I still recall Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver feeling like a revelation after three years of Tomb Raider sequels. It’s not that I don’t enjoy 1999’s Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, but it was the arrival of Soul Reaver 1 two months earlier that demonstrated you could blend fluid action, platforming, and puzzling with engrossing characters, storytelling, and performances.
My knowledge of the IP before that was limited, having attempted to play 1996’s Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain at some point earlier. I dropped it quickly though, as I was never a fan of confusing, screen-by-screen, 2D Zelda-likes – even if it was elevated by the descriptive writing and voice of Simon Templeman. Soul Reaver 1 was far more my style and, despite many flaws that are still part and parcel of this remaster, I was happy for an excuse to replay it for what must be the fifth or sixth time.
That said, while I’ll always support efforts to preserve influential and iconic games, recommending them to a modern audience that lacks a nostalgic hook is difficult without including a ton of caveats.
Storytelling with theatrical style
It’s worth noting up front that all the Legacy of Kain games have been carried by their memorable cast, convoluted but intriguing plot, and theatrical performances. Soul Reaver 1 introduced a few novel mechanics that would be adopted and improved upon in other games, but it’s still an early 3D action-platformer that saddles slick movement and brutal combat with imprecise controls. Soul Reaver 1 Remastered has a few quality-of-life changes but the core mechanics remain unchanged, making this slice of history most compelling for the narrative elements.
If you’re concerned about skipping the first game chronologically, there are benefits to playing Blood Omen first, but Soul Reaver is structured as a journey of discovery for Raziel, while the time-travelling sequels spend a lot of time recounting or returning to past events. The opening scene takes place centuries after the conclusion of Blood Omen, with Kain refusing to sacrifice himself to restore balance to Nosgoth. Driven by his spite for humanity and its scheming “Guardians”, his vampiric empire, centred on the ruined Pillars of Nosgoth, now reigns supreme with the support of his lieutenants. Smoke perpetually darkens the sky, and humanity has been reduced to cattle, with only a few surviving strongholds and small groups of vampire-hunters still roaming the land.
In a seemingly unexpected turn of events, Raziel – Kain’s firstborn and favoured “son” – evolves a new “gift” before his master and is swiftly punished by having his fledgling wings shattered before being cast in the Lake of the Dead. Fast-forward a millennium of torment in the abyss, and his ruined form awakens in the lair of an elder god who claims Kain’s empire is has brought Nosgoth to the brink, with his immortal vampire offspring disrupting the “Wheel of Fate” – the natural cycle of death and rebirth for souls. Offering Raziel a chance at vengeance, he sends him forth to slay his former kin and consume their souls.
Unsurprisingly, there are no honest powers in Nosgoth without a scheme of their own. An early encounter with Kain leaves his blade – the titular “Soul Reaver” – shattered, its spectral form now bound to Raziel, and Kain content their destinies are finally playing out.
It all adds up to the great opening hour or two, and these dramatic encounters and frequent revelations are Soul Reaver 1’s greatest strength during a 10-ish hour campaign. Many of Raziel’s malformed brothers have only a few notable lines, but the constant banter with Kain, the elder god, and the lingering spirit of Ariel – the former guardian of balance – are always interesting and enlightening. As are Raziel’s frequent monologues on the nature of his brothers or the history of the region they inhabit.
The writing is verbose, cryptic, dense with metaphor, and delivered in an exaggerated theatrical style you’d expect from a stage play – but there are few wasted lines, and nothing is ever overexplained to the point it diminishes the air of mystery. You could call the writing pretentious, and I wouldn’t argue, but Soul Reaver 1 is so consistent in its delivery that it feels integral to the experience and remains a highlight 25 years on.
Metroidvania-esque progression, clunky combat, and glorious block puzzles
In contrast, I’d consider the gameplay loop interesting but dated. I’d go further and argue it was never Soul Reaver 1’s strongest element, even at launch. The PlayStation 1 may have delivered some slick platformers and great action games by the end of the generation, but Soul Reaver 1 never played as well as it needed to. The smoother framerate and thumbstick camera control are major improvements, but as you jump, puzzle, slash, and stab your way through the ruins of Nosgoth, Raziel still feels too imprecise in motion, hitboxes feel too inconsistent during combat, and, despite the oversized gothic environments, the camera still fights you in narrow spaces.
What can’t be disputed is that Soul Reaver 1 was ambitious for the time and that ambition remains obvious. A contiguous open-world, with Metroidvania-style progression, a twisted spectral realm to transition between, and only an initial loading screen: that might seem par for the course these days, but it was an impressive feat of CD-ROM data-streaming at the time.
The game world is not nearly as large as the dialogue implies, but a healthy dose of distance fog, a restored day-night cycle, and a myriad of hidden areas ensure it feels both suitably vast and encourages you to backtrack with new traversal powers that Raziel acquires by absorbing the souls of his twisted kin. It’s an early 3D game world full of blocky geometry, limited texture variety, and lengthy corridors to mask the data-streaming, sure, but it still feels impressively cohesive and dense.
There’s a combat system that’s surprisingly deep, though it feels underutilised and secondary to the exploration and puzzling elements.
Vampires can be beaten into a stunned state, but you need to finish them off by impaling them, burning them, tossing them into spikes or water, or disintegrating them with the Reaver – ideally followed up by consuming their souls for health and preventing empowered wraiths appearing within the spectral realm. If you backtrack for hidden runes, you’ll gain access to a small mana pool for spells that can knock-back and stun foes or inflict elemental damage like water and sunlight to finish them off. When using the auto-face function, Raziel is nimble on his feet and one-on-one fights are simple dodge-and-strike affairs, but it’s the combination of multiple enemies, projectile attacks, environmental hazards, and some dubious hit detection that introduces some challenge.
There’s still no difficulty option in this remaster and only a handful of collectible power-ups, but you can’t truly die anyway. If you fall in the physical world, you shift to the spectral realm. It too has dangers but provides an opportunity to consume lingering souls, transition back to the physical realm, and continue the battle – even during boss fights. Should you fall in the spectral realm, it’s back to the underworld starting point and a nearby warp-gate. When that happens, lesser mobs and wraiths respawn but, as with modern ‘Souls-like games, defeated bosses, unlocked abilities, and any warp gates or shortcuts remain unlocked.
It can be frustrating when the control scheme gets you killed, but death is only ever a temporary setback, and this design maintains the brisk narrative pacing.
Far more engaging are the traversal and mechanism-based puzzles, which include most boss fights that feature a gimmick of some sort rather than straight-up fight.
Shifting to the spectral realm to deform the environment remains a technically impressive mechanic we rarely see today, but it’s also used to render water insubstantial and freeze mechanisms in place. As you unlock more abilities – think phasing through gates in the spectral realm or climbing specific walls and swimming in the physical realm – new paths and secrets become available to you. For a newcomer, especially those who love hunting down secrets, Soul Reaver 1’s compact world can feel confusing to navigate at first, with only vague hints provided by the elder god or Ariel when needed. The new map and compass in this remaster are useful, but don’t expect modern niceties like an in-game objective marker to follow.
There are some fantastic puzzles that see you dismantling an ancient lift mechanism, restoring an overrun cathedral as you ascend it, or activating an ancient lighthouse to uncover the sunlight rune, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t highlight the numerous block puzzles. There must be over a dozen of them, many on the critical path and a few more for secret hunters, and they’re complex in a way Tomb Raider could only dream of at the time. Rather than heavy blocks to sluggishly push or pull out the way on a 2D plane, Raziel’s enhanced strength allows him to drag, shove, flip, and even stack massive blocks, creating the opportunity for far more complex puzzles like creating pipe connections and completing murals.
If, like me, you get a kick out of spatial puzzles and the idea of manipulating and orientating 6-sided cubes, Soul Reaver 1 has you covered. If you hate block puzzles, maybe stay clear or go in with a guide at hand.
A subtle remastering effort with a fantastic archive of materials
As I’ve discussed already, the gameplay enhancements are limited but useful for newcomers, while the technical improvements take a similar approach as Tomb Raider I–III Remastered. Soul Reaver 1 Remastered offers enhanced textures, character models, basic shadows, some dynamic lighting, and a massively boosted base resolution and performance target. That said, the remastering effort can feel subtle in places as swapping back to the original visuals reveals the PC version was likely used. As such, you don’t get that striking contrast with pixelated, warping textures and a choppy framerate.
If you’re a fan of the recent surge of indies emulating PS1 or Saturn-era visuals, you’ll be thrilled by the blocky but atmospheric environments, the quality of the voice work and performances, and a fantastic soundtrack (including the iconic licensed main theme, Ozar Midrashim) that now properly emulates the PS1’s dynamic MIDI-driver music that syncs with on-screen action. It also runs well with almost no loading times on even the Nintendo Switch version, though I noticed rare dips when moving between distinct regions and occasional camera clipping due to the widescreen aspect ratio.
Perhaps just as important is the abundant archival content this remastered package offers. Soul Reaver 1 was delayed several times and then pushed out the gate, leaving it full of unused content that has now been compiled and made accessible as concept art, lore entries, audio sessions, and even playable “Lost Levels”. They’re short, glitchy, barely connected fragments with unfinished cutscenes, static assets, and placeholder dialogue, but they’re also a fascinating look into early 3D video game development.
Is it still worth playing?
Now, I adore the Legacy of Kain games for their increasingly convoluted plot, theatrical performances, and block puzzles, so it’s easy for me to recommend Soul Reaver 1 Remastered to those interested in the influential IP or classic 3D action-adventures that formed the foundation of modern titles – the Darksiders IP being a great example in this case.
For returning fans of the original, it’s even easier to recommend as it compares favourably to an emulated PS1 version or a modded PC version. For newcomers however, just like Tomb Raider I–III Remastered before it, you might want to think long and hard about whether you can tolerate the dated gameplay and lack of handholding before picking this up.
Soul Reaver 1+2 Remastered was reviewed on Nintendo Switch using a code provided to gameblur by the publisher. It is also available on PC, Xbox One/Series S|X, and PS4/5.
