And so, in Legacy of Kain Ascendance the wheels of fate continue to turn. But in Nosgoth, they don’t just turn; they grind all in their path to paste. The machinations of the Elder God and its lackeys know no difference between king or pauper. And while Raziel’s loop may have been closed and destined to be repeated for all eternity, Nosgoth’s fate has yet to be determined.
But instead of continuing Kain’s saga, Crystal Dynamics, Bit Bot Media and FreakZone Games have chosen to inaugurate the 25th anniversary of the Legacy of Kain franchise with a brand new single-player game and a media tie-in title with Legacy of Kain Ascendance. But will this new chapter in Nosgoth’s saga scratch that sanguinary fix for fans?
Legacy of Kain Ascendance is the first single-player game in the franchise in more than 20 years. The multiplayer title, Nosgoth, doesn’t quite make the grade for what most fans of the franchise wanted and therefore doesn’t really count. But instead of following Kain’s journey after Defiance, Legacy of Kain Ascendance decides to take a step backwards in time to show you the events that lead to Kain mutilating Raziel’s wings and tossing him into the abyss.
This, then, is a prequel to Raziel’s story that focuses on Raziel’s sister, Elaleth and her journey of vengeance. After Kain attacks their village and Elaleth is transformed into a vampire, her journey of hatred against her brother begins, seeking to avenge the death of her lover at his hands during the attack. Cursed by Morbius, Elaleth finds herself thrust into the time-stream, popping out at various, important points in Nogoth’s past. Points that see her interacting with Kain and Raziel, ultimately influencing the way their journeys coalesce into one another.
In many ways, Legacy of Kain Ascendance panders to the Soul Reaver fan base by bringing out cameos from all the important players in the saga. Cue meeting Kain, cue fighting Raziel as a Serafam and again as a vampire. Cue running into Raziel’s Soul Reaver form and having a chat with Ariel about the importance of the Guardians’ slaying so ruthlessly by Kain. Almost all of the important bits of Soul Reaver history are covered here in what feels like a retro-fitted action. Spread across the game world are more lore dumps for fans for whom the story is the most important part.
And the story here is what does all of the heavy lifting, buoyed up by the original cast that could return to reprise their roles as Kain, Raziel and Morbius, respectively. New characters are added to the story to round out the history of hatred between our characters. But whether or not the story actually works really will come down to personal preference.
The very nature of Kain’s story implies that everything is fated, that there is, ultimately, no free will and that everyone is on a predestined path. Taken in that way, the added story details of Raziels’ sister and exactly how Kain got the idea to raise the Serafan from their tombs make a kind of sense, though what is implied in the main games doesn’t quite fit with this new addition.
The problem, for me, is that it falls into the pitfall that so many modern franchises do with the need to over-explain and detail every little bit of lore and action, which, ultimately, makes the continued fleshing out of the universe feel less like organic storytelling and more like what it is: a manufactured product.
Gameplay And Level Design
From a gameplay perspective, the developers have chosen to tell this new addition to the universe with a heavily retro-inspired 2D pixel action platformer. Each level sees you travelling across a different area of Nosgoth and timeline, killing plenty of Sarafan foot soldiers, vampires and other beasties as Eleleth. As Elaleth you can fly by spamming the jump button constantly, glide while holding it down, attack and parry enemies. As with the main games, Elaleth’s health continuously drips away, forcing you to feed on just about every enemy you encounter.
Level design is rather linear, with some slight detours for exploration that will take you to unwary prisoners to feed on, Lore hidden in breakable walls to discover and relics that add some extra oomph to either your attacks or health. It’s simple gameplay but it does come with some retro difficulty to spice up the journey. From water that results in instant death to torches that you have to jump over because, as a vampire, fire is bad to some enemies that can suck your life away in seconds, Legacy of Kain Ascendance is surprisingly tough. And yes, frustrating as well.
There are many cheap feeling moments in Legacy of Kain Ascendance, mostly from ranged enemies that can hit you multiple times from a distance before you can even get close to them to some very poorly thought out flying and platforming sections in the latter half of the campaign that had me gritting my teeth.
Difficulty And Playable Characters
There are multiple difficulty settings with the games story mode essentially activating GOD mode for you. Water can still instantly kill you, but enemies, including bosses, become nothing but a nuisance. On Normal, the game feels frustrating enough at times that I wouldn’t want to play it on a harder setting. It’s not unbeatable mind you, but frustrating enough that I dabbled with Story Mode eventually.
You don’t only get to play with Elaleth though. Kain is playable for awhile, with added mechanics such as his Bat-swarm traversal to use, while Raziel is playable briefly in all three of his forms, human Sarafan to undead lich. The gameplay doesn’t change up all that much, though as human Raziel you don’t get to feed on enemies to restore your health.
Visuals, Audio And Presentation
Visually, Legacy of Kain Ascendance looks and runs great with some detailed pixel art that I liked and some interesting, artistic use of locations, such a forest sequence played entirely in silhouette until you come to a light source. It’s certainly one of the games most artistically striking moments. What makes Asendance feel even more like an in-res media project are the addition of PS1 style 3D graphical sequences along with animated cut-scenes and still images used to tell the story.
On the aural front, it’s wonderful again to hear the original actors reprising their roles, even if their lines aren’t as meaty as the original games. And the Legacy of Kain Ascendance’s music is, as they say, an absolute banger. There are some really fantastic contributions to the score here including a new take on Soul Reaver’s iconic theme that sounds absolutely stellar. The soundtrack alone is worth the price of admission.
Final Verdict
But is this a worthy addition to the Soul Reaver cannon? The retro action platformer design is a strange choice for a game world that inherently screams Metroidvania and the tacked on backstory is one I’m not sure we needed as much as we did a continuation.
Don’t get me wrong, as a massive fan of the Soul Reaver franchise I feel like Nosgoth is one of the most underutilised game settings and, as with most fans, I’ve always wanted more games set in this universe. The Soul Reaver games has some of the best writing, music and voice acting in gaming and who wouldn’t want more on that level. And as much as I would love to continue immersing myself in Nosgoths fantastic world, I’m not sure this was the best way in which to have done it.
Legacy of Kain Ascendance Video Review
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