Short version of my review : Soulmask has potential, so don’t play it YET.
The game is raw. In both positiv and negativ aspects. I played on warrior mode, tribe mode, single and co-op games, base map and shifting sands map. No multiplayer.
UI : It is to note that you can expend or hide some parts of the UI, but you still keep the « press X to expend ». No option to hide the compass which also shows the temperature and other trivias… The UI takes the four corners and more.
Top-Left is the tuto, but it disappears when you’ve finished the game so it’s more of a guide.
TR is the compass, plus the food you’ve taken with their duration, plus the icons of different effects piling on in a column.
BL is the control command memo. You’ve pressed « e » to ride a mount ? Don’t worry we’ll remind you how to control it. Want to hide the list of command ? Yeah we’ll still keep a « Press F11 to Deploy/Stow operation prompt » which will haunt you the whole game.
BR reminds you that you can use your mask and what’s your weapon special move. That part is nicely done but doesn’t help overall to keep the screen clear.
Now for the bottom part of the UI. « But you’ve just talked about it » nop. Now introducing « experience slide and a popup every 2 second to remind you that you’ve won 3 exp in 3 categories », followed by « items equiped from 0 to 9, your stats (hunger etc.), hp and stamina ». But who is it ? Oh we have a special guest in the form of a quarter of the screen in the top-bar reminding you that you have unlocked a tutoriel. Go check it out in the menu or it’ll never disappear !
UI OVERALL : Sensory overload. The game is good looking so don’t add a ton of infos to prevent me from immersing myself.
Language and other texts : The translations are sometimes a bit strange in english. Overall it’s not as bad as what other reviews tend to say (at least for english).
Sound design : The balance has a lot of issues, specifically for the « robots ». Sometimes a far away ennemy has a sound louder than the rest of the game, and you’re haunted by the detection sound of sentry looping forever. In the shifting sands map, my friend and I have renamed the sandstorm as « sandstorm dot WAV » has it sometimes come and leave abruptly. The sounds themself are good though. Creatures or wild animals are convincing, choping trees or cutting grass is very satisfying, and the « perfect bloc » sound could cure any illness if it was medecine. May the dude who put that ingame be blessed.
Music : The game is very time consuming, and calls for a music which can blend in easily. The current soundtrack works really well. Transitions are smooth and changing is not mandatory when an ennemy is nearby. This leads to nice moments where you find yourself next to a giant snake because neither of you saw the other coming, and the music wasn’t there to underline it.
Visual design : Using UE5, but it does not feel like someone is playing with free models they found. There’s a certain harmony in the overall look of the game. The armors look great, even if everyone wearing them looks dead inside. You leave footprints in the sand and a trail in the mud. You leave ripples in the water and crush tall grass when walking through. It’s a well done job and is helped by the level design (see « Explore the Wilderness » later).
Gameplay :
1 - Fight ennemies :
And I hope you’ll like it, because they come by the dozen from the ennemy factory we’ve put in every camp. It's a variety VS frequency and number problem. They have spears, hammers, bows, etc. Each with different movesets, and with different armors. That part is really nice, but when you need to kill half the population of a small city to access a mine pit it’s annoying really fast.
2 - Fight bosses :
To adress the reviews saying bosses are « too hard », I want to say « skill issue ». The bosses aren’t too hard, but have issues in their design. If you’ve analysed them and prepared, you can pass most bosses using only a bandage or two.
Bandit bosses aren’t fun because they can combo you if you let a single attack passes. So most of the fights are « I dodge 4 times in a row and then I do 1 attack » in a loop. They aren’t fun because when you fight them with a group it’s one player having the aggro and dodging like a madman in darksoul while the others are destroying it from behind and cheering for their dancing clown.
Legend bosses aren’t fun -for most- because they have the same issue, but with AOE attacks and moves that overlaps each others in timing. You dodge their minions while they’ve already move on another spell even though the previous 9 attemps they’ve never used a spell if their minions were still alive. The Sabertooth wants to hit you from your back, so he’s sprinting indefinitly if you follow him with your camera. Anubis hound is a marathon simulator because he keeps running away and dashing from a corner to another.
Nearly every move from every boss cannot be parried properly (with the perfect parry), making the roll far superior as it negates the damage fully. Sometimes you’ll find out that parrying a specific move is the only way to stun the boss and avoid a never-ending combo, but you’ll need trial and error to find that out, so GL.
3 - Explore the wilderness :
Both maps are really big and well made. There are a lots of nice corners to build bases and you’ll rarely be bored of visiting. I really like what they’ve done as two forests will feel different enough. That point stands only if you have a mount or a flying ship unfortunately. Because of its size, going from point A to B is a journey in itself, and you’ll be annoyed quickly when traveling on foot.
4 - Explore dungeons :
They’re repetitiv and designed with loops. Combined with a few variety of ennemies, you’ll quickly understand that you need to rush throught straight to the boss. The devs are conscious of this and even show you a GPS when entering a dungeon.
5 - Build a base :
The auto-snaping has a mental breakdown if you move a bit your cursor. You’ll never see big enough to fit every type of crafting table in your base, so it’s a never ending cycle of grind and rebuild. Lighting passes through walls, the snaping of some parts make a bump when walking or let you see the sky through a closed roof. Most of the time you’ll build a base to « do the job ».
6 - Collect ressources :
Grind aspect aside, the chain of production and the time of craft can be long enough to feel like a second work. If you play only with friends or in solo, use cheats to avoid mining, chopping trees, farming, breeding. Yes that might be the point of the game but you don’t have enough hands to do it and the next point will explain why.
7 - Have a tribe :
A useless thing. The pathfinding has a lot of issues, automating the work takes a PHD or a full-time job at a nursery because you’ll spend your day relocating NPCs staying still or stucked, and you’ll end sighing and saying « fine I’ll do it by hand ». Each human has personnality traits with bonuses and levels, stats and proficiency levels (farming, fighting, etc.). This exists so you can grind your way to find proper tribesmen to do a specific task and lose them when your base is under attack.
You can « take control » of a tribemen and use them like your main character. You can even unlock a tech to save the body data of another character, making your starting character completly useless. You choose its looks, but that’s it. You’re not playing a character, you’re playing the mask, but you can change the mask so I guess you’re playing the program inside the mask. Oh wait that’s the tutorial voice so it’s not you... Good luck having some sympathy for the meatsuit you’re sending to fight.
The game could have been in early access but chose to be in 1.0. The shifting sands DLC seems to be a different game or made by a different team. I played like the game was unpolished but still enjoyed it. I hope it’ll be a gem and not just pyrite. For now I cannot recommend it
