Gone are the unique and varied bosses and patterns of Hyper Light Drifter, in with finicky quick-time event set-piece bosses. Grapple onto a fixed point, and slash and grapple way to the central eye and repeat three times on all six or so bosses. Though visually striking, they looked very similar and played the same too. This copy-paste level design was never more noticeable or frustrating than in bosses. It started to drag out the pacing of an already short 7-hour game. Even the new platforming challenges felt like doing the same thing over and over again without innovation past an initial idea. Locating the eyes, taking them out, and finding secrets felt like checking off items on a list. The movement felt great, but everything around it was just repeating the same thing over and over again. And they were not thought out enough to be considered real places, or at least the remnants of real places. Outside of one or two, they were too similar to be fantastical. I felt no connection, and they just slid away, simply becoming tools for platforming. Most of the areas were vague and unclear even though they were beautiful. “The movement felt great, but everything around it was Reptitive” In-game Screenshot But all the same, it also quickly got repetitive too. Furthermore, Solar Ash has a score with spacy epic synths that only made fights and vistas all the more powerful. It felt like it was a place that could be used and that was inhabited, but this was the exception.
The second area was a memorable downtown center, with skyscrapers, apartments with artifacts, subways, and public transportation. While some areas in Solar Ash felt unique and had a character in themselves, others blended into each other. Fortunately, I rarely fought with the controls or got stuck on objects. It’s simple and immediately understandable, with attacks only mapped to one button, and grapple and time slow abilities adding to your choices in combat and platforming. You also have double jumps and boosts of momentum. Instead of just walking, you skate along the environment and up and down conveniently placed rails. Solar Ash focuses on the perfection of constant movement like in the flow state of sliding up and down the dunes of Journey, taking into account the same minimalist control scheme. “Solar Ash focuses on the perfection of constant movement” In-game Screenshot And unlike that other game, there is a lot more to discover and take in, with a much more refined movement system. The joy of the Solar Ash, very similar to another spacefaring game this year, is in its movement and platforming. But outside of a few, these effects were never very noticeable or exciting. Find all of the caches, and you get a suit with a bonus effect. NPCs are hidden in these levels with story-driven side quests to solve, as well as audio logs and pieces of suits from the other void runners. In each, a boss reveals itself after you destroy all of its eyes scattered across each map.
For the rest of the game, you must awaken and destroy massive legendary beasts, discover what happened to your companions, and start up the Starseed. Your companions are missing and unresponsive. Playing as one of the void runners, Rei, you wake to find yourself crash-landed near the Starseed. After inaction from planetary governments, the mystical void runners try a daring rescue plan by utilizing a tool known as the Starseed, located in a previously consumed world, they try to rid themselves of the Ultravoid threat. This time a massive black hole, known as the Ultravoid, is about to consume the whole planet. It begins with humanity, or rather, a human analog, on the familiar brink of destruction. In-game screenshot “Playing as one of the void runners, Rei, you wake to find yourself crash-landed near the Starseed.”
Still, it does mash the two concepts together to produce an entertaining if shallower result, sprinkled with Heart Machine’s gorgeous neon pink and purple stylistic flourishes.
Solar Ash does not reach the heights of either. Although I hate to compare games to other games outright in reviews, the influence of Shadow of the Colossus and Journey is impossible to ignore in Heart Machine’s sophomore effort.
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