Crossing Souls

Like many indie titles, Crossing Souls starts very promising but can't uphold the quality later. First of all, the controls are horrible and can't be changed in any way. IMHO at least one section (dragon escape) simply can't be played with mouse/keyboard control (due to pressing "E" for climbing) but I also found the joypad setup terrible (movement on analog stick, selecting inventory items on digital pad). To make it worse, I faced all kind of game-stopping bugs like the screen getting black after changing characters or character stopping to move. Plus some of the keys don't react most of the time. E.g. changing the character only works if you're standing still etc. The screwed up controls aren't much of an issue initially, but during some precision jumping with time pressure and boss battles later, they are a show-stopper. Secondly, the game doesn't really know what it wants to be, touches a dozen genres and doesn't do anything really right. The best part is exploring the environment by using the unique powers of the different characters. But even this is only half executed and self-crippled later in the game. Then there's all kind of mini games and time pressure sequences which all have in common that they are super annoying - where the escape from the dragon is clearly one of the most terrible design sins I ever endured in my game playing history. Then there're the boss battles which are all poorly designed where some of them towards the end are really the zenith of crappy design combined with lousy controls. The story starts interesting with a cheeky tone but develops in a disappointing way with a pseudo-profound ending. And sorry, I found the short animation sequences to be rather ugly. There are three save game slots which neither have a date nor a description and you can only save at checkpoints. Still, sometimes not all progress is saved. The first 2h or so of the 10h total were fun which was ruined later by crappy controls and bad design.

This game is a trap. A great demo which entices you to buy what you think will be a great game, but one that quickly sours when you reach the second half. I managed to keep trying for about 9 hours before I threw in the towel. And for this reason I can not recommend the game. Just play the demo and enjoy what could have been but ultimately was not.

Crossing Souls is a game borrows every iconic elements from the 80's and achieves to fuse them in a coherent, beautiful and working mix. The nostalgia factor here is pretty high, and for me the game experience it was like coming back to be a teenager, thanks to a narrative filled with pure and authentic feelings. The game it-self has some quality drop moments, some aspects that could have been better mostly in the final chapter, but I strongly recommend this game. It's a gem! (for the developers: some time the pixel art/animation quality difference between some enemies and the others character it's to obvious) Strongly waiting for the Fourattic next game!

Did you grow up with everything the 80's had to offer? Do you love those movies, this music, these looks? You will get it all in this game and much more. I think this is one of the best games available that tries to bring you some good old nostalgic feeling of the 80's back. At least for me it succeeded. But this game has much more to offer than this. There are many things to collect, a nice story with many dialogues (you can also talk to NPCs and listen to what they say, sometimes you might even get another nice reference of which the game offers plenty), nice fights and mini games. It also has some platform and puzzle elements in it and especially those platforming sections aren't always easy. So yes, it is challenging as well. A game being challenging is not necessarily a bad thing so why only 4 stars when the game is so much fun? Simple: while the checkpoints and savepoints (although you only have three slots which is a bit of a downside) are more than enough until very late in the game they are nearly absent as soon as you reach chapter 7 near the end of the game. So if you fail you will have to do all those sections you already managed again and again. Unfortunately the devs also decided to put savepoints BEFORE cutscenes whenever a big battle is following. So if you fail you will also have to skip through these scenes. Before the final battle (which is pretty hard until you will finally figure out HOW to do this) there is a smaller one and guess where they put the savepoint ... right before the cutscene that is before this smaller battle. So failing the final battle means: skipping the cutscene (dialogue after dialogue), fighting the smaller battle and then probably dying a few seconds later because you are still about to figure out how to beat this. This is just annoying and frustrating. I really hope that the devs will add some savepoints in a future update so I could give the 5 stars this game deserves. Get it anyway - it's just too good to miss.