Really nice stylized visuals and a story with well-developed characters are positive aspects of this potentially really great modern entry into the Beat 'Em Up genre that sadly does not reach its potential because of several types of balancing issues. Still enjoyable to play, particularly co-op, but not as good as it could be.
My wife and I finally quit the game at about 60% completion, not because it was bad but simply because the minor frustrations kept us from being drawn back in.
Gameplay ★★★
First: if you're going to play this game, go to accessibility and turn on the ability for your block to interrupt your attacks. I don't know why this isn't just the default but it makes a huge difference. In a game with blocks and parries, you need to be able to act reflexively at a moment's notice.
Combat is your standard beat em up style but with some minor RPG elements including level-ups, equipment, and stat upgrades. These features set the game apart but also make it fall short in some ways.
I enjoyed the variety brought about by the different types of weapons that play differently, from quick knives to slow war hammers. (Bonus point here for showing the DPS of each weapon on the equipment screen instead of showing me a separate number for damage and attack speed. I don't want to have to do math in my head to decide if a weapon's attack boost is worth its slower speed.) This was a refreshing change from other BeU games that typically just have you using your fists the whole time or using temporary weapons that break or are dropped from screen to screen. Unfortunately, the item drops/stats are not balanced very well. By the time we quit playing we had each been using the same weapon for at least half of our play time because we were never picking up better ones and the shops didn't have any good ones to buy.
A surprising issue that I found was the ever-so-subtle difference in the camera angle from that of most other BeUs I've played. It had a side-view camera slightly above the ground, looking down, but where most other games in this genre have a more extreme angle, probably about 40 degrees from the ground, Young Souls' camera was at more of a 30-degree angle. This doesn't sound like much but it meant that when there were more enemies on screen, the ones in the back get blocked out by the ones closer to the front and it was difficult to see what they are doing and therefore very tough to block, parry, and dodge their attacks effectively.
The major issue that we had was again with balance, but this time with the difficulty. I'll be there first tot admit that I'm not the greatest at BeUs but I've played my fair share and completed each one of them. We started on the Hard mode which made regular enemies manageable but kind of monotonous because of how much HP they had. When we got to the third boss, we absolutely COULD NOT beat him. He had too much health and there were zero health drops from enemies or environmental stuff. So we turned the difficulty down to normal. This made the regular enemies much less threatening but more manageable to our time, and we were able to beat the boss, so we kept it there. We also appreciated the occasional health drop even if they were exceedingly rare. A couple bosses later and we absolutely COULD NOT beat him. So we turned it down again to easy. At this point the main enemies were basically a joke, and HP was dropping from them constantly, but the boss was still hard to beat! The balance issue is clear here. In order for the bosses to pose a reasonable challenge, the enemies have to be trivial. And why am I getting like 2 HP drops per level on Normal but getting 5 HP drops per screen on Easy. Surely there is an in-between here? But the main thing I blame is the lack of weapon and armor drops. I should not be fighting the 7th boss with a weapon I got from beating the 2nd. Even though it was a Unique weapon I should still have found something better by then. Same goes for armor. We just were not ever finding armor, even in the shops that was better than what we already had.
Story ★★★
The story was interesting but of course somewhat flat, featuring a secret underground race of goblins who are preparing to invade the surface for an unknown reason (I didn't finish, remember?)
Characters ★★★
The two main characters are twin brothers and sisters. They are pretty young, probably between 14-17 years old and they were adopted by the guy that gets kidnapped. They've got some attitude, which is fun, but their dialogue can be really cringy because they feel the need to throw in curse words periodically for no reason except I guess just to sound cooler or edgier. Overall I like them, they've just been watching too much TV so they think that cuss words = cool dudes.
The enemies are surprisingly fleshed out and every cutscene featuring them I found myself interested in their plight and pleasantly surprised at the amount of detail we learned about their relationships with and feelings toward one-another. The writing in this regard is definitely really good!
Art ★★★★
One of the highlights of the game for me was the art style and direction. area transitions are done in this quick-cut cinematic fashion the is best explained with an example. When leaving their bedroom, you see a close up of one of the kids putting on a shoe, then it cuts to both sets of feet going down the steps, then a wide shot of them zipping off toward town on their scooter. It's very stylish and lots of fun. The character designs are also all unique and well done.
I'm not sure it's technically under "art" but I'll put it here because I don't know where else to put it. This game has SO MANY SCREEN FLASHES. It is exhausting to anyone and very frustrating for a person who can get a headache from bright lights and flashes. It happens during exploration and during combat, but is really bad when you finish a level. Pick up an item FLASH.
Beat a boss FLASH, get the boss reward ANOTHER FLASH, get the experience reward for clearing the level A THIRD FLASH.
Unlock a checkpoint FLASH.
Excessive. I'm not sure why disabling screen flash was not in the accessibility menu. That one has been a pretty common accessibility feature for over a decade so I was surprised that they had an accessibility menu but not that option. (speaking of: points for having an accessibility menu!)
In closing, I enjoyed Young Souls and really wanted to keep playing it, but it kept feeling like an obligation to go back to. And once that happens the game is on life support for me and it has to turn it around soon or it'll be lost. Unfortunately, Young Souls only continued down the path that made me feel that way and I lost interest in the end.
Played on Gamepass
My wife and I finally quit the game at about 60% completion, not because it was bad but simply because the minor frustrations kept us from being drawn back in.
Gameplay ★★★
First: if you're going to play this game, go to accessibility and turn on the ability for your block to interrupt your attacks. I don't know why this isn't just the default but it makes a huge difference. In a game with blocks and parries, you need to be able to act reflexively at a moment's notice.
Combat is your standard beat em up style but with some minor RPG elements including level-ups, equipment, and stat upgrades. These features set the game apart but also make it fall short in some ways.
I enjoyed the variety brought about by the different types of weapons that play differently, from quick knives to slow war hammers. (Bonus point here for showing the DPS of each weapon on the equipment screen instead of showing me a separate number for damage and attack speed. I don't want to have to do math in my head to decide if a weapon's attack boost is worth its slower speed.) This was a refreshing change from other BeU games that typically just have you using your fists the whole time or using temporary weapons that break or are dropped from screen to screen. Unfortunately, the item drops/stats are not balanced very well. By the time we quit playing we had each been using the same weapon for at least half of our play time because we were never picking up better ones and the shops didn't have any good ones to buy.
A surprising issue that I found was the ever-so-subtle difference in the camera angle from that of most other BeUs I've played. It had a side-view camera slightly above the ground, looking down, but where most other games in this genre have a more extreme angle, probably about 40 degrees from the ground, Young Souls' camera was at more of a 30-degree angle. This doesn't sound like much but it meant that when there were more enemies on screen, the ones in the back get blocked out by the ones closer to the front and it was difficult to see what they are doing and therefore very tough to block, parry, and dodge their attacks effectively.
The major issue that we had was again with balance, but this time with the difficulty. I'll be there first tot admit that I'm not the greatest at BeUs but I've played my fair share and completed each one of them. We started on the Hard mode which made regular enemies manageable but kind of monotonous because of how much HP they had. When we got to the third boss, we absolutely COULD NOT beat him. He had too much health and there were zero health drops from enemies or environmental stuff. So we turned the difficulty down to normal. This made the regular enemies much less threatening but more manageable to our time, and we were able to beat the boss, so we kept it there. We also appreciated the occasional health drop even if they were exceedingly rare. A couple bosses later and we absolutely COULD NOT beat him. So we turned it down again to easy. At this point the main enemies were basically a joke, and HP was dropping from them constantly, but the boss was still hard to beat! The balance issue is clear here. In order for the bosses to pose a reasonable challenge, the enemies have to be trivial. And why am I getting like 2 HP drops per level on Normal but getting 5 HP drops per screen on Easy. Surely there is an in-between here? But the main thing I blame is the lack of weapon and armor drops. I should not be fighting the 7th boss with a weapon I got from beating the 2nd. Even though it was a Unique weapon I should still have found something better by then. Same goes for armor. We just were not ever finding armor, even in the shops that was better than what we already had.
Story ★★★
The story was interesting but of course somewhat flat, featuring a secret underground race of goblins who are preparing to invade the surface for an unknown reason (I didn't finish, remember?)
Characters ★★★
The two main characters are twin brothers and sisters. They are pretty young, probably between 14-17 years old and they were adopted by the guy that gets kidnapped. They've got some attitude, which is fun, but their dialogue can be really cringy because they feel the need to throw in curse words periodically for no reason except I guess just to sound cooler or edgier. Overall I like them, they've just been watching too much TV so they think that cuss words = cool dudes.
The enemies are surprisingly fleshed out and every cutscene featuring them I found myself interested in their plight and pleasantly surprised at the amount of detail we learned about their relationships with and feelings toward one-another. The writing in this regard is definitely really good!
Art ★★★★
One of the highlights of the game for me was the art style and direction. area transitions are done in this quick-cut cinematic fashion the is best explained with an example. When leaving their bedroom, you see a close up of one of the kids putting on a shoe, then it cuts to both sets of feet going down the steps, then a wide shot of them zipping off toward town on their scooter. It's very stylish and lots of fun. The character designs are also all unique and well done.
I'm not sure it's technically under "art" but I'll put it here because I don't know where else to put it. This game has SO MANY SCREEN FLASHES. It is exhausting to anyone and very frustrating for a person who can get a headache from bright lights and flashes. It happens during exploration and during combat, but is really bad when you finish a level. Pick up an item FLASH.
Beat a boss FLASH, get the boss reward ANOTHER FLASH, get the experience reward for clearing the level A THIRD FLASH.
Unlock a checkpoint FLASH.
Excessive. I'm not sure why disabling screen flash was not in the accessibility menu. That one has been a pretty common accessibility feature for over a decade so I was surprised that they had an accessibility menu but not that option. (speaking of: points for having an accessibility menu!)
In closing, I enjoyed Young Souls and really wanted to keep playing it, but it kept feeling like an obligation to go back to. And once that happens the game is on life support for me and it has to turn it around soon or it'll be lost. Unfortunately, Young Souls only continued down the path that made me feel that way and I lost interest in the end.
Played on Gamepass
Reviewed on Feb 23, 2023