Soulslinger: Envoy of Death

no fun tbh

GAME IS FUN AND WORTH IT ESPECIALLY ON DISCOUNT, BUT WITH THE GLITHES AND CRASHES (BOTH IN NORMAL AND DIRECTX11) IT IS ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE TO GET THROUGH A ROUND PLAYTHROUGH. PLEASE FIX THIS.

[b]TLDR: Do not buy. Too many foundational issues that hamper an otherwise fun gameplay experience to the point of frustration that wastes your time. Maybe consider it at $5 or less, but with caveats. [/b] It's a shame I have to recommend against this game because the devs put a lot of obvious effort into making this action roguelite a narrative driven experience with interesting characters, environments, and story to discover -- especially considering the sheer number of competitors out there. Unfortunately, the game's strong and enjoyable gunplay and powerful active abilities are drawn down into the mud with it's very poor balance (meta progression, currency, powerups, and loot) and atrocious and painful dialogue. You'll be working for death and you'll progress the story by beating bosses during each run. As well as potential sub-runs during a run that unlocks additional narratives. You're not just selecting a map and moving forward. +Really cool active abilities! Spawn ghosts of yourself that fire at enemies each time you fire. Spectral bullets that act like homing missiles each time you fire. Fire wall. Vampire bullet. Time slow dodge. And a lot more. +Gunplay is actually very satisfying +Very forgiving hitboxes +Very interesting premise being an envoy (hunter) for death in limbo helping rescue and ferry souls while meeting interesting characters from all eras of time along the way. Too bad their dialogue is absolutely atrocious. +Great mix of western and fantasy +/-You know the suspicious feeling you get when you look at a game and see it has amazing graphics like major AAA titles but then you don't recognize the studio or publisher, the devs, and the gameplay is sus? This game fits that category, but not wholly as the gameplay can be fun. +/-Voice acting is good despite the atrocious dialogue and storywriting. Sometimes it becomes uncanny as if it's done by an amateur or an AI. -Why are there offramp sub-runs that can randomly spawn? Oh, for extra powerful rewards in exchange for taking on additional, harder challenges mid run? Okay, cool! No. The majority of the upgrades are specific to enemy types within that mini-run only. Why? This is a complete waste of time because the majority of the upgrades won't benefit you when you return to your main run! -Unoptimized. During VFX heavy fights or when certain enemies spawn my GPU would max out on fan RPM and skyrocket to 99% or 100% load. Also there would be micro stutters throughout despite a lengthy shaders optimization when you first launch the game. Stutters seemingly happened upon seeing new assets for the first time (gun, enemies, environment, etc.) -A lot of useless chaff or clutter 'power ups' (if you can even call it that). In proper roguelite fashion you'll unlock or encounter more, which unfortunately would only add onto the already heavy chaff at the start of a new game. -Atrocious dialogue. While there are an interesting mix of characters because the game is set in limbo (you'll encounter death, vampires, other hunters [envoys], and people from all ages of history) their dialogue is very out of character and hollow. It's atrocious. Why does a character that presumably died thousands of years ago talks like a millenial from 2000? Its extremely jarring and takes you out of what immersion you had that the devs clearly cared to put a lot of effort into building. -Poor AI. Many melee enemies will just stand and stare at you as if they somehow got bugged. Pathfinding for ranged and melee enemies is broken especially if you're on a different vertical level. This has me suspecting the devs heavily relied on giving enemies the teleportation or ranged abilities to overcome pathfinding problems. Especially since many maps have a lot of verticality -Some rooms (maps/areas) you'll fight in are too small given how many enemies are thrown at you -You progress towards a final boss through rooms (like hades) and each room will give a reward 'theme' you'll know before going into it. However, there's too many 'themes', too much chaff (as earlier described), and sometimes too few enemies to farm for currency for meta upgrades -Poor balance. All items in the game are not balanced properly with respect to level design, enemy density (both too low and too high), the length of runs, the length of sub-runs, and the boss design. The fun combat gameplay cannot make up for this because trying to progress with unlocks or meta upgrades is like running into a wall. -Why is a basic thing such as stat tracking behind a currency payall? Not MTX, but the same currencies you will need for meta upgrades in a game that already has poor balance. Had I known how rare the mats I used to unlock the stat tracker in the camp I'd have NOT bought it. It only shows your last run stats anyway. Useless! -Graphics settings are very limited. Cannot remove screenshake which is extreme depending on gun use or how fast you fire -The first 'big boss' is nothing but a mega bullet sponge that throws endless waves of 'elite' enemies at you. These elite enemies swarm you, have mini aoes, have teleport abilities, and have ranged abilities. There's a short timer before he summons another wave to attack you. Mind you, this is while the boss walks extremely slowly towards you, staring, and occasionally throws his giant sword at the spot you were 5 minutes ago. Did I mention he goes on a 3 minute monologue complaining about stuff that makes absolutely no sense and challenges your ability to not hit alt f4? -Main character has a really good voice actor, but just like the other character their dialogue is terrible -So many guns will be thrown at you but they're not worth your time. I stopped even checking when I saw it was the same DPS just with a completely unrelated or unmatched element pick. (ie. Why am i getting a poison pistol when I'm in a fire room?)

Игра так себе. Болванчики, по которым нужно стрелять, полностью оправдывают свое имя. Арсенал скудный и интересного оружия кот наплакал, Перков для прокачки мало. Стрельба сносная. На второй день начала вылетать со странной ошибкой. Единственное, что радовало - синематики, они красивые.

FIRST OF ALL I LOVE THE GAME SO FAR BUT THERE 3 PROBLEM I FACE MAKE ME CANT PLAY ANYMORE 1)I DONT KNOW WHY BUT I CANY CHANGE THE RESOLUTION AND THE GAME RUNNING ON 2K I TRY CHANGE THE OPTION IN THE BEGGING BUT NOTHING CHANGE EVERY DISGUSTING OPITION ARE TURN ON LIKE BLUR AND THE OTHER THING AND LIKE I SAID ABOVE THE 2K HURT MY EVEY WHILE I PLAY ON 4K MONITOR..... 2) THE GAME FORCE ME PLAYING JUST AND ONLY SHOUTGUN AND THAT MAKE REPTITIVE AND ANNOYING THERE IS NO OTHER GUN BUT THERE OTHER THING YOU CAN DO BUT STILL NO SO MUSH LIKE THE ABILTY AND SUMMONING AND THE BOOK 3) THIS PROBLEM YOU CAN SAY WILL NOT HAPPEN TO ALL PLAYER AND MAYBE WILL NOT HAPPEN TO YOU AT ALL IN ONE AREA I KILLED EVERYONE BUT I STILL CANT MOVE TO THE NEXT ONE ITS LIKE THEY TELL ME THERE SOMEONE LEFT BUT I STAND IN THE MIDDLE AND THERE NO ONE LEFT IN THE AREA

While the game at it basis is somewhat fun roguelike with satisfying shooting I cannot recommend it. Enemy AI often just turns off and they are just standing there waiting for me to kill them. Metaprogression is really slow and I do not feel any more powerful on the next run due to poor upgrade and few resources to buy more. When you have more flying enemies throwing projectiles it is almost impossible to survive the onslaught. Also why is enviroment wild west while enemies have nothing to do with that? I would at least expect some gunslingers, bandits, indians, just something that fits the setting, not demon knight and assassins.

Impressions after three runs. I will be uninstalling the game now due to the repeating crash. +Player choice +Music / voice over +Writing is pretty nice +Feeling of progression; roguelite-mechanics +Various events and encounters feel really nice (at least the first time; no repeated yet) +Smooth engine (as they are using Unreal engine in small arenas only) -Fatal Crash constantly in large DESOLATE area with Revolver + Double Barreled -> Large AoE Poison + Poison active skill (for the "taunting ghost AoE") -> crashing the taunting dude led to double crash in row -Small arenas mean few seconds of loading between every arena (which happens dozens of times over a run) -Difficult to see what is as a friendly effect and what is not -> what damages you -Gunplay doesn't feel awesome, just "okay" -> some guns don't hit instantly but you don't see your projectile -Gameplay feels already somewhat repetitive -> enter a chosen arena -> fight spawning monsters = Neutral to positive. While I felt I got the moneys worth, the issue is that the game turned unplayable due to a crash that repeated.