retail price. The game comes packed with legitimate potential, but can’t quite take its ideas far enough past its simplistic interactions. There are some highlights, such as breadth of different environments to explore, but even some of them are bogged down by needless and wasted space. I want to know more about this world, I just wish that Soul Axiom took the time to tell me all about it.
